
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, November 15, 1993                   TAG: 9311160259
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Ben Beagle
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

DON'T TOUCH THAT DIAL - HE'S REALLY ON THIN ICE THIS TIME

I am now convinced that the networks are trying to rend the fabric of the American family. Or something very like that.

If not, why would some airheads schedule a football game on one channel and figure skating on another? When the ideal, loving couple we are talking about here have only one 19-inch television set and the female spouse is a figure skating junkie?

There is nothing to cover this in the marriage vows as far as I know.

I've certainly never heard a preacher cover this situation. I mean, what would he say? Maybe something like this:

``And when there is a skating show on one channel and a football game on the other and there be only one TV set, you will cleave to to the channel preferred by the one with whom you have plighted your troth. And let no person switch this channel.''

Meanwhile, the male member of this loving duo continues to think that an axel is something you break if you run your car over something really big.

This is not a matter of being macho as far as I'm concerned. I just don't like ice skating. Hans Brinker - who skated all over Holland or someplace for reasons unclear to me - bored me to death in elementary school.

I never could stand the ice Sonja Henie skated on.

There is also the serious problem of a double standard here that most network executives have ignored.

In case some of you guys haven't noticed, it's not a very good idea to comment on the way in which certain female skaters are composed physically - which is usually very nicely. We won't get into particulars here, but I think you take my meaning.

You also don't want to jeer and slap your thigh as a comment on the costumes worn by certain male skaters.

Such talk about female skaters will mean accusations that (a) you are a dirty old man who is old enough to be the female skater's grandfather; or (b) a very common version of a dirty old man.

Essentially the same thing happens during gymnastic competition in the Olympics and reruns of ``Charlie's Angels.''

Raucous comment on the dress of male skaters will get you a cold stare and a lament that if she had known what a slob you were she never would have married you.

Females are given greater latitude on those rare occasions when they watch football. I don't know where it says so in the marriage vows, but they are allowed to make comments about the rear ends of certain football players. They are also allowed to wonder aloud how much mousse the coach of the Dallas Cowboys uses per game - which is, I think, relevant inquiry.

Don't get me wrong. I will defend their right to do so with my life - especially in cases of speculation about the coach's hairstyle.

I believe strongly, however, that males should have equal rights to comment upon the times in which we live.

I don't propose any answers here, my fellow Americans. I'll just be glad when the figure skating season is over.

And then we can take a good look at the divorce rate.

by CNB