You will never guess why the TV is called the idiot box and the answer may not be too obvious. Just like a fishhook is for catching fish, a birdhouse is meant for birds and a toolset is for a tool-man, the idiot box is called so because it is intended for… yep, you guessed it (finally!).
But I have another reason for being so wary of televisions and all the programming they throw our way and that is the way they make us believe one thing when it is as far from the truth as is imaginably possible.
Love and romance are the biggest lies ever told and when on TV, they amplify even more. Watch TV and you will be led to imagine that companionship is the best thing to happen to mankind. No, the PS4 is the greatest thing to happen to man-kind, that is, till a PS5 comes along.
Recently, I was made aware that Dharma & Greg is back on television. Great show, funny and all, nostalgic too somewhat, for who doesn’t want to be the cool corporate type with a hipster partner and yet everything in life remains hunky-dory.
What crap! I’d sooner wish for world peace and expect it to happen. In fact, I can’t think of any couple which doesn’t misrepresent real life on reel life.
Richard Gere and Julia Roberts, never happens. Or take Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, not only did their real life romance nosedive, but even casted together, it didn’t do much to titillate the audience.
Even Indian couples who share chemistry on screen are never married in real life and married couples are rarely cast together.
‘Happily ever after’ comes with a timestamp, one that mandates an expiry date. Sure there are exceptions but which rule doesn’t have them.
In other words, fairy tales are exactly that, tales. Fairies belong to the scripted world of bright lights and glitzy sets.
Take them out of context and you are trying to squeeze in much more than a life’s worth: like parking an Impala in a cycle stand.
It is pointless to have a point of reference and then to try and hit it every time you are with someone. You never step in the same river twice, so no two relationships are ever the same and one that is on TV definitely does not mirror real life.
You can have your brand of happiness as long as you find contentment in the notion that it will be unique and hence immeasurable and also incomparable.
And the next person’s set of relationship woes will always seem lighter than yours. Contentment then begins when you learn to remind yourself that it is great to watch a TV show as long as you know that reality starts when you switch it off.
The writer is a lover of wine, song and everything fine
