Argumentative Essay - Television 2# (in collaboration with Soo and Chai Boon)

Does television bring more harm than good?

Today, almost every single family on our planet has a so called “member” which is a television. It is not just an ordinary member, but a very important one, because the time spent next to it exceeds the amount of time spent together with any other family member. Indeed, according to the American Time Use Survey (2003), it is discovered that watching television is the highest average hours spent by both men and women compared to socializing and communicating activity. Psychologist and parents are perturbed as children can watch television with ease (Sharif 1999). Unquestionably, I strongly assert that television bring more harm than good as television will cause viewers to become physically and mentally deterrent as well as poor behaviour.

Firstly, television viewers defected physically as health problem is one of the cruxes of this issue. “It is a sedentary activity and when indulged in with snacks, can cause obesity and related diseases” (Rutherford 2002, p.14). Additionally, children too are influenced to not being active if they watch television for prolonged periods (Sharif 1999). Based on a research from UK Time Use Survey (2000), the dearth time spent on doing sports and exercises are quite limited compared with the hours spent on watching television. Briefly, television viewing may lead to health problems.

Secondly, television viewing may also cause audiences especially children to be mentally affected as to their thinking skills. Indeed, it is well-supported by Leigh (2001), as she said that the essential skills in developing problem-solving and organizational activity are majorly affected as children do not generate the imaginative skills to create fictitious characters, situations, and make-believe worlds. Moreover, short-term attention is likely to be implemented into the children’s minds (Sharif 1999). This is because of today’s short segments and loud yet colourful presentation of children’s programs and music video clips. Therefore, children’s thinking ability is reduced as an implication of television viewing.

Lastly, poor behaviour of children is also another consequence of television viewing. Children’s behaviour is often portrayed by the programs they watch. Children nowadays continually become less susceptible to violence as graphic scenes of rampage demonstrated not only on television shows but also on the prime time televised news. As a consequence, children may bear in mind that being violent is normal and it is the only way to solve problems naturally. Furthermore, some poor attitude is illustrated by emulating characters they saw on television (Sharif 1999). In short, bad attitude is likely to happen due to television viewing.

In conclusion, television viewing causes spectators to be deterred physically; children will scarce in thinking skills as well as bad behaviour. Indubitably, television programs are created to demand incessant focus, thus making us unable to concentrate on things like homework (Leigh 2001). Ultimately, television viewing consume into duration set aside for homework or exercise (Rutherford 2002). Finally, related authorities such as parents, and the media should take action from the grass roots level to prevent children from being deteriorated by the bad side of television. Therefore, I stress on my stand once again that television bring more cons than pros.

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