Their frequent explanation: TV is filled with reality shows, and who wants to see that crap? If you publicly reject TV, you rise in many people's estimation, even triggering guilt among many TV devotees (in the same way an outspoken vegan can inspire guilt among frequenters of Burger King). Consider the timeless words of bygone FCC Chairman Newton Minow: I invite you to sit down in front of your television set when your station goes on the air and stay there ... until the station signs off. "Vast wasteland" was coined in a speech by Minow a half-century ago, when there were just three commercial networks, no cable-network options, few shows in color, and fuzzy, snowy pictures (with high-def transmission barely dreamed of). [...] the snob appeal of dissing TV is as attractive today as it was when Milton Berle was cavorting in drag as Mr. Television. [...] do TV defectors need to be reminded that TV's wasteland, immeasurably more vast today as it sprawls across hundreds of channels ? far more than the handful of channels in the past ? is relieved by broad swaths of solid entertainment, and by patches of inarguable brilliance? The stigma of "television" becomes all the more nonsensical as the nature of TV (what does "TV" even mean?) is increasingly in flux. The so-called second screen (of a computer, tablet or smartphone) offers companion sites for a communal experience to viewing any given TV show, and for offering feedback to that show. People who see lots of shows on TV are slammed as couch potatoes, while people who see lots of films at their local movie house earn the honorific of cineaste.
Source: http://www.chron.com/entertainment/article/Calling-TV-stupid-makes-you-seem-smart-by-3388437.php
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