Tuesday 27 August 2013

Giant Size Television Thing



Following Jamie Oliver’s latest ill though out tirade, it really is time to call time on the giant size television thing.  There are many ways to attack the poor (as the current Westminster government has shown us) but getting in a flap about the size of their TV sets has to be one of the stupidest.

Let’s start with a simple question: when was the last time you saw a small television set? These days, if you’re going to buy one at all, it’s going to be large. It is also, most likely, going to be cheap. We are far from the days when televisions were a luxury item. One can buy them in supermarkets now for less than some people spend on their weekly food shop. They’re also cheap to run when compared with the old cathode ray models, averaging about three pounds a week. That’s pretty good for a box that keeps the kids entertained if you’re working the long hours that most poor people do, or if you’re looking for a job.

Televisions are even cheaper second hand. They have a very low resale value, so if you lose your job, selling your television won’t help you much. The chances are you will have to part with your internet connection, if you had one in the first place (many poor people still don’t) as internet access constitutes a much larger ongoing expense. This means your television will become your main form of access to news. There have been rulings against bailiffs taking televisions in payment of debt, as they are considered essential for keeping people informed about the world. If poor people are forced to get rid of them, that’s a pretty effective way of barring them from any engagement with public life. Losing access to information about current affairs (bearing in mind that many avoid the expense of paying for a daily newspaper) makes it difficult for them to exercise their democratic rights.

To say that poor people should not have access to television is also to say that they should not have access to entertainment. It means their kids will experience social isolation and have difficulty fitting in at school, with a potentially negative consequences for their education. It means that older kids who probably also have few books or toys will have nothing to do but hang around in the streets, and we all know the kind of problems that can lead to. It means that those adults who cannot look for work—who are poor due to illness or disability, or who are full time carers—are deprived of something that can help fill their time. Bear in mind that these are, by and large, not people with the means to buy books or musical instruments or to make regular trips to the cinema or theatre. Television may be all they have.

So why is the possession of a television whilst poor now the subject of so much disapproval? It’s pretty simple: when we go inside the poorest people’s homes, whether directly or via a camera (whose observations we probably see on our own television sets), the TV is generally the only thing we see that looks like it might be worth anything at all. Think about that. There’s usually no computer, no sound system, no attractive furniture, no sports equipment, no art. These are people with next to nothing. Picking on the television is the only effective way to pretend that they are hanging on to some kind of meaningful resource, thereby depriving others. It’s simple propaganda.

Jamie Oliver, who would not be successful himself without television, should know better than to go along with this kind of lie. How are his crusades to change people’s eating habits going to reach their targets if not through their TVs? Yes, it would be better if people engaged in more active pursuits, but that’s not an option for all of them.  Yes, it’s tragic that many are reduced to living life simply as spectators, but the real problem there is lack of opportunity—depriving them even further will not help. We should not be looking at people in desperate situations and asking what they still have that we might take. We should be asking what we can give, how we can increase their opportunities, how we can help them to connect with the world more effectively and thereby improve their own situations. We should think about the roots of the word ‘television’ and try to see a little further ourselves.

3 comments:

  1. An excellent post. I hadn't thought about this too much, apart from recoiling from Oliver's comment, but you make the point very well. I just wish there were better things to watch on it.

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    1. This horribly reminds me of my divorce 23 yrs ago, when the all male JP, solicitors (including mine) and my ex all agreed with much laughter that he (the ex) needed some income to buy beer on a night out "a man's entitled to a social life" but that me and the children were not entitled to have enough to rent the TV which was a "luxury item"(that's how you had TV in those days folks. Sorry. Blast from a depressing past.

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  2. I believe there is also an urge to punish the poor for being poor, by not allowing them anything 'nonessential'. I've also heard things like "Well, they shouldn't be sitting around watching TV when they should be working/looking for a job". The poor must be kept ignorant and miserable.

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