It"s no secret that most busy American mothers use the TV set as a live-in babysitter. In some households the tube holds a child"s attention for the odd half hour or two while mom works on dinner; in others it is the child"s constant daytime companion. Is there any harm in this?

    Debate rages over the question, and periodically research is published showing that TV reduces attention span, makes children jumpy or inclines them to violence. In today"s cartoon David Horsey makes fun of the claims of "children"s TV", the special programming that supposedly uses entertainment to help youngsters to learn to read and take their first steps in the big, diverse world outside their family. What do children really get from this programming? 

    Horsey"s suspicion is that children"s programming chiefly turns kids into TV addicts, not into readers or happy mixers①. The toddler in the cartoon, still at the age of pacifiers and stuffed animals, is held spellbound by the figure on the screen. What is the stimulating message of this creature specifically designed to fascinate small children? "Can you say TV?" The sooner the kid learns the word, the more effectively he can remind -- or nag -- his mother to turn on the boob tube.

    A child hooked on TV is a viewer open to commercial messages, and there are plenty of those targeting children of all ages. Thus, at the very least, mom"s search for peace and quiet sets the stage for her child"s transformation into an American consumer -- and, of course, soaks up time that could be used for other, perhaps more desirable, transformations.

    在美國，很多忙碌的母親把電視當成住在家里的保姆，這已不是什么秘密。在有些家庭中，當媽媽做飯時電視會拴住孩子的注意力，有時是半小時甚至兩小時。還有些家庭，電視就是孩子整天的伙伴。這種情況有什么害處嗎？

    對這一問題的爭論十分激烈，相關研究也在定期發表，這些研究表明，電視縮小了孩子們的興趣范圍，使孩子們變得心緒不寧，產生暴力傾向。在今天的漫畫中，漫畫家戴維-霍爾西嘲笑了“兒童電視節目”的自我標榜，這種電視節目據說是用娛樂方式來幫助兒童學習認字，幫助兒童向家庭之外的大千世界邁出第一步。但是孩子們從這種節目中真正得到了什么呢？

    霍爾西認為，兒童節目的主要功能是把兒童變成電視迷，而不是變成愛讀書的人或是善于與不同的人相處的人。漫畫中剛學走步的孩子還處于叼奶嘴和玩毛絨動物玩具的年齡，可已經被電視上的人物迷住了。而這個被設計成非常吸引小孩子的形象正在啟發孩子什么呢？--“你會說‘電視’這個詞嗎？”只要孩子一學會這個詞，他就能更明確地提醒媽媽--更可能是糾纏媽媽--打開會把人變蠢的電視。

    被電視拴住的孩子對商業廣告毫無限制地接受，而商業廣告中有很多針對所有年齡段的孩子。因此，媽媽想通過電視讓孩子安靜下來的做法，其負面影響往最小了說，是為把孩子變成成天想著買東西的人打下了基礎--當然，這還使孩子把時間全耗費在電視上了，而這些時間本可以用在對孩子成長更有意義的事情上。