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F@k factor
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boyfalldown
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It is a bit s***
neil_g
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Personally I don't. But think of all that schedule time thst could be freed up for something.. Well.. Better?I don't like broccoli, so I dont eat it
The sceptic in me wonders how much advertising and sponsorship revenue the networks would lose though.
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"Talent" Shows.
"Reality" shows.
TOWIE or any of its clones.
Soaps.
I'macelebritybigbrother.
I'd rather do the ironing.
Hell...I'd rather do anyone's ironing!
What time do you want to come round and collect it?
viv1969
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Hugh Jarse
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"Talent" Shows.
"Reality" shows.
TOWIE or any of its clones.
Soaps.
I'macelebritybigbrother.
I'd rather do the ironing.
Hell...I'd rather do anyone's ironing!
You are booked
What are your hourly rates?
viv1969
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If the choice were ironing ir being forced to watch that drivel, I'd do it for free
Bernie174
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Dear BBC Points of View
Could you please arrange for the entire BBC Schedule to only consist of X-Factor/Strictly come prancing/I'm a third rate Celb get me on the show/any other similar drivel.
This because I really dislike Ironing and I have found a novel way of getting it down for the price of my licence fee which I'd have to pay anyway, either way it's cheaper than Mrs Miggins Ironing service.
Thanks
Lots of love
Bernie
Hugh Jarse
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If the choice were ironing ir being forced to watch that drivel, I'd do it for free
TBH Not a lot of TV gets watched in my house though my 'man cave' has a big flat screen TV and Sky TV etc for the Sport channels and genuine classic films.
Also since I have retired from full time work, very little of my clothes need ironing. I have my high days, weddings and funeral suits but the rest is pretty much a 2 minute run over with the iron or into the trouser press so I have to cancel the ironing contract.
Arrgggghhh this house is full of nutty kids getting ready for school...... fantastic!
Steve
Hugh Jarse
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OP
archangel
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I don't watch them but they just irritate me when I turn on tv or switch channel......and see a perfectly good programme slot taken up with such crap....and now I see adverts for "I am a t*** get me out here"
Hugh Jarse
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Best fit for me is a simple house rule... TVs on in empty rooms was always a no go.
The celeb and talent type shows never became de rigeur at home and when the kids grew up , left and had their own families, they never got into the x factor type shows.
That said some people love them and all I feel is each to their own!
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Byker28i
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Other programmes are available...
http://www.radiotimes.com/tv/tv-listings#{"sd":"09-11-2014 18:00:00"}
8 million people tuned in for the halloween special, 10.8 million for Strictly.
Personally I recommend a good book, I'm currently reading Danzigers Britain and have bought a couple of others of his.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Danzigers-Britain-A-Journey-Edge/dp/0006382495
viv1969
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I'll take the book option.
I just don't see the entertainment value in the types of programmes mentioned earlier.
Perhaps I should try recording them and watching them back when my insomia kicks in.
Anything to avoid ironing Bernie's smalls!!
Hugh Jarse
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I am trying to find a book by supposedly a grandson os Tolstoy (also a Tolstoy) set in England and is the tale of 2 evil teachers who set up a private scbool to get loads of cash in fees and steal pocket money from the kids in the school.
I read it in the mid to late 70s but cannot find it anywhere in my store of books. Searching on line has yielded nothing......
But agree a good book is a superb way to spend time.
srichards
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That book sounds a bit like an Ealing comedy as well. It rings vague bells for me too.
As for prime time weekend evening tv, I watch netflix. This way all the insipid drivel is avoided.
Is it called the The Founding of Evil Hold School? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0779867/
It was a jackanory.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-founding-Evil-Hold-School/dp/0491003714
As for prime time weekend evening tv, I watch netflix. This way all the insipid drivel is avoided.
Is it called the The Founding of Evil Hold School? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0779867/
It was a jackanory.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-founding-Evil-Hold-School/dp/0491003714
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Earley Man
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Over forty years ago I read an article in a newspaper, obviously can't remember which one but not a redtop, in which the writer stated "It must be realised that television programmes, with a few exceptions, are designed to act as chewing gum for the mind." I thought he was right at the time and nothing I've seen on TV has changed my mind since.
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i love it, if you dont then turn over you fat lazy sods
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That's absolutely true - and now I've got that to mind, I'm not going to shake that thought off.
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But its like a car crash isn't it?
Its so terrible that you just have to look
I might add though that I hardly watch TV (and haven't for many years)
save for the odd film here and there.
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archangel
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The earliest evidence of this vivid metaphor located by QI appeared in a 1944 book by Henri Peyre who was a Professor of French at Yale University. In 1944 television sets were still very expensive, and the industry was immature in the U.S. The metaphor was applied to movies and radio broadcasts instead. Boldface has been added to excerpts:
Yet there is no sorrier sight to watch then the vacant faces of those former high school and college students when, at thirty-five or fifty, all their mental alertness having vanished, the spark gone from their eyes, they dutifully chew their gum to keep from yawning, while absorbing thechewing gum for the eyes of the movies or the chewing gum for the ears of the radio.
