I think I'll keep it.

I love my YouTube on the big screen, and Rachel Maddow.

I use my TV differently than the vast majority of Americans.

Plus I have decent DVD collection.

I do run a Fauxless household. No Faux Snooze here.

It was amazing when I started watching again and noticed, this is NOT how people interact with each at all. The acting on tv shows was horrible. Painful to watch after I had gone so long without watching it. Now it all seems ok again. AM I just accustomed to the bad acting and fake interactions again?

I do watch plenty of TV. I just do it without commercials and when I want to, not when a network or station dictates.

Something else. I have found that after a few seasons most shows really do jump the shark and become unwatchable because they go off in directions are are truly stupid.

"Have Gun, Will Travel".

I never watch any shown with commercials live. I always dvr it and then start watching around a third of the way.

Witty and funny selling a multitude of products.

Now they are mainly lawyers hawking for medical malpractice clients or those who have suffered drug side effects, along with ads for new drugs with stupid names with a laundry list of side effects.

I usually mute the set or do things in the house (always something needs to be done). And some commercials can be pretty funny.

I love so many of the old shows, Mart Tyler Moore, Andy Griffith are two I find almost comforting nowadays. Frazier and Will and Grace are two shows that always make me laugh. And Maddow I would hate to miss. I use HULU, Romu, and other services, so watch when it is convenient to me.

I think it is great you made this choice for your life, but I never get when people feel the need to preach to others. As another poster said, you do you.

But I still don't like the time wasted while they are on. A half hour show is what, 22 minutes of running time? I'd rather watch all 22 minutes without interruption, because the commercial breaks aren't long enough to do anything very meaningful.

What I notice is people here complaining already about certain political commercials being run. Or they complain about a particular commentator as if their TV has no off or even mute button. I'm offering an alternative.

I'm also to going to stop using Interstates because there are billboards on them.

Yes. GASP!

I have a car.

I was miserable. At school other kids would talk excitedly about this or that program and I would just have to stand there like a deer caught in the headlights.

It took three years for my parent finally to relent and get me a little B&W set. With the stipulation that it stayed in my room. Only my room. I was OK with that.

However during the TV-less years I found the drama section of the local library branch, and started checking out big anthologies of stage scripts. I read a lot of them - like Bus Stop, and other American classics. I can't say I comprehended all of it, but I did get a feel for the dialog and it was entertaining in its own way. When we finally got a TV, I think my script reading sort of stopped.

But really, if you have a TV, you don't have to watch it. These days I mostly watch PBS shows - Nature, Frontline, BBC dramas, etc. The regular broadcast stuff is pretty much limited to the evening news (too many commercials, I agree) and then maybe Steven Colbert's show.

As for your cable hookup location... it's simple enough to get a cable extension to another part of your room, so the fact that it's under the window doesn't really mean the TV has to be there too. In my case, I use an antenna to get HD broadcasts - no cable TV. (Although I use the an internet only cable connection).

I will say one thing: with Trump popping up in news broadcasts all the time, the mute button on the remote control is essential (as it is for certain extremely annoying commercials).

I got a bit of an education about TV in college. One year I lived in a big house and one of the guys there was a post doctorate researcher from Switzerland. In college I didn't watch much TV anyway, but he made it fairly unpleasant to watch TV. We Americans would just stare blankly at the screen when the commercials came on, mentally zoning out, and he would burst out with derisive laughter at the commercials because he found them so absurd. Well, yeah, but it was rude of him to break our trances like that, LOL.

I do enjoy recording to DVD various PBS shows, so I can watch them later when the weather is bad and/or I'm immobilized.

Anyway, to each his own. You can have a TV and not use it, you know.

I love Rachel Maddow and PBS so, for me, no thanks. I’ve lived happily for many years in different parts of my life without films and music. I prefer to enjoy and learn from it. The garbage I have no time for.

in any language. A lot of timely and prescient stuff.

I have stopped listening to the 24/7 "Breaking News" Cable Infotainment Channels and I will agree with you that my life improved dramatically since then.

I'm happy with my computer and Chromecast.

the 24/7 image of the towers falling and pretty female news anchors sitting on desks with their legs crossed so viewers could look up their skirts - that I turned it off. Full stop. After some years I started watching the freebie cable channels on rare occasions - PBS and CNN mostly.

After some 6-8 years I started dating a man who is addicted, especially to football - now my husband - and we have the sort of TV I swore I would never have - big ass, takes up a huge chunk of wall.

Compromise: Mute the fucking commercials! It is standard TV viewing behavior for us both now - I get agitated and start talking back to the TV when AT&T starts telling me they do what they do because they care for me and fossil fuel companies talk about making coal plants breath clean just like trees.

Also - Look up “Amusing ourselves to death” by Postman - essential reading.

Regardless, you've got a pretty provincial view going on here.

I have compromised and have the most minimal add-on to my broadband cable package (and one you have to really demand as it is not advertised nor offered), that for $16 or so, I get all the networks plus a number of digital channels that probably would be accessible by antenna if you were in a good reception area (I've tried and short of a roof antenna, I don't get much of anything clearly). Local news remains important enough to me to justify this, for now. I find myself watching very little tv otherwise, so I imagine I will question even that much next time I have to "re-up".

... trust me, I need all the help I can get from my teevee.

It's a tool and if a user abuses it such as watching Faux news, is that the TV's fault?

People have a choice. Yes, we have cable. We also have a Roku, Netflix and Hulu. There is so much ad free content out there that it makes your head spin.

We also watch a lot of documentaries, biopics and much more.

Plus, I love cspan.

