12 Little-Known Ways that Television Stifles Spiritual Awakening

Television is a staple of almost every household in the developed world. Many kids spend more time watching TV than going to school, and the average time spent in front of the tube is 4.5 hours a day and rising. What effect does spending so much time absorbed in watching television have on our spiritual development?

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You probably already know that watching television is the world’s most popular leisure activity.

In the 1970s it was uncommon for kids to watch TV before the age of four, now it’s uncommon for kids not to be watching TV when they’re four months old. In the developed world, 99% of houses have a television and 66% of homes have three or more sets.

TV has been proven to increase cravings for junk food, and increase the likelihood of becoming overweight, being bullied, underperforming at school, being inactive, and becoming prone to misbehaviour. Every hour you spend in front of a TV takes 22 minutes off your life; that means you’ll die five years earlier if you watch six hours of television a day.

We know too much TV is bad for us, but have you ever stopped to consider the effect that television might be having on your spiritual growth?

Here are 12 things to think about the next time you sit down to your favourite sitcom, movie or news show.

#1 TV is one of the biggest time-sinks ever

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How much time do you spend in front of a screen? Source

The average person will spend 9.1 years of their life watching television (that includes 2 years of mind numbing commercials!). If you have a spouse and watch TV, you probably spend 3 to 4 times more time in front of the television than you do talking to your partner.

That number is set to increase with the introduction of online and time-shifted viewing, letting us watch what we want when we want it.

Television on demand has given rise to a new craze known as “binge watching” where people lock themselves in a room and watch television seasons or movies back-to-back, barely surfacing for days or weeks.

Some people believe it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert at anything. There are almost 80,000 hours spent in front of the tube in nine years of television viewing. Just think how many meditation techniques someone could master, or how good their awareness of the present moment would become if they devoted even two thirds of this time to their inner development.

If you feel like you don’t really watch that much TV, use this handy tool for an objective analysis – the results might surprise you!

With so much time spent in front of the screen you’d think we must enjoy everything we’re watching, but it’s not always the case. When was the last time you stayed in front of the TV, even when there was nothing worth watching, just because you couldn’t summon the energy to drag yourself away?

#2 We’re TV addicts

We are addicted, but it’s not entirely our fault – network programmers want it that way.

I got addicted.

News, particularly daily news, is more addictive than crack cocaine, more addictive than heroin, more addictive than cigarettes.

— Dan Rather

Researcher Herbert Krugman discovered that endorphins were released while watching TV, a kind of naturally produced opiate. TV programming is never-ending, and TV networks use psychological tricks to addict us which are hard to see and harder to break free of as they play on our instinctual drives.

Television stimulates desire and curiosity by constantly showing us promos for upcoming shows and leaving episodes in cliffhanger scenarios, creating a knowledge gap that acts like a mental itch that we can’t help but scratch by tuning into the next show.

Addictions of any kind are harmful spiritually as they chain us to something external and make us psychologically dependant upon it. When those addictions also steal our time there is much we lose out on.

#3 Concentration – a dying ability?

We are trained from birth not to concentrate on what we’re doing – a trait reinforced through years of living in a hyper connected society and multitasking.

Researchers have found that there is a close link between attentional disorders and time spent in front of the TV. Television shows are increasingly so fast paced (seriously, watch that video and your head will spin) that regular life is unexciting in comparison and we can easily have trouble paying attention to the slower pace of everyday existence, which lacks explosions and rapid scene changes to keep us amused.

We improve in whatever we do repeatedly, so it’s unsurprising that if we spend a lot of time zoning out in front of the TV then we can find it hard to focus our minds on anything. That’s bad news if you’re interested in meditation, astral projection or awareness of the present moment – all activities that require a focused mind.

The next time you turn on the television, try to notice what you’re doing while you watch it. Are you focusing on what you’re watching? Or are you eating dinner, checking your emails, playing a game on your phone or any number of other things that split and strain our attention?