The same men who once read Shakespeare, Molière, Byron glance at the headlines of their tabloid papers, turn straight to the page of the funnies, to devour them with the same dutiful sense of boredom as they swallow their hamburger at lunchtime and their highball after dinner.
More than a decade later this figurative language was applied to another communication medium. In January 1955 Steven H. Scheur who was a well-known film critic visited the “book-lined New York apartment” of John Mason Brown who was a prominent theater critic. They discussed the quality of the programs broadcast on television. Brown applied the chewing-gum metaphor to TV:
Although Brown is generally recognized as our most eminent theater essayist—Saturday Review of Literature—he confesses to a special partiality for TV news shows.
“So much of TV seems to be chewing gum for the eyes. … TV desperately needs more self-reliance and pride in the medium.”
By 1958 the remark was being credited to the architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Details are given further below.
Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.
In June 1955 “Time” magazine wrote about a radio program called “Invitation to Learning” featuring three participants: critic John Mason Brown, essayist Clifton Fadiman and moderator Lyman Bryson. During the show Brown repeated his harsh characterization of TV:
Talk is cheap, the three decided, but conversation has a different price tag on it. “There must be mind in talk to make it conversation,” said Moderator Bryson. “Television programs are so much chewing gum for the eyes,” said Critic Brown. “A conversation has to be more than just chewing gum or wastage.” Essayist Fadiman urged intellectual exercise.
Brown’s remark was memorable, and it was included in a collection titled “Best Quotes of ’54 ’55 ’56” compiled by James Beasley Simpson. Brown used the saying when he was interviewed by the compiler in July 1955, but this time he credited another unnamed person:
“Some television programs are so much chewing gum for the eyes.”
John Mason Brown, quoting a friend of his small son, interview with James Simpson, July 28, 1955.
In October 1955 the popular columnist Walter Winchell printed a version of the saying with a similar indirect attribution:
John Mason Brown’s quipper-snapper: “I heard someone (a young man of 17 but of great wisdom) define many television programs as being just so much chewing gum for the eyes.”
In January 1958 the saying was attributed to Frank Lloyd Wright by the columnist Ed Sullivan who stated that Wright employed the expression during a dinner. This is the earliest evidence of this common ascription located by QI:
Frank Lloyd Wright’s definition, at a Chicago dinner: “TV is chewing gum for the eyes,” would be applauded by Clement Attlee, who explains his refusal to buy a TV set: “I don’t want it. I don’t like it. I won’t have it.”
In February 1958 a popular syndicated columnist Larry Wolters writing in the Chicago Tribune credited Wright: 7
CHICAGO: Definition of television from Frank Lloyd Wright:“Chewing gum for the eyes!”
In October 1958 a writer in a West Virginia newspaper connected the saying to a manipulative press agent: 8
Some poor press agent has succeeded in getting his client credit with saying: “Television is chewing gum for the eyes.” We’ll go along that. Especially the endless and tiresome series of adult and adolescent westerns that smoke up our screens nightly.
Wright died in 1959 and a short Washington Post article reviewing his career credited him with a version of the quotation: 9
Wright died in 1959 and a short Washington Post article reviewing his career credited him with a version of the quotation: 9
But Mr. Wright did not merely express an opinion; he threw off remarks like a porcupine shedding quills. His barbs struck home. One recalls the remark credited to him that television “is chewing gum for the eyes.” Surely this was ungrateful from a man who came over television with so unblurred and memorable an image.
In 1960 the indefatigable quotation collector Bennett Cerf ascribed a variant of the remark to Wright in his syndicated column: 10
In 1960 the indefatigable quotation collector Bennett Cerf ascribed a variant of the remark to Wright in his syndicated column: 10
No TV addict was the late Frank Lloyd Wright. “Television,” was his dictum “is nothing more than chewing gum for the eyeballs.”
In 1961 the columnist Larry Wolters published the saying again, but the phrasing was slightly altered: 11
In 1961 the columnist Larry Wolters published the saying again, but the phrasing was slightly altered: 11
The late Frank Lloyd Wright on TV: “It’s only chewing gum for the eyes.”
In 1962 a newspaper in Montana printed a variant in which the word “eyes” was replaced with “mind”: 12
In 1962 a newspaper in Montana printed a variant in which the word “eyes” was replaced with “mind”: 12
It’s called idiot box, Cyclops, chewing gum for the mind, the mind-seduction machine, conversation killer, a wasteland and television.
The connection to Brown was not forgotten, and in 1968 “Time” magazine credited him with the saying: 13
The connection to Brown was not forgotten, and in 1968 “Time” magazine credited him with the saying: 13
A dozen years ago, Critic John Mason Brown defined television as chewing gum for the eyes. Now the record industry has come up with bubble gum for the ears. Set to a chink-a-chink beat, bleated out with pep-rally fervor, it goes like this:
Yummy, yummy, yummy, I got love in my tummy, And I feel like a-lovin’ you; Love, you’re such a sweet thing, good enough to eat thing, And that’s just a-what I’m gonna dooooo.
