I was
raised by television. I think it's almost more significant to say that I don't have cable, which makes the fact that I do have a TV set almost
defunct, since I can't watch anything on it without cable. I use it strictly to watch rented movies. I haven't ever bought cable, not since I went away to college.
People use TV as such a frame of historical and current events reference that when you aren't caught up on the fast pace of its image bombardment, you are somehow missing out on what they consider to be required knowledge. I think we can all agree that the quality of television programming has been on the decline lately.
When I am in the presence of cable TV, I am transfixed, hypnotized. For a while, if I have time for it, I will allow momentary media pacification. It is a comfort to me that I do not have it readily available in my home and allows me to enjoy with minor guilt the few times I do slack off in front of the boob tube.
I take a small pride in the fact that my lack of exposure to TV allows a buffer of ignorance in most cases. If it's news and I don't hear about it on NPR or read about it in Details magazine, I'm likely not going to be enriched that much by knowing about it. So there. Neener neener.