#4 TV changes our perception of reality

Spiritual development wakes us up to what’s really going on in the world by developing an awareness of the present moment and an ability to see through illusion. By doing so we discover who we really are and learn about reality.

More and more, however, television is becoming a filter through which all our human experiences are validated and even lived – “life” can be experienced vicariously through the characters in our favourite movies or TV shows. This vicarious experience threatens to numb us to events in the real world, and we are pressured to maintain the status quo of consumerism and animalistic behaviour promoted by advertisers and network programming.

Practically everything we see on television is scripted and fake – even so-called “reality TV” shows – but it’s easy to feel inadequate in comparison to the high-flying personas that make for entertaining viewing. Feeling insufficient we are more prone to daydreaming about how we wish our lives were, even going so far as to create imaginary relationships with our favourite characters.

TV urges us to escape from our lives rather than see and understand our lives for what they are, and use the real-life circumstances we have each day to awaken consciousness and develop spiritually.

#5 TV can put you in a trance-like state 

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“And when I finish counting down from ten you’ll believe everything they tell you on the news..” Source

Watching lots of television can cause us to live our lives in a dream world, but the act of watching itself can put us into a trance-like state.

Jerry Mander, author of Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television, explains how the brainwaves of viewers’ slow down while watching TV, regardless of what they’re watching.

Researchers have discovered that we become mesmerised by the technical aspects of television editing including cuts, edits, pans, zooms and sudden noises, which trigger involuntary responses and keep our attention glued to the screen.

We can see a close relationship between the speech patterns of news presenters and those of hypnotists, as both speak in an even monotone voice while looking directly into the eyes of the subject. News shows in particular are also known to employ other hypnotic techniques such as the use of mnemonic imagery and numerical countdowns before relaying the so-called “news”.

If you have ever noticed yourself become completely absorbed in the TV, unaware of what’s around you, you know what I’m talking about. In this state, the left side of our brain used for analysis and critical thinking is switched off in favour of our more emotional right brain. What we see on TV is delivered directly into our subconscious mind where it influences our beliefs about the world. If these beliefs implanted in the subconscious are not consciously uncovered, they are often acted upon rather than moderated. TV’s trance-like effects on our brains can linger – even when we switch off the television our brains can remain in a state of lowered alertness.

Do we really want people we don’t know implanting behaviours and beliefs deep within our minds?

#6 TV makes you passive

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Our brain is more active while we sleep than when we watch TV. Over time what affect could this have on our mental functioning? Source

Television is commonly considered one of the most effective tools to pacify and subdue psyche ward patients and prison inmates around the world.

And if you’ve ever heard the phrase ‘veg out’ in front of the TV that’s exactly what we’re doing – while watching TV our brains have less activity than when we are asleep.

Researchers Kubey and Csikszentmihalyi found that for many people television elicits a conditioned relaxation response.

The sense of relaxation ends when the set is turned off, but the feelings of passivity and lowered alertness continue. Survey participants commonly reflect that television has somehow absorbed or sucked out their energy, leaving them depleted.

Regular TV viewers can have their world view essentially mediated for them by television networks. The job of the audience is to passively accept and absorb the point of view TV presents. This results in a public with similar conditioning who in real life are more likely to accept the world view presented to them by others.

This begs the question – are our thoughts our own? And if not, whose are they?

Shortly, the public will be unable to reason or think for themselves. They’ll only be able to parrot the information they’ve been given on the previous night’s news.

— Zbigniew Brzezinski

To live spiritually in the moment we need to be active, to see for ourselves how we and the world really are. If you’ve ever tried to observe your thoughts and emotions you would have noticed that depression, anxiety, and other negative states come and go without any effort on our behalf, draining our energy as they go. While watching TV this process happens on autopilot.

The more time we spend passively absorbing entertainment rather than actively engaging in life, the more we train ourselves to watch rather than partake in our existence. Without activity, our consciousness is less likely to manifest and the more difficult awakening becomes.

#7 TV activates your reptilian brain

As well as making us passive, television alters our brain function, reducing activity in the neo-cortex and other higher brain regions and increasing activity in lower brain regions known as the ‘reptilian brain‘ and the limbic system. These lower parts of our brains are used to moderate negative emotions and instinctual behaviours related to aggression, dominance, fighting over territory and procreation.

The reptile brain is unable to distinguish between reality and the simulated reality of television. To the reptile brain, if it looks real, it is real. Thus, though we know on a conscious level it is “only a film,” on an unconscious level we do not–the heart beats faster, for instance, while we watch a suspenseful scene. Similarly, we know the commercial is trying to manipulate us, but on an unconscious level the commercial nonetheless succeeds in, say, making us feel inadequate until we buy whatever thing is being advertised–and the effect is all the more powerful because it is unconscious, operating on the deepest level of human response. Source

The next time you’re watching advertisements or music videos – two types of media which particularly appeal to our animalistic drives – you might find it interesting to try to understand what drives or emotions the programmers are trying to evoke in you.

By viewing critically we are more able to separate ourselves from this influence. Over time we can replace the animalistic parts of ourselves with greater consciousness which benefits our spiritual experience.

#8 TV stirs up emotions

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How is the television stirring up your emotions? Source

Researchers have found that the happiest people do not watch television.

Most advertising is based on making people feel self-conscious, insecure and inadequate. If we just buy this latest gadget, we’ll finally be happy! But it’s not physically possible to compete with the fake reality shown in movies and TV shows and comparing our lives to the people we see on screen can leave us feeling depressed and dissatisfied with our existence. While this might have the effect of causing us to search for a deeper purpose to life, the common response to negative emotions is to hide them by searching out more intense entertainments and distractions – which TV networks readily supply, perpetuating the cycle of TV dependence.

TV’s influence on our emotions doesn’t stop there. Watching scary or violent movies can cause us to relive traumatic memories from the past. Viewing of violent or grotesque imagery creates chemical changes in our brain similar to those seen in post-traumatic stress, and if we see enough repeated acts of violence, our body reacts as if we are the ones being abused.

Researchers have discovered that when we watch negative news broadcasts, not only are our lower emotions such as sadness, anxiety and depression stimulated, but unrelated worries in general become heightened. Test subjects were found to be more likely to catastrophise their concerns, blowing any worries they already had out of proportion.

TV creates a wide ranging emotional impact that we live with long after we have turned it off. Television programmers are experts in emotional manipulation and when they can control people’s emotions they can turn them against you and anyone they see fit. Spiritual minorities are a common target for demonisation. TV programming can cause people to become afraid and distrustful of anything not supported by the televised norm, and without awareness of this mechanism of fear people can readily give up their freedoms for an illusion of security.

#9 TV might be the death of emotional intelligence

Emotional intelligence is the ability to understand your own and others emotions and to use an understanding of emotions to guide your behaviour.

Unfortunately, television is dulling our awareness of our feelings and creating a generation of people grossly lacking in emotional intelligence. A recent study by the Millennium Cohort found that kids who watch more than 3 hours of TV a day had a higher chance of emotional symptoms and problems in relationships. Psychologically it’s well known that children who watch more TV are less likely to display empathy, will resort to aggression or sadistic behaviour, will be argumentative and will seek instant gratification.

Others have found that children who watch too much TV lose the ability to read social cues, and that increased TV viewing leads children to have a poor understanding of other people’s emotional states, and to be unable to distinguish the thoughts and feelings of others from those of their own.

Are we creating a generation of people who will be unable to develop spiritually because they are unable to understand their own emotions?

#10 Almost all TV has an agenda

All television is educational television. The question is: what is it teaching?