In 1974 the prominent talk show host Dick Cavett writing in “New York Magazine” ascribed the saying to the popular comedian Fred Allen 14
Yummy, yummy, yummy, I got love in my tummy, And I feel like a-lovin’ you; Love, you’re such a sweet thing, good enough to eat thing, And that’s just a-what I’m gonna dooooo.
In 1974 the prominent talk show host Dick Cavett writing in “New York Magazine” ascribed the saying to the popular comedian Fred Allen 14
Fred Allen called TV chewing gum for the eyes. Although many people write me after a show and thank me for educating and stimulating them, my guess is that a larger number of people want TV to be a visual Muzak, a mind deadener.
In conclusion, QI believes that Henri Peyre deserves credit for originating this striking metaphor by 1944. He applied it to movies and radio and not TV. By 1955 John Mason Brown adapted the metaphor to television. However, he did not credit himself with the coinage; instead, he ascribed to words to an unknown young person.
Evidence also suggests that Frank Lloyd Wright employed the expression during a dinner circa January 1958 though it is unlikely that he coined it. The ascription to Fred Allen is not well-supported at this time.
In conclusion, QI believes that Henri Peyre deserves credit for originating this striking metaphor by 1944. He applied it to movies and radio and not TV. By 1955 John Mason Brown adapted the metaphor to television. However, he did not credit himself with the coinage; instead, he ascribed to words to an unknown young person.
Evidence also suggests that Frank Lloyd Wright employed the expression during a dinner circa January 1958 though it is unlikely that he coined it. The ascription to Fred Allen is not well-supported at this time.
viv1969
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Says the guy turning his brain to Brie by watching it.
Still...good to see the charm school was worth the money
Byker28i
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Says the guy turning his brain to Brie by watching it.
Still...good to see the charm school was worth the money
Yum Brie...
Hugh Jarse
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Sadly not the book
Ot was a hard bacl tome amd a good read. Beyond Jackanory level but thanks for your input
S
Earley Man
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Hi Mike,
Thanks for posting this, I didn't know the history of the quote. I have always assumed that the person who wrote it in the paper had coined the expression.
Bernie174
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Oh please.....My smalls are vast!
I did watch the last 5 minutes of one of these reality 'talent' shows on Saturday. In my defence I didn't inhale/chew/take it in so using the US Presidents standards of guilt I am innocent, however, even that 5 minutes made me ashamed to be British, the howling mass of chav's in the audience who doubtless got free tickets from BBC Be on a show really were reminiscent of a pack of orphaned hunting dog puppies.
It made me want to reach for the Club's Webley and walk slowly out of the door.
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So the 400,000,000 people who have bought one directions records are wrongSays the guy turning his brain to Brie by watching it.
Still...good to see the charm school was worth the money
viv1969
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As prepubescent girls who are known to have little, if any taste or judgement. ..yes
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When I was not quite as old as I am now, we used to have programmes with real entertainers. People who could tell jokes, play musical instruments, act, perform magic, sing, etc.
Now it seems that programmes are about gardening, decorating, cooking and cleaning your house. People who would have been servants (if you could afford them) are now our 'stars'.
And the 'I can't believe it's not talent' type of programmes are no better. If they really wanted to showcase talent, it would be very easy to fill each show with real talented people but instead they go for what they think is entertaining and glorify the mediocre. Acts which have no right to get past the audition stage somehow get onto TV.
Steve.
Now it seems that programmes are about gardening, decorating, cooking and cleaning your house. People who would have been servants (if you could afford them) are now our 'stars'.
And the 'I can't believe it's not talent' type of programmes are no better. If they really wanted to showcase talent, it would be very easy to fill each show with real talented people but instead they go for what they think is entertaining and glorify the mediocre. Acts which have no right to get past the audition stage somehow get onto TV.
Steve.
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Are you married to ST4As prepubescent girls who are known to have little, if any taste or judgement. ..yes
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Ah real entertainment, you mean like Hughie Green used to muster up from the homeless shelters every Saturday Evening like the guy who could move his stomach muscles, or the one who could dislocate his own shoulder joint, the chap who played spoons and the old bird in the dowdy dress who spoke posh and read poetry, oh how i long for those golden days to return.
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viv1969
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No.
I have taste.
Also...having sold 45 million "records", and taking into account the rate at which they release the garbage...coupled with the probability that each girl will promptly wet themselves and purchase everything available, you'd probably find that one direction's buying base is just a teensy bit smaller than your given 400 million.
Hugh Jarse
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Had to give you a thumbs up for that but we need a Bah Humbug Hammer too
Bah humbug for me too
Hugh Jarse
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No.
I have taste.
Also...having sold 45 million "records", and taking into account the rate at which they release the garbage...coupled with the probability that each girl will promptly wet themselves and purchase everything available, you'd probably find that one direction's buying base is just a teensy bit smaller than your given 400 million.
And a Bah Humbug for both of us... so true..... too much pocket money and princess/fairy photoshoots on Groupon too!