Television has always been a big part of my family. Growing up, the TV was pretty much always on. I remember watching Sesame Street, Electric Company, Zoom, and an assortment of cartoons and School House Rock's. This was back in the era when Saturday morning cartoons were "safe" to let your kids watch.
Although I can't give specific examples, I don't feel like it's safe to put on cartoons and let the kids just watch, unsupervised. I think they can get introduced to inappropriate themes, attitudes, and vocabulary way too early.
Before Logan was born I started out with the philosophy of "My kids won't watch anything on TV unless I am sitting right with them." This changed around the time I got pregnant with Ellis and was so sick I would just put in movies for Logan and go writhe in agony on the couch. Eventually, it turned into "only PBS TV" which I still deem as 'safe'. I distinctly remember kind of bragging to a friend that my kids didn't even know who the Backyardigans were and she said, "They will... you just wait."
Then we got cable and Noggin. I remember the first time my kids saw commercials for toys. Their faces lit up like they saw the Messiah. They had no idea such things existed! Enter: materialism. Materialism is a nasty bug that's hard to shake and easy to catch again. For some, it's a plague. For Logan, it's easily justified and soundly debated. Case in point: another infomercial. The conversation went something like this:
Lo: Mom, I have something to tell you. Um, on TV it has these headphones and when you use them you won't disturb others (she said those last 3 words very slowly and emphatically using her hands to mimic punctuation). (pause). And they are less than $50. (pause). Do you think that sounds pretty great?
Me: Sure. And what are you thinking about those headphones?
Lo: Good. I think pretty great. It said, 'Not $200, not $100, not $50 so they put X's on it. (pause). Amazing, right mom? Isn't it amazing?
Me: Well, maybe. How much under $50?
Lo: I'm not sure. (then skipped off losing interest in the whole conversation)
Editors note: Turns out they are just $19.99 plus S&H. They create a perfectly antisocial home environment where the dad can just watch ESPN in peace and block out those pesky family noises. https://www.myzoneheadphones.com/?gclid=COTE0b_S4a0CFQ41hwodLjihTQ
I'm thinking it might be time to start reading to the girls from Ecclesiastes. I could probably use a refresher about how meaningless everything really is myself :)
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