— Nicholas Johnson

Television tells us what to think, how to dress, what to buy Source

TV propagandists and advertisers more than anyone would benefit from the creation of a public with an inability to determine their own thoughts from those of others. And it’s a vicious cycle. It’s been proven that kids who watch entertainment TV are less likely to read books, so those who watch lots of TV often end up getting all their information about the world from just one source.

It’s fairly well-known that only a handful of corporations own almost all of the media outlets that we tune into. But do we stop to consider that those behind the networks and their advertisers with billion dollar budgets all have an agenda to push?

Through shows, movies, and the news we are repeatedly told how to act, what to think, and which products or entertainment we need to consume.

A Harvard University researcher concluded that for every extra hour of television someone watches per week they spend an extra $200 a year. It’s not uncommon for people to go into debt chasing the dream lifestyles portrayed on television. We then have to work more to pay our bills, come home exhausted and lacking free time and energy crash out in front of the TV, perpetuating the cycle and losing valuable time that could be used more effectively.

Beyond simple physical guidelines it seems we are also being given a guideline to our spiritual life (or an imposed lack thereof).

Some of this programming is fairly out in the open. Take this Versace commercial for instance which seems to be all about conformity and having our lives and desires dictated by powerful people in society.

Or the 2014 grammy awards which seem to display a barely disguised black magic ritual.

Other programming is more subliminal. Take these images from kids shows for example, or this screenshot from Ke$ha’s Die Young Video, where the door of her car says ‘Evil’.

Notice anything strange about these images? Source

Notice anything strange about these images?
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#11 Who are you really? TV changes our behaviour

Have you ever found yourself quoting lines from your favourite TV show? Do you walk or dress like your favourite character? Are your political and spiritual opinions your own or are you just repeating what you saw on the latest political debate or morning variety show? What would your life be like if you’d never watched TV?

As a species we model or mimic behaviours of those in positions of authority, and we are definitely set up to feel that the people on TV have more authority than us.

Unsurprisingly as TV becomes more violent and shows more acts of sexual promiscuity, these behaviours are increasingly prevalent in society.

Studies have found that:

Even the Disney Channel is not immune as one Mother discovered when her daughter began acting arrogantly and hurtfully towards her friends after too much exposure to Disney programming.

Our morals and behaviours are influenced through the emotively driven storylines of television shows and movies and we can begin to unquestioningly accept the reality that they present about how people should behave in the world.

As we do so true spiritual values like empathy, compassion, inner peace and patience are increasingly becoming lost to the world and are seen as bizarre, replaced by acts of indulgence, violence and consumerism.

#12 What goes into your subconscious affects your dreams

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Have you ever had dreams about some TV you just watched? Source

Anything we do repetitively during the day will re-occur at night in our dreams. That includes thoughts, emotions and behaviours. That’s why you might find yourself working in your office in your dreams every night, or living out the scenarios you’re most anxious about.

Movies and TV shows hijack and accelerate this process, embedding images directly into your subconscious which then can come back as dreams. If you’ve been watching a lot of horror movies and keep having strongly emotional nightmares about being attacked, chased or killed this might be why (it can also be due to the state of your psyche).

For as long as people have been sleeping, dreams have been amazing source of spiritual and divine guidance, a way for people to tap into the mystical side of life and get access to teachings from beyond the physical realm. In order for this to happen dreams need to be as clear as possible – a process helped by being as clear and free of emotion as we can be during the day.

Watching too much or the wrong type of television can hinder this process as the heavy imagery embedded in our subconscious takes the place of other more meaningful experiences.

Next time you sit down to watch TV, don’t turn it on

Think for yourself, especially when it comes to spirituality! Source

Think for yourself, especially when it comes to spirituality!
Original Source

Television is not all bad. Choosing and critically watching the right movies or shows can inspire us, inform us, teach us new skills or give us spiritual strength. But be mindful of what you are putting into your subconscious, and try and uncover the emotional and behavioural effects your TV viewing – particularly the violent or animalistic programming – has on your spiritual development.

