Response essay on academic or literary analysis

¶ … presence of a television set in the home have a negative impact on children and the family unit as a whole? According to some researchers, this is exactly the case. Marie Winn's article "Television: the Plug-In Drug" was published originally in 1977 and updated in 2002. At that time, televisions had been in homes for about three decades and the color television was taking hold. More and more programming was being designed for children and for every educational program like Sesame Street on the air, there were many cartoons without much educational value at all, if any. This was back when there were only a handful of television channels and people were just beginning to work on cable network systems. Even at that early stage, Winn saw a negative impact on children who spent copious amounts of time watching television. I think Winn makes an important point, that too much television can have a negative effect on children but that it is more the parent's who are to blame for television's impact on their kids.

Winn explains that although the first articles about television would have pictures of families all sitting around together and watching as a family unit, but that was not necessarily the reality.[footnoteRef:1] I think this is a very interesting perspective and also very true. Back in the early days of televisions, the 1950s and 1960s, a lot of television programming was aimed at families but that ceased to be the case not too long after its invention. Whereas in the 1950s, the whole family might watch Gunsmoke or Bonanza, there is little on television now that might really interest the whole family. Children's programming tends to be dumbed down and uninteresting to adults, and dramatic programs and sitcoms are often dealing with themes which are too adult for young children to see. Now, there are programs which are directed towards certain family members, Winn uses sports as an example for the father, dramas for the mother, and cartoon programs for the children. They generally watch television at different times and even in different rooms. More and more time was given to time apart which changed the parent's perception of quality time. [1: Marie Winn. "Television: The Plug-In Drug." 2013. 465]

Instead of spending time with their children, adults found it easier to stick their children in front of the television and allow programming to act as a babysitter. A babysitter is someone who is charged with watching a child while the adult is busy doing other things, whether those things be housework or even pursuing hobbies and other interests. When you become a parent, it can be very difficult to find time for yourself. Housework always needs to be done and this can be difficult with little ones under foot. It is even harder to find the time to pursue interests or even read a book when you always have to tend to small children. After the advent of the television, life became easier for parents in this respect. When a child was bored, they could be placed on the sofa and the adult could turn on cartoons, knowing full well that the attention of the child would be fixed on the television screen and they would not be inclined to go to the adult for attention unless an immediate need such as hunger occurred. This helps the parents, but seriously impacts the amount of time families spend together; proving that television negatively impacts families. Not only does television distract the children, but it acts as a nurse and as an aid to boredom. When a kid is sick, the parent would tend to them not only with medicine but in snuggling and in reading stories. Just as it babysits during chores, the parent can lay the sick child upon the couch and not be too bothered by the illness. In the past when children were bored, they would go outside to play or pick up their toys if they were entertaining themselves. Parents would play with them too. Now, instead of a family board game or a story, when a child says they are bored, the mother or father turns on the television. It often happens that television is more of a parent in terms of supervision and influencing the child than their flesh and blood mother and father. The technology has the ability to interfere and disrupt the natural dynamic between family members.

Television, according to Marie Winn's article, alters the family dynamic. With the invention of television, there is less face-to-face interaction between family members, including negative interactions. Fighting and quarreling between family members, especially siblings, had to be mediated by parents. This taught children how to cope with arguments and disagreement and also how to solve problems. Even in televisions where there is television, there are obviously still fights between siblings, but the parents too have not had proper problems solving skills at this point because they too were raised in homes with television. Instead of helping solve the issue peaceably, many households devolve into screaming matches between children and adults. Fighting is just one of the family rituals that occur in a functional unit. When this is artificially interrupted by something, such as television, then the other components of the family are upset too.

Throughout the essay, Marie Winn puts a lot of blame for familial disharmony on the television set. However, it seems that the real responsibility is that of the parents. Television in and of itself is not the problem; lack of interaction between family members and adults using television as a babysitter is the real problem.

Outline:

1. Paraphrase of author's argument & thesis statement in response: