Television can kill you

When I was a child, television was considered bad for you. It corrupted your mind. It ruined your eyes and it gave up radiation that could make you sterile or worse.

Today, with televisions increasing in size, they've become deadline for an entirely different reason. Once again this past week, we read of a youngster who was crushed and killed by a large-screen television falling from an unsuitable television stand. Several similar stories have been in the news over the past couple years.

It's always been amazing to me the role a television plays in the average American home. Remember when they were called television "sets?" That's because at one time you bought a kit (or set, like an erector set) and built your own. My first television set was a five-inch screen attached to a box the size of breadmaker. All during college and for much of my early career years, that tiny black-and-white filled the bill perfectly.

The last television we purchased was about 15 years ago at a department store in Santa Maria, Calif. It was a nifty 24-inch with a great picture and heavy as a refrigerator. We still have it. It's probably the best investment we've ever made.

It's hard to believe that beginning in 2009 our old television will be officially obsolete. We're trying to decide whether we're going to buy a new one or simply get the digital converter kit. Hardly seems right to get rid of something that works so well.

For all of the technological changes, it's fair to say that Newton Minow continues to be correct in his assessment that television is a "vast wasteland," as he declared it in 1960. Oh, there are moments of brilliance. Who can watch the Walton family wishing each other a good night and not be moved?

Today's television content consists of a collection of reality shows, game shows and an odd and absurd retinue of productions most of us can easily live without. But we don't. It's the odd household that doesn't have cable or dish so we can surf for hours and never find anything worth watching.

And now, television is the latest threat to our children, only this time a quick and deadly physical threat, not a slow and mind-rotting threat many of us have always believed it to be.

Maybe the era of digital and high definition television will mean an increase in the quality of programming. Maybe not.