Next time you get the urge to watch TV, you could sit down and do a meditation practice instead. Or go for a walk in nature and try to be aware. You might get cravings and withdrawal symptoms, but if you stay strong these withdrawal symptoms will be shortlived and your life will be so much better. Have a really good practice and you’ll wonder why you ever watched TV in the first place.

Remember that almost everything on TV is scripted. Even the news is a form of entertainment. It’s not your life, and it’s not reality.

I wanted to leave you with part of a speech from the 1976 movie Network.

Listen to me! Television is not the truth. Television’s a [..] amusement park. Television is a circus, a carnival, a traveling troupe of acrobats, storytellers, dancers, singers, jugglers, sideshow freaks, lion tamers, and football players. We’re in the boredom-killing business. So if you want the Truth, go to God! Go to your gurus. Go to yourselves! Because that’s the only place you’re ever gonna find any real truth. But, man, you’re never gonna get any truth from us. We’ll tell you anything you wanna hear. [..]

We deal in illusions, man. None of it is true! But you people sit there day after day, night after night, all ages, colors, creeds. We’re all you know. You’re beginning to believe the illusions we’re spinning here. You’re beginning to think that the tube is reality and that your own lives are unreal. You do whatever the tube tells you. You dress like the tube, you eat like the tube, you raise your children like the tube. You even think like the tube. This is mass madness. You maniacs. In God’s name, you people are the real thing. We are the illusion. So turn off your television sets. Turn them off now. Turn them off right now. Turn them off and leave them off. Turn them off right in the middle of this sentence I am speaking to you now. Turn them off!

One thing is certain. Any real spiritual revolution will not be televised.

About David Arkyn

David has a deep interest in spiritual development, but has discovered there are many forces in the world working to keep people asleep. His recent interest has been researching the psychological tactics and techniques used to limit people's spiritual potential, writing about his discoveries here at The Conscious Reporter.

25 comments

  1. It’s not TV that lowers your vibrations, it’s both how much and the quality of the content, itself. I find, if I limit to one hour a week (Yes, one night, one hour a week), I’m barely affected. Also, what about nature documentaries? They are beautiful and inspiring. They are not dark. They are not violent. They are not mindless trash. They are art. They will give people who cannot travel the rare opportunity to see parts of nature that would otherwise be inaccessible. It would be a shame not to appreciate the hard work and the art of cinema while watching some of these 4k, high-budget nature documentaries, with their beautiful orchestral scores.

    There is beauty in everything. All someone has to do is open their mind to it. A spiritual person would know that.

  2. I would add that the general tenor of movie and tv shows is either spiritually empty or outright spiritually dark. Lots of heart hardening violence, lots of sex, and if spiritual things are alluded to at all they are almost always, well, as close to demonic as I think you could go – dark witches, satanist, literal demons, vampires, random monsters. By this you wouldn’t get much of a glimmer there is any Light to spirituality. There are a surprisingly few exceptions.

    Now I could hold that spirituality is just seen as very real or valid by the consensus culture. But if that is so then why the dark forms of spirituality prominently featured? Yes much of it is watches as mere “entertainment”. But I don’t see how it can do anything but hurt the changes of drawing toward Light.

