Read this if you dare.

[Spidermama]

This is a brilliant book. Well researched facts and brilliantly written. I haven't totally managed to stop my two year old from watching telly but it's down to an absolutel maximum of two hours a week in emergencies.

Since reding the book my other three old kids hardly watch any TV and they don't even ask either.

This book has done to our TV habits what Alan Carr did to my smoking habit.

People get very defensive about this subject but I urge everyone to read this extraordinary book. I'm really glad to have had my eyes opened.

crime rates and then the birth rates boom 9 months later too aitch !!

Humphrey the element of hypocrisy is not lost on me. True he does make some of his living on TV and crappy programmes at that. But the man is a writer and broadcaster. He makes his living from putting forward his views and he uses the available media to do so. I don't think this should utterly discredit his work on this matter.

It's similar to saying that vegetarians who wear leather shoes should be utterly discreditted and scorned or people who use washable nappies must also knit all their own jumpers and shun modern appliances like washing machines in favour of old fashioned wash boards down at the riverside. Well, almost.

We all of us do what we can. No-one is totally beyond reproach, but the research he puts forward is very compelling and I'm grateful to him because he may well, in some small way, have helped me parent my children better by alerting me to the issues surrounding TV.

he was shit on R&J, though...
just a whiney self-absorbed yank.

there are certainly issues surrounding tv, that much is beyond dispute.....and we as parents need to ensure that the TV, like anything we give our children access to, is used responsibly and in a balanced way...

i would definitely be interested to see the correlation between half of rapes and watching tv....

I suppose Spidermama, if this book helps parents to use tv more thoughfully then it could be useful.

Some parents do plonk the kids on the sofa in front of the tv from an early age without thinking about it.

(just going to switch the tv off )

I sometimes go for walks around the neighbourhood just to get out and usually every single house I pass has a TV on. It's a total obsession. Most of us will spend years of our lives sitting in front of the telly and it's just such a waste of time.

Of course, I've largely replaced my TV viewing with things like MN, and I'm not sure it's all that much better. At least it's not utterly passive and I do take much of what I learn on MN into RL.

My friend told me the other day that she's fed up that her almost two year old still hasn't learned to watch TV so now she straps him into his pushchair and sticks him in front of the telly to try to force him to learn.

now that is bad, IMO.

re "It's similar to saying that vegetarians who wear leather shoes should be utterly discreditted and scorned or people who use washable nappies must also knit all their own jumpers and shun modern appliances like washing machines in favour of old fashioned wash boards down at the riverside."
I wouldn't buy their books either then!

Realistically, most of us don't have any help like an aunty or a grandma on tap to sit and read with the children while we cook or do the laundry. This is why the thought of giving up or even limiting TV is so hard to contemplate.

My dh's mum used to strictly limit his TV intake. He'd have to ask before it was switched on and it would have to be for a specific programme then it would be turned off after the programme. I think that's a great approach rather than just switching it on to see what's on.

My dh and his brothers are very bright, book loving and they get loads done and are always going on trips and getting out of the house. They put me and my family to shame but I'm learning.

He says the only slight downside was feeling left out of things when people talked about, for example, Happy Days and the Fonz. He missed out on that and the rest of us were so obessed by it. Whilst I don't think watching Happy Days did me any lasting good, I can understand why it's nice in society to have a shared cultural experience like this, but how sad we have to do it through telly, and an American import at that.

I enjoyed this book too and am happy to lend my copy to anyone who CATs me. As long as they don't sound shrieky.

I think, as with most things, it is a question of balance.
I found it really easy to strictly limit the amount of time we all spent watching television when my children were in school
Now they are home educated I find that there are programmes that I class as part of their learning, eg: programmes on BBC History or Discovery Kids.
There are also times when I have to work, so sometimes the children sit and watch television for an hour or so. But equally, sometimes they will spend the time outside building a den or climbing trees.
But we also spend time going out to museums, the theatre, for walks etc.
So some days they watch no television at all, on other days they watch a good few hours.
I don't think the sort of family you are is determined by whether or not you watch a lot of television - I think if you spend time talking to each other and discussing things, then that's a solid foundation - whether you're all sat in front of Coronation St, or making your own windfarm in a field somewhere.

Well I'm interested enough in the subject to have ordered the book from the library - so I am prepared to have an open mind and give it a go. The kids are pretty good with the TV - they ask before they put it on and they are only allowed to watch certain things (the number of which, since Discovery Kids has stopped, has decreased dramatically ) - plus we watch things together as a family - but it is not really on as "background" and we only have the one TV in the house. I guess that we are probably some of the converted to which the book is preaching!!

I'm really not sure about the no. of rapes/murders linked to tv watching though - think that might be a bit OTT - surely computer games also have an insidious influence?

Wonder what Harold Shipman used to watch as a child?

muffin the murderous mule