Everybody says too much TV makes your kids dumb. I’m going to start limiting David’s TV time, because it’s making him too smart. And making me look dumb.
We are in the car when David says, “Mommie, this box is recyclable.” He’s eating a snack in the backseat.
“Maybe. Some plastic can be recycled.”
“It says it’s recyclable. See these arrows? That means you can recycle it.”
“Where did you learn that?” I ask surprised. This kid can’t even read yet, and he knows the symbol for recycling?
“TV. Mommy, do we recycle?”
“Um, no — well — uh, we do recycle our pop bottles,” I search for answer to appease him.
“You should recycle everything to keep the earth clean so that there isn’t trash everywhere.”
“Did you hear that on TV too?”
“Yep. So are you going to recycle all our trash now?”
I try to explain to David that we live so far out in the middle of nowhere that there is no collection site to take our recycling. It’s true, but I can’t shake the feeling of guilt that’s starting to wash over me. “My kid thinks I’m a slacker because we don’t recycle,” I think to myself.
“If we don’t recycle my world will get dirty. They should make it easy to recycle.”
“Yes David, yes they should.”
Environmentalism isn’t the only thing David’s learned from TV. One day after playing outside I told him to wash his hands. This was in the fall when the Swine Flu scare was in full swing.
“TV said your hands get germs crawling all over them, and you shouldn’t touch your eyes, or your mouth, or your nose because you’ll get sick. You should wash your hands all the time, and you’re supposed to wash them for 20 minutes,” David tells me as he lathers up.
“That’s a long time to wash your hands.”
“Yeah, so we don’t all get sick. And you could even die.”
“Hmmm, well you certainly won’t get sick and die if you wash your hands for 20 minutes several times a day. But you might need to use some hand cream. David, I think they said 20 seconds.”
“Nope. It was 20 minutes. Do you wash your hand for 20 minutes mommy?”
“No. I don’t wash them quite that long.”
“You’re going to die.”
After a trip to the ER for a busted lip that wouldn’t stop bleeding I had this conversation with David.
“Why did that doctor sound funny when he talked?”
“He just had an accent. I think he must be from Europe. People who are from different parts of the world sound different when they speak.”
“You shouldn’t say he’s different Mommy. That’s not nice. It’s OK if we’re not all the same. It doesn’t matter. Some people don’t look like us, but it’s OK. We’re supposed to like them anyway.”
“Let me guess. You heard that on TV?”
“Uh-huh.”
Photo by Daily Invention. Used with permission under Creative Commons License.
About Colleen Stout
I just tweeted this because it made me laugh. I have a 12 yr old son who often shames us for not “doing the right thing”. Now if he would just do what WE want him to do. Wait. Maybe I’ll buy ad time on TV, then he might take our advice & requests seriously! Thanks for starting my Thursday off with a smile!
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Your story remind me of my cousin. He hates books but love television. His mom let him watch a lot of discovery channel. And he love trying all the stuff at home. Sometimes, he just ask questions that we have no answers for
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Ha, I love this! I can’t wait til my daughter is old enough to tell me what I’m doing wrong
They sure do keep us accountable!
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Funny segue from your son bantering with you about washing your hands to your son having a busted lip. I’m sure totally unrelated, but it still made me smile.
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Hey with my step-son I told him he shouldn’t believe everything he hears on TV as the absolute honest truth. I told him if he did that he’d be an adult who ended up buying everything he saw on infomercials from TV and be very disappointed.
I told him if he heard something on TV he needed to clear it with us first before he absolutely believed it.
Just a Christian’s point of view here.
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My girls are 16 and 18. They crack me up because we’ll be doing something in Anatomy and they’ll say “hey,I remember that Magic School bus episode where they went into the blood stream…”/
TV can be VERY educational if used right!
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My sons only watches The Food Network. You should hear him when he eats. It’s like an episode of Iron Chef America.
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