Parents are mistreating their children on a daily basis and do not realize the damage and harm they are causing.
I am, of course, referring to children being exposed to passive viewing of mindless television every day for hours on end.
Children must never watch television. Television causes psychological, physical and emotional harm. Some of you would ask how I could think this. My children watch television. I watched television growing up, and I’m perfectly fine. Are you? Are they?
First, a study done by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 83 percent of children under the age of 2 are watching television over two hours per day on average. In addition, Dr. Aric Sigman, who is an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, said that “television viewing is linked to stunting brain development in the child’s frontal lobes, leading to reduced impulse control and increased antisocial behavior.”
Here is another fact: There are nine million children who take prescription medication for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and that number is doubling every year due to the two or three hours a day they are spending in front of the television.
Nine million children are on drugs because they are unable to maintain focus in classrooms, because they are used to being stimulated by television programs that require no thought on the part of the child. When in a classroom setting, they become confused and do not know how to process the ideas and participation required of them. Therefore they act out, and what do we do? We label them “problem children” and put them on drugs to ensure their behavior will be easier to control.
America has become a spectator society, a nation of couch potatoes. Children have lost their sense of imagination and must be immediately entertained. There is a direct link between television viewing and obesity in children. One in five children are obese because they are spending more time sitting in front of the television instead of getting physical exercise by playing outside. Because of obesity, children then develop diabetes and then have a greater risk of developing heart disease in adulthood.
Harvard Medical School did a study and found that 35 percent of children who watch television are fatter because they become less active.
Parents are using television as the new, free babysitter. Don’t be fooled. Everything has a price, and this price is your children’s future well being and a lifetime of painful struggle with prescription drugs and obesity.
Lastly, television content is emotionally damaging to children and their fragile self-esteem. We are force-feeding the notion that our children will only find happiness if they find their Prince Charming and are swept off their feet straight to the alter, to fulfill their lifelong dream of the storybook wedding.
Shows on television feature material with adult themes like love, kissing and sex, which is not material appropriate for children, yet it is a billion-dollar industry because we, as the unfulfilled consumers, bought into it.
Why does Disney continuously make kids’ movies that always result in a woman being rescued by a man, or animals who must fall in love? We need to teach our young girls that they do not need to be rescued, so they may develop into capable, intelligent and self-reliant women.
It’s a dreary day when families know more about what is going on with Ross and Rachel from “Friends” than they do with their own family members. It’s tragic that children want Cinderella’s dream instead of creating and finding their own.