  3. I just Googled tv spiritual growth because we have a huge flat screen tv in our bedroom with no windows, only a skylight and it has negatively impacted my marriage, geels like we have been lockex up in a prison cell to be brainwashed. The tv is high above our bed the first thing you see upon waking demanding atttention. My husband has a ritual of switching the tv on when he come home & cannot fall asleep without it. We are Christian but i don’t see much evidence that our lives are different to any other. We don’t give as much time to prayer, spiritual growth, reading and intellectual conversations. For a long time, I couldn’t put my finger on what the problem is. Tv subtally infiltrates every area of our lives through our thinking. It really is an idiot box. Whoever I visit, has the tv on, has children parked in front like little zombies. This is what Anton LaVey of the church of Satan wrote about. This was his intention: There will be one in every home brainwashing the masses. It will become the family altar, the new religion. It is suicidal causing to drift through life without resistamce without gumption standing up for right & opposing wrong. When I suggest to my husband we can read our Bible, he gives me a glazed look and carries on watching tv! I wonder if it is the abomination standing in the sacred place described in the Holy Bible. Lounges are a place of prayer and seeking God have been transformed to a place of “relaxation” centred around… you guessed it! The tv. We are being trained to passively receive in stead of actively discerning & seeking out truth. My entire family young and old have become affected aka infected. God help us all.

    • Thank you for sharing so honestly actually Grace.

      Having grown up not entirely in front of the screen but already spending a significant time in front throughout my childhood, I’ve seen in myself that its grip on me was huge! It has been a terrible and long struggle to rip myself gradually free from the addiction to entertainment in front of a screen.

      But I see that for current/future generations, influenced and brought up in front of a screen even more, and that from infancy— that the place of addiction it has within them will be too much to break.

      There will not be enough strength, nor the wish, nor the know how, for someone to switch from receiving nourishment and fulfilment from emotional entertainment— to the way of living where we get our nourishment and satisfaction from real life around us. And this goes beyond just not having ‘a life’ any more. I’m talking about the loss of a psychological way of being. Like forever being locked in a daydream. Where people will no longer be interested or able to perceive life in awareness/mindfulness. Like you know when being in a clear state in nature…. and perceiving that beauty, which is Reality. And that moment of experiencing beauty is only a hint of a perception and magical life that exists and we could have. But the ways are closing for people to feel reality, and higher realities, and spend their life ‘asleep’ in front of a tv, deaf to God’s call.

    • Thank you for sharing Grace,

      I didn’t know Anton Lavey wrote about this but of course it isn’t surprising.

  4. Great article! I completely agree with everything said. It’s amazing how much we’re indoctrinated by tv watching. Most of us grew up around a TV, so it becomes a completely normal activity. In fact, if you DON’T watch tv, you are considered weird. It seems we’re at least moving away from cable tv, reducing mindless tv watching and commercials at least. I think it will take a while, but I believe the future will have much less television.

    • It’ll be replaced with other technology that’ll give even worse results. It’s amazing how many people don’t look when they cross the road these days because they fail to look up from their mobile phones. I saw a young couple on a date once who didn’t even speak to each other at the dinner table – just looked at their phones.

  5. I woke up a few days ago 7-7 Actually
    Learning a lot about this human experience

  6. Great article and great website. Very informative. This article should be required reading for every adult in America.

  7. Great research and great information. Thanks David.

  8. Great article David!
    I particularly noticed this change in behavior you mentioned when watching the new disney film, that won an oscar too, “Frozen”. My daughter would get really angry afterwards and act like Elsa, one of the female characters that is really mean.
    I don’t think one should totally isolate oneself from the television, because you have to know what type of things affect the people around you. However you can watch it consciously and decide what will benefit you and what will not.

  9. Got rid of my TV 11 years ago and never looked back. I can relate to all the aspects you mentioned. Thanks for pointing out those Disney screenshots — creepy!

  10. Can we get you to repeat this on television please David.

  11. Agree on all counts. I don’t watch TV at all but I do catch myself caught in the new TV … the internet which can be just as damaging when misused.

    • Indeed, “TV” is in many ways synonymous with YouTube or any other internet-based video service. I haven’t owned a TV for at least eight years and am glad I don’t, but that doesn’t stop me from being at risk from the influence of those that create TV shows/ads. It’s all on the internet too.

      There are great points in the article about the psychological effects of passivity and viewing negative programs. We all face these issues every time we go online, so it’s important to be mindful of them.

      • Noticed that one institution is using subliminal messaging on Youtube vids recently. It’s worth taking censorship seriously.

