There's a language to television that most all of us speak. It is taught at the earliest of ages now, even before we learn to talk. A one-year-old may not be able to tell you his name, but he can certainly follow the plot to The Office. It's a strange and peculiar language that has no lexicon or grammar. It's a language based on instincts, sub-conscious behavior, and a super-evolved form of hypnosis-like telepathy. The evidence of this proposed language exists in the curious cases of those who do not know how to speak it. After years now without a steady flow of visual mind-numbing media I myself have become one of the few.

    I was a TV watcher from the get go. Hell, I was practically raised by Eureka's Castle and Mr. Rogers. I watched my fair share of cartoons and sitcoms up into my early adult years, but eventually found little that held my interest or seemed geared toward a man of my tastes. Soon a lack of proper funds led to the absence of television, not by choice, but because food was more important. I would catch an occasional show here and there, suffering through America's Next Top Model for another's sake or tuning into the few Adult Swim cartoons that are among the rare shows that actually speak any sense to me. But it came to be that the natural flow of the television super-highway became invisible to me altogether.

    Having been without it now for some great while, I will occasionally sit down in some place other than my home and flick on the bright flashing lights of that cursed invention. I now find it utterly disturbing, a vile place filled with nothing but absolute horror. It speaks in tongues and spells no message other than one of inherent doom. Channel 1... doom. Channel 2... doom. Channel 3... the doom spin-off. And Channel 4 is showing made-for-TV doom. It makes no sense! None of it. Especially advertisements. The modern ad companies rely heavily on a constant lack of intelligence and attention. They are expecting you to be zoned out and only paying attention on some distant level. They only need to plant the seed, the method doesn't have to add up. Anyone who can stand far enough away from the ads can see that they rarely make any sense at all. The people watching them around you seem to get it but you will turn from viewer to screen over and over wondering if there's something you're missing. They could be in Japanese and I would understand just as much.

    What happened? It didn't take that long. I've spent the majority of my life intoxicated by a constant stream of useless plots, slogans, jingles, and facts only to lose the ability to translate this information into a workable form in less than three years.

    Take Rachel Ray for example. God what a brainless twit! I watched the tail end of her "show" today, which is as much hers as the sun is mine. What I saw was a sad, middle-aged woman cooking ridiculous food for an invisible audience. Notice that they never show the audience, you just hear them clap. What's more sad: a woman reacting to a phantom audience or the actual thought of people traveling out to watch that she-beast murder the food in front of her? She's a horrible little puppet there to sell Ritz Crackers and ad-space. Chances are she's as oblivious to her horrible fate as most of us poor saps are.

    We take so much of the idea of television for granted. The damn thing was only invented 70 years ago. It's only now that we have children more developed and experienced through television than actual life experience. We are completely unaware of the consequences that came with a device invented by our great-grandfathers. There's no doubt that we can see a detachment with reality developing in much of today's youth. Of course these kids don't know the weight of their actions! When some one on TV screws up it's funny. There's no serious recourse for Sponge Bob, we know it will all work out in the end. Taking a life? Hell, it happens all the time on TV and they get off scott-free!

    I challenge everyone who reads this to go without watching TV for at least six months. Once you've passed that mark turn it back on and you will see the horror that I see. The colors will bleed out from the screen and breed degeneracy all over your eyes while the screeches of some monstrous harpy-like she-devil will be felt in the depths of your loins. Don't believe me? Just try it. Turn off, tune out, drop it. If you can.

Labels: media, public, television