Trash TV: We're All Guilty

In my house, we usually always have the TV on at night, whether it’s my dad’s car shows or my mom watching "48 hours," if the TV isn’t on in the family room something isn’t right. It’s not like I was on protected viewing as a child. I mean, my mom refused to let me see the movie "Juno," but in retrospect it was probably best for my unexposed, 12-year-old eyes. In fact, when I was growing up I seldom watched TV in my free time, but looking back on it, I am 100 percent accepting of the fact that I spent more time reading books than watching episodes.

Today, that’s a different story. Usually, whenever I have down time I find myself opening up my laptop and clicking on the Netflix shortcut in my browser to watch whatever show I’m currently obsessing over. I have seen every last episode of "Gossip Girl", "Grey’s Anatomy", "Sex and the City", "Orange is the New Black" - you name it. I was probably on my fifth consecutive episode of "Criminal Minds" when I paused and thought - I should probably be doing something more productive with my time. So the next night instead of binge watching my new favorite crime show, I started back up on "BMS" (I know, it’s embarrassing). While hearing Thad Castle’s whiny voice I thought about how truly mind-numbing the TV show is. Yeah ok, that seems pretty obvious, but I had chosen that show for a reason.

Why did I choose that show? Simple, I chose it because of its surface value. We absolutely devour this kind of mental junk food because it allows our brains to unwind and escape to a fictional situation. It requires no effort. In a weird way, it might even be advantageous to have a guilty pleasure that allows you to completely rest your mind. It's entirely ok to get in your weekly dose of trash TV, just don't over dose. So I am going to keep checking in on. "The Rich Kids of Beverly Hills" and continue to occasionally Keep Up With "The Kardashians" because every now and then we all deserve some trash TV (or at least that’s what I’m going to tell myself).