Why in the hell would I want to give all that up?

In response to your OP, no I won't. I enjoy primetime programming,, and access to News coverage, and (strangely enough) I believe in paying for content being produced. I have plenty of free time to engage in other activities as well. And I can ignore commercials just as easily as I do in the newspaper.

..but then I wouldn't be able to watch television.

And there are a lot of things on television that I enjoy watching.

Meanwhile, I’ll keep both.

I don’t have cable anymore, but I’m quite happy with my TV thank you very much.

Commercials just don’t bother me at all. My mind simply tunes them out.

I should probably be out saving the world or something but I already did that once and it's still a mess.

So, you're just trading a big screen in for a smaller one. I like being able to see what I watch. And, I can stream the Internet through my TV, and watch commercial-free, without getting all sanctimonious about it. Not that PBS, which is what I mostly watch, anyway, has commercials...

I don't pay for cable. I do pay for internet and have a smart TV. It's kind of awesome. I also have rabbit ears and get a lot of stations that way, including the major ones. I have Amazon Prime so I get a lot of free videos and shows from them. I also pull up youtube on the tv a lot. Sounds like I use my TV in a very similar manner to how you use your computer and my family doesn't have to look over my shoulder to see. Why would I get rid of it? You made no argument to do so. Literally. Today's TV's are computers. My laptop actually syncs to my computer if I want. I also like that I can take HD videos with my camera and play it on a loop over the weekend. I have a great video of a mountain stream in NC that I loop. It's so relaxing on the big screen.

Sounds like you replaced a big screen for a smaller one and that your argument is mostly about getting rid of cable.

I gave up television/cable/satellite over twenty-years ago.

I even have a few anecdotes about the benefits.

I will never go back. If people want to watch TV, that's fine with me. It's kind of like a nice, cozy cocoon.

Plato's Cave is probably a good analogy, the Matrix is another.

Neither my husband nor I are big on watching TV. The most we watch is during baseball season. I think the last series we watched was Northern Exposure in the early 90s. We like documentaries, Rachel Maddow, and baseball, so we subscribed to a couple streaming services that give us what we like to watch. Our lives are definitely enriched but not taken over by TV.

I get the OTA TV through an antenna that connects to my SmartTV. I got it at a dollar store for $2.99.
Look up the programming here: https://nocable.org/

TV has a very useful purpose for me.

I select my own channels and choose what I want
to watch.

All of this is very easy and digital.

I like to know what kinds of shows people are watching,
and I also have selected several shows I enjoy.

What would be really good is for people to have access
to learning critical thinking skills and the ability to distinguish
between fact and opinion.

And read the news. Just that will make anyone smarter and saner.

And I don't miss it one bit. I do have Netflix and Amazon Prime, so plenty of movies and TV shows to watch, but without interruptions. "Your life will be vastly better if you get rid of your TV." I agree 100%!

But, why do you think your idea is right for other people?

We do have a television with a DVD player and an $8.99 an month Netflix subscription. Sometimes we rent DVDs from the Redbox at our local grocery store, and I sometimes find DVDs in thrift stores.

My wife and I watch movies and a few Netflix series but I've long lost any tolerance I had for commercials and television news.

When I was a kid there were times we didn't have television because my parents couldn't afford it. If the television broke we were simply out of luck until they had money to repair it or get a new one. This could be half a year or more.

Maybe children are conditioned to feel uncomfortable if they don't have television.

Our children, adults now, don't have traditional television in their own homes, not even DVD players. It's the same with our nephews and nieces. Those who do have actual televisions 'cast programs to them from their phones. This was very confusing to their grandparents at first. Our oldest kid and spouse don't even have a remote control for their television.

"How do you watch CNN or MSNBC?"

I don't know.

From. My. Cold. Dead. Hands.

I watch very little TV, but I do watch more in the bad weather months (winter) than I do the rest of the year. I am an avid reader but there are only so many hours I can read before I need a break. As others have stated on here, I use my TV mostly for programs and channels that have no commercials. I love, love, love PBS and get four PBS stations. Could I watch it on my desktop computer monitor? Yes, but I am now older with eyesight issues and have a 45" TV where I can actually see what I'm watching much better. And even more so than that, sitting in a desk chair watching my computer monitor at a desk is not my idea of watching a program. I want to snuggle up on my couch with an afghan and my feet up to watch something, and I can't do that at my desk.

So, I have rabbit ears for my TV which allows me about 35 local stations (on a good weather day) and I usually only use that for catching the local news and my PBS shows. I have a Netflix subscription and pay for nothing else. That costs me $8.99 a month. Netflix puts out some wonderful content. I have a Roku box and can find plenty on that for free if I want, but rarely do and I am at my local library every week, so have access to all sorts of DVD's.

I do not watch TV news on a regular basis. I get my news mostly from DU! There are even postings on DU with links to MSNBC, CNN, etc. but I hardly ever click on them.

I think life itself is all about balance, and with self-awareness one is able to realize that a steady stream of news spouting and commercials is not good for humans. That I do agree with you on. Unfortunately, many Americans labor under the delusion that they just NEED to be in the know at all times.

As someone else posted on this thread, after 9/11 I completely turned off all news. I could see the way that was going and how we'd all get sucked into this notion that we had to remain "vigilant" at all times and the ensuing nationalistic fervor was nauseating to me.

I'm about your age, and what I know now that I'm supposedly wiser is that there really is very little we have absolute control over in this life.

And now I need to get up off this desk chair and get outside to enjoy a beautiful autumn day!

Major earthquake, fire. I know not much happens up there in Santa Fe.