Blast from the Past: Returning to a family tv hour by Kristen Math

When I was growing up, our family hour began at 7pm.  Dinner, homework and extracurricular activities had to be out of the way so that we could all run to the family room and plant ourselves in front of the television set.  Sure, most people today would cringe at the idea of suggesting that watching TV and family time are somehow related, but I bet they never popped Jiffy Pop popcorn on the stovetop, cuddled up with their dad, mom and brother on a comfy old couch and marveled over Ponch’s latest escapades or the ‘genius’ of another adventure with Bo and Luke Duke.  Sure, Daisy pushed the envelope with her shorty shorts and in retrospect the adventures did involve some rather unwholesome booze runs, but that was no competition for today’s seedy television fair.   Children’s programming has even become more appalling.  Gone are the days of The Brady Bunch or The Muppet Show.  They have been replaced by the likes of SpongeBob Squarepants, Edd Edd’n Eddy and the much anticipated Mr. Meaty.  Family-oriented programming is literally a thing of the past.  After listening to my two year old repeat the word ‘stupid’ after seeing it repeated again and again on a Nickelodeon and realizing that my daughter’s life resembled something out of As Told By Ginger, I decided enough was enough.  It was time to pull the plug.  We removed the cables from all of our television sets to restrict daytime television watching.

In place of standard television, we then instituted our own ‘family hour’ each evening.  My husband and I have purchased the DVDs for the TV series The Brady Bunch, Growing Pains and Facts of Life.  At 7pm we all pile on to our two old leather sofas down in the family room with popcorn finished in less than 2 minutes in the microwave.   We watch one episode from each series and then send the kids upstairs to get ready for bed, comfortable knowing that they are consuming television which is geared at children and families, and that addresses themes that are still relevant to today without crossing the lines of indecency.  My daughter can now proudly sing The Brady Bunch theme song and my oldest son is already planning to order Doogie Howser.  My husband and I are almost finished watching all of the published episodes of Bewitched.

During the day, our house is now strangely quiet.  Gone are the howls of “I split my pants” or the loud commercials enticing the kids to want more. The constant background noise spit out by the little black box has been replaced by the quarrels of childhood.  My kids are back to arguing with each other, fighting over who gets to ride on the ‘best’ swing and are throwing sand out of the sandbox.  Oddly, I prefer it this way.  The TV was an ‘easy’ way to keep the peace, but it was out of control in our house.  Hopefully, as the summer months fly by, our children will adjust to the new TV-free days, and we will all benefit from spending time together each night bonding over the trauma of Marcia getting braces or Bobby’s fall from the neighborhood tree house.