The perils of television-induced brain rot have been preached to us since the time we were young. Great-aunts and teachers warn us of the danger of television as if watching it were the same as staring at food heating up in the microwave. With a stern look and wagging finger, they caution that sitting in front of the tube will turn your brain to mush (which is exactly what those zombies from AMC's "The Walking Dead" want).
However, our concerned guardians never say the same about books and reading. In fact, it's usually the opposite. All reading is lauded as key to a successful future. Whether it's "Captain Underpants" or Charles Dickens, books lord their reputation over the frowned-upon television shows. For many adults, all reading is good and all TV is bad. Yet this delineation is far too simple and black and white. Not all reading is constructive, and not all television is detrimental.
What many fail to realize is that a large portion of America is reading the same sort of noxious material that many find so abhorrent when televised. For example, E.L. James' "50 Shades of Grey" and the other two books in the series have been at the top of the best-seller list for the past 30 weeks. Worldwide, it has sold about 40 million copies. The winner of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, Jennifer Egan's "A Visit from the Goon Squad," meanwhile has only sold 300,000 copies. What started out as "Twilight" fan-fiction (and evolved into a highly erotic novel) has sold more copies than even the beloved favorite "To Kill a Mockingbird."
The same happens with television. The most-watched shows of 2012 were "NBC's Sunday Night Football" and "American Idol." For its third consecutive season, CBS' "NCIS" took the spot for the most-viewed scripted show, averaging about 19.5 million viewers for its sixth season. One of my favorite shows, the critically-acclaimed comedy by Louis C.K. "Louie," has nowhere near this viewership. The 2012 Emmy winner for best writing in a comedy series falls laughably behind, with an average of only 800,000 viewers for its third season. For some perspective, the show chronicling the life of a chubby five-year-old beauty pageant queen from the deep South, TLC's "Here Comes Honey Boo Boo," averages 2.4 million viewers per episode.
The problem with television is not that the medium is inherently bad for your mind it's that most of the shows on it are terrible. There's no question that watching a marathon of "Two and a Half Men" or "The Biggest Loser" is a waste of time, but would time spent reading a fluffy sex novel be that much better? By generalizing that all of television is damaging, many people overlook the multitude of engaging, interesting and informative shows television has to offer. Aside from obviously educational programming like PBS' "NOVA," there are many shows that can ignite a serious discussion about all sorts of topics. Frequently after watching "The Walking Dead," which is just as much an in-depth character study as it is a zombie apocalypse thriller, I reflect on what it means to be human and how one can lose humanity, in much the same way I did after reading John Steinbeck's "East of Eden."
This blind emphasis on reading anything, as long as it's words on paper and not images on a screen, forms a loophole for lazy or misguided kids. Because they're told that it's OK as long as they're reading, some turn to dribble devoid of all the merits commonly associated with literature. Just because a teen's nose is buried in a book doesn't mean he or she is learning something valuable. In the case of a lot of teen fiction, she could be learning to prize a relationship with a sparkly boy above those with her family and her humanity.
I'm tired of being met with a condescending look of pity or disgust after telling people I love watching TV. I'm tired of people assuming that television has more in common with the garbage bin than it has with "A Tale of Two Cities." As with everything, the value of television should be determined by the merit of an individual show, not the medium as a whole. The same applies to reading. A borderline pornographic story does not become more substantive by virtue of its being in a novel rather than on TV.