OT: (Rant) Speaking of Mr. Bucket

Susan Hartman ,in rec.crafts.textiles.needleworkwrote: and entertained us with

They are like saccharine, argghh! That Andre whatever makes me feel overdosed on sugar too.

and "12 Chinese Girls Band." Aargh! Where's "Masterpiece

There is such a thing as fund raising and over fund raising. I wonder if it really pays or whether they will wind up having to commit to do it more often, sort of hoist by their own petard.

One PBS station I know of publicized for a couple weeks that "we need to raise $X", and if they had met their fundraising goal before the scheduled start of Pledge Week, we got to see all the specials uninterrupted. And, of course, since there weren't pledge breaks interspersed, they could show an extra program every evening. They almost always had their goal before the deadline.

I've suggested it to the one here, but I think the station manager gets his jollies by being on the air, because they've never even tried it.

I am very nearly at the point were I'll stop supporting my local PBS stations. Either the programming is horrid or old. Or an all day kiddie=thon. Used to be after about 10 AM, I could watch Nova, Nature or "how to" shows.....

I find myself wondering how much the funds raised go to what ever celebrity they have on to shill... C

You know, my dad always donated to PBS because he said "I watch it, so I'll help pay for it," so if I didn't have money, I didn't watch PBS.

In the last few years, however, I've radically reversed my thinking on that once I actually THOUGHT about it (well, let me clarify: once I started doing my own tax returns).

I already pay for it and I have no choice in the matter. If they can't compete with the rest of the world on what they get, screw 'em. There's precious little I can get on PBS that I can't get on the cable I CHOOSE to pay for.

And as for kiddie shows, Sesame Street isn't the only game in town anymore, nor the best.

amen

Seems to me Sesame Street has gone way downhill from the original concept and first few seasons. It tries to be everything to everyone and that just can't work.

Now - I loved Cyberchase and Arthur was pretty good. I miss Electric Company and Zoom for DD.

I like all those shows but not opera or classical music. What can I say, I've got simple tastes.

My aunt was a volunteer at Channel 13 in NY for many, many years. She was extremely generous to me and my sisters when she was alive and continued that tradition in her will so I give a small dontation in her honor to the local station.

In the book "The Tipping Point," they talked about Sesame Street and how groundbreaking it was for children's education for its time, but that Blue's Clues is way more sophisticated in its psychology of early childhood learning, though its production values were much, much more simple.

A while back, I got my daughter the Schoolhouse Rock DVDs (2 in a set), but she was too young for them then. Now she'll be 4 next month and she REALLY REALLY likes them. The cool part is that I can sit and listen to that running in the background all day and not get tired of it. I've caught her singing along with "I'm Just a Bill" a couple of times now.

The other thing she really likes is the old cartoon lineup that was old when I was a child: Scooby Doo, Tom & Jerry, Pink Panther.

For her birthday, I'm going to get her the first season of Rocky & Bullwinkle and possibly the first season of Animaniacs.

What I loved about early Sesame Street was that it didn't talk down to its audience, it didn't talk at them, it talked to them.

DD loves Tom and Jerry and anything older than Mom.

Animanics were so fun. We have a thing for Avatar here. Surprisingly good. C

LOL - you're so right. I've been watching BBCA instead. Don't you get WETA

- they're slightly different in programming right now from WMPT?

Ellice

WOW - that's kind of harsh. PBS, and most of the Arts organizations have drastically had to adapt their fundraising in the last 20 years, and their funding from government sources has reduced, and reduced. Hence, the PBS stations do more than 1 fund raiser a year - at least around here.

Subject matter wise - I'm sure if you get cable, then you can watch National Geo or Discovery and get similar to NOVa, Nature. Same with Globe trekker vs Travel channels. Personally, I like not having to watch an ad every 3-4 minutes, and can deal with an ad about PBS for 2 min at the end of the hour. But, that's your choice.

You pay for the national highway system, too. And public schools. And the antional museums. And the federal park system (supplemented by their admissions as those occus, and other money-making enterprises). I'm guessing that what you pay to PBS annually is likely just a couple of dollars. Watch some stitching show and feel like you got your money's worth. We're lucky here that there are 3 PBS stations - and one of them shows 2 quilting shows, and sometimes we get the Shay Pendray show. Another shows sewing shows. Those shows have gone off or aren't or won't be carried on TLC/Discovery/HGTV. The point of PBS is supposed to be relatively unbiased, not commercially competing - though clearly the programming does have to compete, hence fundraisers. Commercial media - that's what the endless ads are about. I'd rather just have a 15-30 second blurb of this show made possible by contributions from than watch minutes several times over of commercial ads. So, it seems a little unrealistic to say "compete..." as they do still pay for their shows, and must present so that people are willing to supplement the funding which they receive.

We all have a choice.

And there are plenty more on PBS. And on the seemingly gajillion kiddie stations. And then, after your kiddies sit and watch those you can take them to MacDonalds and shop at Toys'r'Us, and buy or not buy and explain why not all the kiddie things advertised. There is a reason that the last 20+ years kids are virtually addicted to fast food, and it's not the business of their lives alone.