  12. Great Article. I can see how easily I get trapped watching mindless rubbish on TV. It really is, as my friend calls it ‘the poor mans meditation’.

    Time to cut it out of my life once again thanks for the reminder, great article

  13. Thanks Dave very interesting, I also see the same things happening with computers, the internet and more so the smart phones, were people think there doing well not watching TV yet will spend countless hours on these other devices looking at rubbish

  14. The way TV is used is bad. But Tv is not bad. It’s an amazing invention and could be used for the benefit of society.

  15. What a well-written and well-presented article David, thank you very much for this.

    That Versace commercial is shocking. It’s incredible they can show something so blatantly, like they don’t even bother hiding what they’re doing, just presenting it as a cool and fashionable thing, and everyone will gobble it up.

    I regret it but I pretty much grew up in front of the screen. As a young child it wasn’t a big problem (and the kids’ shows weren’t as disturbing as they are now anyway), and we got to spend lots of time playing out in nature. It was in my teenage years that I must have watched 6 hours of tv per day. It was an addiction for sure, and sometimes I wonder if it ruined my brain. I have this feeling of just watching the events of life, that I can’t affect them, and it is very problematic to try to solve problems or look for solutions. It’s like a problem solving switch doesn’t even exist in my mind. I can look at a painting for instance and not understand what is going on in it or what its theme is unless someone tells me. It’s like the edge of my mind has been dulled down.

    I gave up tv completely years ago. I started to abhor the feeling of numbness and dizziness it gave me. I do watch interesting documentaries and things online though. My partner and I actually were going to watch something online a little while ago, but couldn’t make the computer work. I felt disappointed, but we decided to sit outside with a blanket and a cup of tea, and watch the stars together. It was wonderful, and we saw a shooting star (I rarely see them)! Definitely beats the late night shows….

  16. I got through 45 seconds of the most random episode ever and had to stop. Way too crazy–it’s just repulsive.

    When I taught elementary school I observed the emotional intelligence aspect that you mentioned. Children would mimic behaviors and language they saw regularly on their favorite TV shows, including aggressiveness and lack of care/ understanding for others. It’s actually shocking what passes for children’s entertainment now.

    Thanks for a great article, David.

  17. Another well written and researched article – thank you. This site is an incredible project, thanks to all involved.

    One thing I’ve noticed with TV show or movies is that they carry on in my thoughts the next day. If I watch a show at night then in the morning when trying to be aware while making breakfast etc I find the show/movie constantly “playing” in my mind. It definitely makes being mindful harder for me.

  18. Thank you very much David for looking into this. Actually, I have just recently started to dig deeper into the “Disney agenda” too, and there definitely is something very nasty going on, including subliminal sexual messages, emotional brainwashing and other horrible things, just like the mother in the link you posted found out. The reason that made me look into all this was actually similar as hers, as I also noticed that the behavior of my 8-year old niece always changes after she watches a good portion of Disney shows. She becomes very artificial, talking with a weird accent as if she was on a show, being rude and exaggerated in general.
    I talked to her a bit about that and also about some other movies which I consider weird, and she kind of listened and even asked what kind of movies are OK to watch then, but it was hard for me to say, as I don’t have such an overview of everything that’s there. I realized how hard it must be for them, to distinguish wrong from good today, when there is so much darkness in everything and they don’t have much experience. There are also some more indirect things in the movies or fairy-tales, for example so many monsters presented as normal characters today, various skulls and crazy looking entities or a gloomy atmosphere. The famous “Monster High” is just one example.

  19. David, Great article! Although many of us know the huge detriment to life that is ‘TV’ it’s wonderful to see it all put together here and thoroughly researched. Your sources are great. I particularly liked the new info I learned about the ‘reptilian brain’. Yeeeesshhh! Spookie. I’m glad to have been a TV free household now for 8 yrs +.