I’ll preface this post with a few facts. First, I’ve been drinking whisky. Second, all of this is based on my personal experience and opinions and is nowhere indicative of scientific fact. I have read nothing about this subject. This is just about me and my personal observations about television versus radio.
Having said all that, let me explain the background of my claims. I am not in any way a stranger to the allure of the television, the evil siren of the entertainment world. In the past, I have found myself easily succumbing to television and watching as my standards for worthy entertainment dropped time and time again. This usually ended up in me being hopelessly addicted to horrible reality television shows in which the freaks of society and their average counterparts are thrown together to mingle, fight, love and lose. Anyone living in the UK will be familiar with this sort of television. In this case, my example is Big Brother. Anyway, the point is not what it was but the fact that watching it can be almost as boring and monotonous as a television watcher’s meaningless existence. It is only slightly above the thrill I may get from – I don’t know – clipping my toenails, perhaps. Actually now that I think upon it further, clipping my toenails is more satisfying because of the delay between clipping sessions. Anyway, I haven’t been watching much TV lately because we don’t have one in a great location for us in our current living arrangements. Overall, I see this as a good thing.
I’m not by any means saying that all television is horrible. I love a good documentary, decent films, etc. You can’t get that sort of thing on radio in the same way and I appreciate some regular television as well. I’m a shameless fan of the new Battlestar Galactica show, and I don’t care that you know. I like it and I think that it is good television. The thing is though that most of the time, television is just not that good. I’d just as soon be playing games, taking photos, writing or just surfing the internet. Unfortunately, television does not allow me to do these things once I get into the habit of watching it. It sucks me into a time vortex and I waste the hours of my life in front of the box.
Since I came to the UK, I’ve been listening to BBC Radio 4. I started this practice because I was driving a total of around 8 hours on the weekends going to and from my wife’s house, before she was my wife. I’d leave right after work on a Friday night and get there about 4 hours later, since there was traffic and a long distance to contend with. The main problem was that I was always tired from a long day of work and I found regular music didn’t help me combat this. I’d just go into a sort of trance and it started to get dangerous. One day I tried listening to Radio 4, which is a spoken-word station. For some reason, this station kept my brain active and every time I’ve listened to it since, I’ve never been at risk for falling asleep.
Radio 4 broadcasts news, drama, comedy, science and history. It has a good mix of topics and all of the newsreaders, hosts, etc always seemed very well informed. I’m not going to tell you that I love everything on the station because I don’t. Some of it, frankly, caters to an older audience and I don’t care for the soap operas such as The Archers. I do very much enjoy the plays, the current affairs programmes, the pieces on literature and poetry and the programmes which focus on religion/spirituality and the like. I find that while I listen to the radio in this way, my mind is active. When listening to dramas, plays, or listening to a book reading, my imagination paints a picture using the words coming through the speakers. My brain is always working and assessing the words on the radio but when I’m watching the television, my brain is dead. I find myself wanting to eat or surf the internet while I watch television because watching television on its own doesn’t occupy enough of my brain.
Maybe your experience is different, but I’d urge you to give talk radio a chance if you haven’t done so already. Radio 4 is great and I hear good things about NPR although I don’t think their format is all talk. Anyway, that’s all from me for now.
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