ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, April 25, 1996 TAG: 9604250078
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-12 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: TALKING IT OVER
To The Editor: I THOUGHT that was a wonderful letter to the editor by Fred C. Jones III (Feb. 20, ``Television is promoting illiteracy'').
The author recommends ``disposing'' of the television since it has taken away a child's ``desire'' to read. Maybe, though, we could just keep one of those ``mindless boxes'' solely for public television.
For instance, I heard this statement recently on public television, attributed to Groucho Marx: ``I find television very educational. Every time they turn on the TV, I go into the other room and read.''
- FRANKLIN H. TITLOW
OUR REPLY - WE, TOO, thought it was a good letter. Among educators, it is widely believed that excessive TV-watching hurts reading skills. Family time, outdoors recreation, civic engagement and all sorts of other positive activities also suffer as a result of television's mind-numbing, hours-gobbling, values-eroding influence.
Unlike Jones, though, we don't go so far as to advocate disposing of the "mindless boxes" altogether. It is a revolutionary communications technology, with which we all need to come to grips. Besides, there are some good programs, even on networks other than public television.
Sanctimony, in any case, is unlikely to improve literacy. Even Groucho, one of the century's greatest enemies of sanctimony, wasn't always the best of readers. In a blurb written for a S.J. Perelman book in 1928, Marx wrote: "From the moment I picked up your book until I laid it down, I was convulsed with laughter. Some day I intend reading it."
One thing we like about the national, annual "TV Turnoff Week," which some local schools are sponsoring, is that it doesn't ask families to go cold turkey forever.
Rather, it helps people make an effort - not "some day," but for a particular week - to gain control of their television-watching habit. The intent is to show who's in charge. Can we turn the thing off if we want to?
The experience suggests it isn't easy. For some of us, the first step is to recognize we are addicts.
- The editors
The Last Word: ``EXCESSIVE TV watching hurts reading skills.'' I agree.
Since I have the last word, I'll start by saying that a printed word is worth a thousand pictures.
Ms. Sherwood would break into our sleepy afternoon by handing out her little mimeographed slips with the day's reading on them. We'd dutifully read together the day's contribution - ``the hillsides dew pearled .... '' (My dooo wasn't appreciated.) Next day, ``open up those pearly gates, and the king of glory shall come in ....'' (My gloary wasn't appreciated.)
Then: ``And now, these three - faith, hope and love - and the greatest of these is love.'' (Say luuuhhhhv.)
That was more than 70 years ago. Thanks, Ms. Sherwood, for some printed words.
But it's the noospapers that continue to supply most of our printed words. Heywood Broun recalls an old wire editor and his helpers sitting idly on Christmas Eve in their printer room next to the big city-room. It was almost midnight, and not one of the printers was even running.
But suddenly there came a clatter from all of them. The startled Broun and his helpers jumped up to read the same printed word on each of them: ``A child is born.''
- F.H.T.
Franklin H. Titlow of Blacksburg is a retired editor of the Montgomery News Messenger.
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