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<title> TELEVISION IS GOOD FOR YOU! </title>
Most people in Sweden watch television at least a few minutes a day, now more than ever. The number of people watching television are increasing all the time and the offering of TV shows as well. This development is sometimes seen as negative on the basis of arguments like, "we do not know how to entertain ourselves without TV" among others. There are different kinds of television, the one with an educational purpose, such as UR- Utbildningsradions programs and news and these are best seen at the non cable channels. The other is the one with a relaxing purpose, such as Friends, Vita lögner, Ricki Lake and many more and these are shown on cable. I myself believe that you get a lot of advantages when watching TV as long as it is only for a limited period of time.
	 First of all, my parents always told me when I was young that watching TV is bad for you. Not because of what the shows contained but the fact that my eyes soon would look like the TV screen. This did of course not happen but it was enough to give me a fright and they did have a point. Sitting too close and for too long in front of the TV can worsen your eyesight quite a lot. This is one of the reasons why we should watch TV only for a short period of time.
Another is simply that you sometimes just waste your time and it all depends on what and how you are watching it. Most of the cable channels for example TV 3 and ZTV are what I would call entertainment channels. Surely they work as relaxation and sometimes in an educational way, but it is not half as good as it could be. TV 3 for example have a lot of good shows like Efterlyst and Folkhemmet- so called public shows while their news is a big joke and is created to be that way as well and they also have lots of ads, which makes people switch over to other channels.
I myself watch all channels but mostly 1,2,3 and 4, but would probably watch the other channels if I had access to them in my dorm room.
	 Moreover there is the question of whether we are capable of entertaining ourselves without TV. This is easy, of course we are. For instance, when I go to Sandhamn, a little Island outside Stockholm where there is no TV at all and we do all sorts of things, such as play cards, read books, etc. The issue is not if we are able to entertain ourselves or not, but the fact that we like to watch TV. I sometimes prefer watching TV instead of reading a book, like when I am studying and I am really exhausted, because you do not relax your brain as much when reading a book as you do when watching a soap opera or a comedy. Take for instance Friends a comedy on channel 5 which is on for thirty minutes, you study hard before the show and then relax and have a bit of fun. After this well needed break you go back to your studies with new energy.
	 Furthermore there is the educational purpose where channel 1,2 and 4 are excellent with great shows such as UR's shows as I mentioned previously, real news and Mitt i naturen a one hour long show about animals. My family used to watch this show together every week and we learned things about animals we might not have heard about before. Another thing is that you are actually able to socialize before, during and after the show. At least that is what we did and still do. 
	 To sum up, my opinion is that a few minutes of TV watching a day is not going to do you any harm as long as you do not watch TV for a whole day. My mother once said "take a look in the TVguide and pick something you really would enjoy, then take time to watch it instead of zapping channels", and of course she is right. Do remember that it does not matter if it is education or relaxation you are after as long as you think it is good.
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