The following is the opinion of the author and does not necessarily reflect the views of this publication.
Part III: Television
Today, El Hyena will discuss the current state of American television (hereinafter “TV”). Although El Hyena does everything in his power to avoid watching TV, sometimes there is just no way around it, like when El Hyena visits his beloved parents, who sit in front of their TV for hours watching anything and everything. They do have their favorite shows, but there’s no end to what all they will watch, even when there’s “nothing on”.
El Hyena is old enough to remember the good old days of TV. TV programming way back then consisted of kiddie shows such as Romper Room (El Hyena was always a Do Bee), Captain Kangaroo (El Hyena worshipped Bunny Rabbit) and cartoons; family comedy and variety shows (with singing and dancing!); various dramatic shows (Cowboys and Indians, Cops and Robbers, Good Guys and Bad Guys, etc.); news, and; sports. That was pretty much it.
Of course, back then there was no cable, and El Hyena’s viewing pleasure was limited to “VHF” and “UHV”. They had separate channel changing dials and everything. Sometimes El Hyena had to move the rabbit ears to get a good picture. VHF was ABC, NBC, and CBS, while UHF was Channel 39.
When it came to watching the news, it was either Walter Cronkite or Huntley-Brinkley. They were very serious men, didn’t make faces or holler at you, and told you what happened that day. Not what they thought about what happened, just what happened.
Sports consisted of football, baseball, some basketball, and some golf. If golf wasn’t exciting enough, one could watch paint dry or grass grow instead. Every four years El Hyena could watch the Olympics, where foreign people competed in incomprehensible activities they considered to be sports.
The dramas almost always had happy endings and a “moral”. If Mark (The Rifleman’s squirrelly kid) hadn’t disobeyed his father he wouldn’t have got caught in the quicksand, but he got saved anyway and learned his lesson. At least until the next week.
Variety shows ranged from Lawrence Welk (El Hyena only had to watch that while on vacation at Granny Pearl’s) to Dean Martin / Andy Williams to Laugh In. Laugh In was very cutting edge: Dick and Dave drank whiskey and smoked cigarettes, and President Nixon came on the show and said “Sock it to me”.
TV is not that way anymore, primarily because of cable, satellite, or whatever. Nowadays one can complain about nothing good being on any of three hundred channels. Not only that, but (brace yourselves) one can fly through different channels without even getting off the couch (emphasis El Hyena’s).
For sports, one can even watch two teams in Unpronounceablestan play soccer (what the rest of the world ignorantly calls “football”). You can even watch football (real football featuring gazillionaires) on more than one channel (emphasis El Hyena’s again).
In El Hyena’s humble opinion, the biggest change in TV has been in “the news” and the advent of “reality shows”.
Modern “news” shows don’t just tell us what happened. That is so twentieth century. Nowadays young women sometimes tell us the news, and many of them are seriously “perky”. Note: El Hyena does not disparage women – El Hyena loves women, and was even married to one a while back, until she quit being “perky” and became “insanely homicidal”. But that wasn’t her fault; it was always El Hyena’s fault (Yes, Dear). Anyway, news “anchors” also tell us what they think about the “news” and the “newsmakers” and, most importantly, what we should think. It is a vast improvement now that we no longer have to bear the burdens of thinking for ourselves, drawing our own conclusions, and forming our own opinions. If we are uncomfortable with our spoon-fed conclusions and opinions, we can go to another channel where we will be provided with different ones more to our liking.
In El Hyena’s humble opinion (he has more than one), “reality shows” signal the end of civilization as we know it. Seriously, are we better off now that we can eagerly watch strange, often dysfunctional people doing strange, often dysfunctional things while living their strange, often dysfunctional lives? But wait, it’s almost time for The Real Housewives of Jersey Shore Swamp People Hoarders! El Hyena does not want to miss Snooki wrestle an alligator while simultaneously beating up her husband, screaming at her kids, and bidding on the unknown contents of an abandoned storage space, all of which she’ll take home and throw on the floor in the family room with the extra crunchy fried chicken buckets.
Now that’s entertainment, and that’s the way it is.
Next month, El Hyena will discuss politics, in a completely objective and non-partisan way, of course. If you don’t read it, it’s because you hate America.
