# Why is the TV always on? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 8, 2000, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897 "2000-05-08T12:01:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Fillet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/2acd7d/32.png) [@Fillet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fillet)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/21 "2000-05-09T00:35:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\*And another question, am I the only one in the world who enjoys sitting in an absolutely quiet room? \*\* I like an absolutely quiet room too… sometimes. I appreciate the quiet most if I’m reading something for pleasure. Funny thing is, if I’ve brought home work to do, or I’m paying bills & whatnot, I’ll flip on the TV for background noise. Under those circumstances, absolute quiet is actually distracting to me, and I find it very hard to focus. Having the (low) noise of The Weather Channel, or the umpteenth showing “Nature’s Wrath: Floods” on TLC gives me something to shut out, & helps me concentrate on the task at hand. I like to get out of my office and work in a coffee shop once in a while for the same reason. Turning the radio on isn’t always as helpful as the tube (maybe the lack of visual stimuli). If I do resort to the radio, it has to be an all-news station (perversely, talk shows and music are also distracting). ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/22 "2000-05-09T02:30:52Z")
My dad turns on—or records!—documentaries, then sleeps through them. Maybe he’s absorbing them subliminally. ---
**Author:** ![Kat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b19c9b/32.png) [@Kat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kat)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/23 "2000-05-09T04:22:14Z")
> [@](#): > > And another question, am I the only one in the world who enjoys sitting in an absolutely quiet room? I can’t stand an absolutely quiet room. I grew up in a large family and even when the TV and radio were off, there was people noise everywhere. Silence is just creepy for me for that reason, I need to have sounds. I’m more likely to turn on music than TV, though. ---
**Author:** ![Ayesha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c0e974/32.png) [@Ayesha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ayesha)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 11:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/24 "2000-05-09T11:37:58Z")
Our t.v. is on 24/7 yep, that’s how it is around here. There are four adults living here all on different schedules. I am home almost all the time. Alone or with a house full of sleeping males. It keeps me company, I don’t watch it much, but the noise is comforting in a sick, twisted kind of way. ---
**Author:** ![evilbeth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/evilbeth/32/2268_2.png) [@evilbeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilbeth)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/25 "2000-05-09T12:07:41Z")
When my eyes get too tired from reading books or being on-line, I will just veg in front of the t.v. My husband is a channel surfer and that irritates me. However, there’s always the alternative–my slut-whore sister-in-law will be watching t.v. with other people (they are watching also) and whenever she has decided that _she_ does not want to watch anymore, she will get up, turn off the t.v. and leave the room while everyone else just kind of looks at each other in shock. She does this all the time. The first time she did it we thought it must have been an accident (like when you accidentally turn the light off when you leave a room and someone is stilll in there) but she does it every time. ---
**Author:** ![beefymeg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@beefymeg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beefymeg)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/26 "2000-05-09T13:47:55Z")
This is great! I’m glad I’m not alone, tater. I was eating a lovely bowl of cereal in my living room this morning. My hubby-to-be grabs his work bag and keys, and ON HIS WAY OUT THE DOOR, turns on the TV. I think he thought he was doing me a favor. Another bothersome thing is that he NEEDS to watch TV to fall asleep at night. The blue light keeps me awake, though… so we try to alternate nights. We did go cold-turkey off cable TV when we moved into our new place, though… and we’ve survived. It’s a miracle! ---
**Author:** ![tatertot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c37758/32.png) [@tatertot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tatertot)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2000, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/27 "2000-05-10T06:58:03Z")
I’m going to hijack my own thread. When you are listening to your car radio, do you wait to change stations at a red light, or do you fiddle constantly with the controls, going through all the stations at least once, until you find a song you like? I bet you can guess what I do! 🙂 Seriously, I bet that tons of wrecks are caused by people paying more attention to the stereo than to the road. It really drives me nuts when my husband does this when he’s driving, so much so that I’ll ask him to pull over so that I can drive. Meg, my husband does that too! He also insists on listening to a cd before bed, which keeps me awake. And he turns nothing off, so if I happen to go to bed before him, I’ll wake up to find the tv, computer, and all of the lights on. Arghhh. ---
**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2000, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897/28 "2000-05-10T14:57:37Z")
Being I can’t hear the radio, stereo, voice phone, voice answering machine, people on the street or in stores, I like to turn on the TV with captions so I know what people are talking about these days. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-tv-always-on/18897.md?page=1)