Channel Zero
Television? Not on Their Watch

By Korin Miller
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, March 15, 2007

Nell Triplett's Woodley Park living room is filled with the usual suspects: couch, coffee table, bookshelf and cozy fireplace. But there's one notable absence. "I've never had a television," she says.

No TV? Anywhere in the apartment? Doesn't she know the latest about Kate and Sawyer's "Lost" romance, or Meredith and McDreamy on "Grey's Anatomy"? Nope. She doesn't watch either one. The latest straining hopeful to be booted off "American Idol"? No clue.

Instead, she takes yoga, salsa dancing and French classes in the evenings. She plays the violin, reads a lot and trains for a marathon. Triplett, 25, says people give her a funny look when they learn of her TV-free life: "They always ask me how I live without it. . . . [But] I've never even considered owning one."

For many of us, television plays a big role in the way we live. At home, living rooms gave way to family rooms that gave way to media rooms. Reading chairs begat easy chairs that begat recliners, now with remote control and beer cooler built in. And then there's the endless programming, from ESPN to HBO to MTV, presented on flat screens, projector screens, HDTV with surround sound. Why would -- how could -- anyone do without?

Not many people do. According to a Census Bureau study, 98.2 percent of U.S. households in 2004 had televisions, averaging 2.8 sets per home. But there is a minuscule group of Americans who just say no to television.

Their reasons vary: Some, like Triplett, never had a TV growing up. Some think the shows are not worth their time. Others simply find television too distracting. Whatever the rationale, life without TV is a rarity.

"To aggressively not have a TV is to take yourself out of the loop of American cultural conversation," says Robert J. Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University. He says people are often shocked, then reverential upon learning of someone's TV-free lifestyle.

Triplett grew up in California's Santa Cruz mountains, where no-TV families were fairly common. "I have a lot of respect for the way my parents raised us," she says. "Without TV, we had time for creative devices and spent time outdoors." The self-proclaimed "news junkie" says she's probably better informed than many other people, getting news from the Web, newspapers and radio.

Triplett is content to come home to silence after a long day of work or an evening out with friends. "It's nice to not rely on a TV for company," says the government employee. "I look at a screen all day. I don't want to look at one at home."

Jeffrey Boulier ditched the tube 12 years ago when he realized his viewing habits were distracting him from his schoolwork at George Washington University. "I just found it too easy to get sucked into watching it," says Boulier, 33. "I would suddenly find myself at 2 a.m. watching 'Judge Judy.' It just wasn't worth it."

When he's not working as a database administrator in the District, he reads at home in Fairfax, e-mails friends and surfs the Internet, plays pool and volunteers as an emergency medical technician in Nokesville. He says he's much happier without TV: "It takes up all your time, and I've got a lot of other things to do."

Despite his experience, Boulier says he isn't one to climb on a soapbox and preach about the benefits of a TV-free life. He says he has "some vague objections" to television because the tube has "replaced a lot of alternatives that are more socially beneficial or more intellectually stimulating for some people." But Boulier stresses that his unfavorable view of TV is "not a huge thing" for him.

Jonathan Karp, 40, occasionally thumbs his nose at his TV-viewing friends, but he says it's all in fun. The software developer throws a non-Super Bowl party at his Cleveland Park house every year and cooks for friends while most of us are tuned to the game. "It's pretty rare that there's a televised event that I feel like I have to see," Karp says. He characterizes himself as "non-TV" rather than "anti-TV" and stresses that he's "your normal, average D.C. resident." As evidence, he points out that the couple who live across the hall from him don't have a television either.

Susan Campbell knows that her TV-free life is unusual, and she's fine with that. Campbell and her husband, Mark Pugliese, were never big TV viewers and didn't buy a set when they got married. Four kids (all boys) later, she says they made the right decision: "It's very noisy in our house, and when you add the TV to that noise, it's just a cacophony. Who needs that?"

A few years ago a friend gave them a TV. It's in the basement, not the living room, of their Cleveland Park home. The boys watch it only on "special occasions," such as the State of the Union address, she says. They have to get permission from Mom and Dad. Campbell's oldest son, Nick Pugliese, a junior at Gonzaga College High School, says his mom would be puzzled if she caught him watching their set. "She would have to ask me what I was doing," he says. "It's not like she would be furious, but it's not the kind of thing that you would see in our family."

The boys "periodically" pester Campbell about TV, she says, but did so more often when they were younger. Nick remembers rallying together with his younger brothers on the issue but says it was so the three of them could play video games, not watch shows.

Nick is active in sports, clubs and his school's musical, but says he's a bit out of the loop when it comes to certain TV shows, such as "24," a hit with his classmates. Regardless, he says, the benefits of his non-TV life outweigh the negatives: "My parents told me I read 'The Chronicles of Narnia' at a really young age. I did a lot of stuff that I wouldn't have done if I had watched TV."

Nick may be on to something, according to Dorothy Singer, co-director of the Yale University Family Television Research and Consultation Center in New Haven, Conn. Children who watch a lot of TV have less patience and don't share as well as their counterparts, Singer's research has found. They're also less likely to pick up a book and read for fun.

And yet Singer does not advocate completely removing TV from a household. "I think television can give us tremendous information, depending on how you select it," she says. "You'd be foolish to get rid of it." She recommends that families keep their set in a common room, where everyone has access to it, and remove TVs from children's bedrooms.

Nick Pugliese says he plans to enjoy a few shows in college and will probably buy a television one day. And although Triplett considers many TV programs to be "trash," she isn't ruling out buying a set when she has a family of her own -- as long as her kids don't watch too much of it.