OK - off the soap box.

ellice

Funny, I have BBCA on right now too! (in commercial from my personal fav - Cash in the Attic)

ellice wrote: > LOL - you're so right. I've been watching BBCA instead. Don't you get WETA

We just started to get WETA fairly recently....thank heavens! We finally broke down and got the local cheapo cable about a year and a half ago, and WETA is one of the few channels we can get on it that we never had before. They often have better programming than MPT.

We found ourselves having to repair/replace the TV antenna every three years or so, to the tune of $300/repair, and decided the $10/mo. for cable would be pretty close to a break-even. So now we get WETA and WHUT from Howard University, too! And just a couple of other stations we never got with just the antenna - CNN, NASA, a Spanish channel.

The kids were shocked when we finally got cable. My daughter who had just graduated college said, "Finally you got cable, just when I'm moving out!"

One of these days we'll shock them and get a cell phone! LOL!

Sue

We find we really appreciate the wide scope of satellite TV. Science, food, crafts, history.....

LOL - we switch back and forth between them. MPT has more afternoon weekday stuff - when I'm home - for me.

Cool. WHUT has Fons & Porter, which I like - in the morning. Followed by Kaye's quilting - which I find kind of not so great most of the time - but sometimes it's okay. They also have a totally different set of Mystery, and other kind of older programs, as well as some current stuff.

We have friends like that. They had to give in and get cable because of all the connectivity for the computers, and it was much better than DSL. But, they are also serious baseball fans.

I am astounded that you still have managed without the cell phones. We waited a long time to get ours, but running different ways on weekends when I was still fit and skating finally necessitated it. Honestly, I think it's a safety thing at this point with all the crazy driving around here.

Ellice

Just make sure you impress on everyone who has the number that you got the cell phone for YOUR convenience, not theirs.

There are some people who will never have my cell phone number because they will panic if I don't answer it. With just my home number, they can rationalize that maybe I'm not answering because I'm not home, but with a cell phone ... well, you remember what happened a couple years ago when someone didn't stop to think that the doctor's office requires you to turn the cell phone off and there was a perfectly logical reason why I wasn't answering the phone that had nothing to do with my lying half-dead on the floor.

While my comments were not directed at anyone in particular, I felt your comments were directed at me in particular.

I personally don't feel even one penny of mine should go to a government-funded (either wholly or in part) TV station and in my view, it is nowhere near being balanced or unbiased.

I pay taxes on the gas I buy for my usage of the highway and, in the case of turnpikes, I pay more for the highway than it actually cost to build and maintain. In addition, fully half or more of the price-per-gallon is tax, so I'm not terribly thrilled about THAT, either.

I pay property taxes for public schools, which in my district, are excellent. In my parents' case (the Kansas City school district), not so much, so they paid their taxes AND paid for private school tuition, which they could barely afford. It behooves a society to have its citizens be well educated, but I don't see the illiteracy level dropping, do you?

Yes, I do pay for cable. As for my children wanting this or that or some other thing, I actually know how to say "No" in a firm and uncompromising manner--and I do so with alarming regularity. It is not lack of access to or failure to watch PBS that causes fat and spoilt children.

My comments weren't a personal direction at you, but at your comments which you evidently feel strongly enough about to post on a public discussion group. My response was in the spirit of discussing those comments (think debate) not to question your right to choose for the most part.

And you're entitled to that view. So you can join the lobbying efforts of those who prefer to remove public funding from the arts, or specific portions of the arts, or what they don't see as worthy art. Clearly you feel that broadcast media shouldn't be supported. Personally, I find the news on NPR much more biased and less likely to show multiple sides of a subject than with the PBS news. But, that's my observation.

And you pay taxes through your income taxes, as portions of the federal budget go all over the place - including the DoT, FHA which even trickles down into the funding for Emergency Medical Services (yup, overseen by DOT)

Who really knows WRT the illiteracy level. I think it varies in changing from regions and localities. And I'm astounded if you're thinking that your public schools get no federal funding. It's possible.

I have not issue with your paying for cable. Or not. I did however point out the wondrous workings of the advertising industry which has so succesfully aimed at children. So well in fact that is the reason which Phillip-Morris was ordered to spend an amazing amount of money on education to undo, or prevent the further results of it's advertising aimed at youth. Clearly we are a nation with issues of health and fitness in our children - and an amazing proliferation of fast food. If you think the advertising doesn't affect your children, good for you. Your strength in parenting is to be commended, and they must be immune to the powers of suggestion. I didn't suggest that a lack of access to PBS was the cause of such, however I do suggest, as has been written about many times by experts and observers on the media, that the exposure to well-aimed advertising will affect there behaviour, and the results follow. Heck, Marshall McLuhan was writing about this in the 70s.

I'm sure your children are lovely and well-behaved.

ellice

ellice ,in rec.crafts.textiles.needleworkwrote: and entertained us with

snipped in the interests of brevity and to spare people on dialup...

That's very patronising you know. I doubt very much that her kids are watching ads, overweight and eating at McDonalds. You probably know more than me though, I only have three kids, five grandchildren and two g-grandchildren - how many did you say you have to be such an expert ?