SCREEN AND ITS EFFECTS
1.
Six
Ways TV Corrupts and Destroys Our Children and Society
2.
Is
TV Destroying You?
3.
Television
Harmful to Toddlers
4.
Top
10 Reasons to Turn Off Your TV
5. The Ill Effects of
Television
Six Ways TV
Corrupts
·
Sexualization
of children from an early age
·
Destroying
the difference between feminine and masculine gender
·
Hatred
for parents and total independence from them
·
Creating
negative perception of parents
·
Introduction
and familiarization with magic
·
Reduction
of intelligence
The author of the
paper has given sufficient reasons that affirm all the above claims. It’s
interesting to note that the definition
of television, as given by Encyclopedia Britannica, is the electrical
transmission of pictures in motion and simultaneous electrical transmission of the
accompanying sounds. This covers not just the television screen but also the
computer systems and phones in our hands that perform the functions of
television.
Is TV Destroying
You?
The second paper
alleged that TV does destroy you thus:
·
Destroying
your Aqeedah
·
Destroying
your Islamic morals
·
Destroying
your wealth
·
Destroying
your time and wealth
Remember, the
argument is not about the concept of TV per se but the contents therein, most
especially the movies and programmes alike. The author argued that TV has been
the strongest propaganda machine ever created to alter one's perception.
These are the
alternatives to TV consumption proposed by the author:
·
Outdoor
activities
·
Spending
quality time with family
·
Community
engagements
·
Others:
enrolling in classes of interest, reading Islamic books, listening to lectures,
dhikr, charity projects, etc.
Television Harmful
to Toddlers
This paper covered
the effects watching TV has on toddlers, ranging from retarding their
intellectual growth to exposure to immoral content, which is socially
engineered to familiarize their brains and consequently affect their later
relationships as adults. The paper presented empirical data from multiple
research studies conducted on toddlers.
Top Ten Reasons to
Turn Off Your TV
This paper
mentioned ten items that could compel you to turn off your TV, but I will
mention a few, as many have been previously covered by the initial papers:
·
It
makes you uninteresting. This is because one who watches TV all the time hardly
has a life outside it. You can't maintain intellectual discussions but are
limited to movies and TV alone.
·
It
makes you buy things and costs you money. TV introduces you, through
commercials, to new items—some of which you don't need, or your existing ones
work perfectly—but psychologically disposes you to buying them.
·
TV
is addictive. There's no two ways about this. Watching TV is not synonymous
with relaxation, as it keeps your brain busy with the characters featured
therein, to the extent of sometimes dreaming about them.
·
TV
ruins relationships. Know that watching TV together is not quality time.
·
TV
stresses you out and even makes you overweight, as it limits you to a sedentary
lifestyle. This paper offers no solution of any sort.
The Ill Effects of
Television
This is the last
paper, and it focuses on the Islamic jurisprudence of TV content as follows:
·
Music
and TV are inseparable, and Islam has already frowned upon music as it diverts
one's attention from dhikr.
·
Female
voice: Islam forbids women from softening their speech when talking to
non-mahrams, but TV does exactly this in virtually all commercials—even those
that have nothing to do with women.
·
Nudity
and immorality are also rampant segments of every TV content.
·
TV
and crime: of course, violence is part of the content watched on TV, and this
has a profound effect on one's brain, as it renders one insensitive to crimes.
The document ends
with this question: "Should anyone be watching television?"
The Discussion
We had e-attendees
and, of course, those of us who physically graced the session at Kano
Zoological Garden. The contributions below are a summary of the discussion by
Hashim Muhammad, Imam Az-Zubayr, Ahmad Muhammad Tahir, Mujiburrahman Rabiu
Lawal, Misbahu El-Hamza, and my humble self. Frustration with TV and its
content was so visible throughout the documents, and no viable, workable
alternatives were presented. The document did more to highlight the problems
rather than offer a way out. There seems to be a limitation in forms of halal
entertainment, especially for kids in our communities.
1.
You
can't discard a habit without creating a substitute, and habits are formed
gradually, not overnight. All the issues described have nothing to do with TV
as an entity but with its content, and therefore changing the content is
possible. Even though some of the papers did acknowledge the positive sides of
TV, they still felt that since the disadvantages outweighed the benefits, it
should be discarded, which is not quite possible for everyone (some can; in
fact, some have already divorced TV). Let's start by focusing on the positive
aspects: the lectures, documentaries, learning, Qur'an recitation, and all
forms of dhikr, as there are channels dedicated to these contents, then a
little of the conventional TV content to start. Something like a 70% to 30%
ratio, as one hardly wakes up and cuts off a habit.
2.
Parents
must work on designing the content that will be consumed by their children, as
they are solely responsible for moulding their kids, even if it takes watching
the content ahead of time. Otherwise, TV will do it for them, and they will
definitely not like it.
3.
Games
are safer than TV these days. The concept of gamification of knowledge is
becoming a norm, where kids play a game and simultaneously learn from it.
4.
Communality
of experience enhances the fun of any entertainment.
5.
As
for breaking addiction, not only for TV, identifying the trigger (the cue) is
key, as it will enable you to replace it with a good habit. Don't resist the
temptation; rather, acknowledge it.
6.
These
three books were recommended for further reading to identify habits, their
formation, and proper utilization:
·
The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg
·
Atomic Habits by James Clear
·
Originals by Adam Grant
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