Perhaps a few prompts will illustrate your own experience: the 1950's had Ozzie and Harriet, I Love Lucy, The Honeymooners, with the icons of James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, and Elvis gaining influence; the 1960's took a dramatic shift with the presence of more social conscious issues of That Girl, Laugh In, and The Dean Martin Show while maintaining a relatively conservative line up of Leave It To Beaver, Fathers Knows Best, and The Andy Griffith Show; the 1970's had the waning ultraconservative image of The Waltons to the new normal TV expression of the American family in the Brady Bunch and The Partridge Family while remaining well guided by the social issues of the day with Sanford and Son, Saturday Night Live, MASH, and perhaps one of the most telling signs of a changing in social mores when Bing Crosby did a duet with David Bowie on Bing's Christmas special; the 1980's saw cable television flood viewer choices with variety, infomercials, and satire with the expansion of the new norm for family in The Cosby Show, Webster, My Two Dads, and Full House, while the almost anything goes culture found multiple opportunities in cable programming only to be outdone by the music channels which captured much of the programming market; the 1990's gave rise to the expression of the comedic awareness of the family dysfunction created by the previous three decades in shows like Everybody Loves Raymond, Friends, Married with Children, Seinfeld, Frasier, Beverly Hills 90210 while attempts at balancing the scales with Touched By an Angel was run off the air. The 1990's invented a new way to dumb down viewership with adult animation that attracted children and fed them the dumbed-down version of adult topics completing the ultimate multi-generational influence; the 2000's turned itself into the reality TV decade finding a way to commercialize anything from swapping parents or spouses, to obesity, to talent, to addiction, to law suits, to medical illness, to vacationing, or to incarceration. Clearly our viewing habits reflect a fifty year social evolution of something. Whether that something is good or bad depends on one's own 50, 40, 30, or 20 year reflection through the same eras.

The point is that television programming programs more than the schedule of shows. Here is another type of a Recovery Challenge - Perhaps as we enter this summer we can redefine what influence the television has- try turning it off for one month or one week and reconnect with the people sharing your house. You might just find that you have a pretty neat set of people living with you and your experience might just open the door to something special- try Turning Off and Tuning In.

God Bless,

Craig Taffaro, Jr.