I have a problem with television. Granted, I don’t have cable, and so I only get network TV and PBS, so that’s a pretty small sample, but I most definitely have some issues.

It starts with the so-called “situation comedy.” I don’t understand the appeal, for example, of watching a half-hour show which is predicated on a misunderstanding, the early clarification of which could have avoided all kinds of tangents and pratfalls. And the originary misunderstanding almost always leads to any number of cover-ups, and compounded misunderstandings from which hilarity naturally ensues and somebody invariably ends up having to hide in a closet (literal or figurative), or lie to their partner or best friend in order to avoid clarifying the whole picture, before the staging of a therapeutic explanation wherein, say, Grace tells Will that she’s really not sure she wants to have his baby or vice versa, and Will or Grace say, “Well, why didn’t you tell me?” and they have a teary rapprochement and go to commercial before we return for a reassuring coda which is both comfortably amusing at the same time that it re-establishes the edginess that obtained before the sappy resolution. Hilarious.

Except that it’s not hilarious to me. It makes me very uncomfortable. It makes me twitch. It makes my palms clammy. It makes me change the channel. It makes me turn off the TV, pace around my house, and hide behind the couch, until I compulsively return to the remote and turn the TV back on to check on the status of the misunderstanding. All the time I’m thinking, “Why don’t you just tell them that you don’t like eggnog? What’s the worst that could happen? They’ll understand if they really love you. It’s not a big deal.” Instead of which these people are contorting themselves into all kinds of bizarre shapes and positions to avoid being honest about a relatively minor preference, or an easily communicable set of crossed wires. Name any sitcom of whatever supposed quality and I will most likely find it unwatchable on account of the anxiety quotient it engenders in me. Frasier? Excruciating. Everybody Loves Raymond? Turn it off, it’s making my soul hurt. And so on.

Of course, the early clarification of such misunderstandings would also lead inevitably to the demise of the sit-com as we know it. One can imagine, in my padded cell of a world, six five-minute un-coms, where the misunderstanding is clarified almost immediately and the credits roll with everyone breathing a collective sigh of relief as they await commercials for antacids, Paxil, and plush toys. This might not make for high ratings or great viewing, but it would save me a good deal of grief, I have to tell you.

I’m sure I’d have a lot to talk about in therapy, clearly, and not only with regard to my television foibles. Everyone with whom I’ve shared this predicament is quite convinced that I have bats in my personal belfry, and I have to say that I’m inclined to believe them most of the time. But perhaps this really might be a philosophical position as well it highlights some kind of psychological or existential crisis on my part. Perhaps we need to re-examine the whole premise of the “situation comedy,” for example? Why must we persist in this dualism of conflict and resolution within a framework of humor that involves neurosis and other kinds of disorder that are really unattractive and fundamentally dishonest? Aren’t there other ways to be funny? Really, aren’t there?

But it goes deeper than that. It’s not just your run-of-the-mill “comedy” that gives me a problem. I have the same problem with some children’s programming, and before you say, well, why is a grown man watching children’s TV, I have to reply pre-emptively that I thought perhaps I would find some solace there, some sense of calm, a pastoral cathode realm in which nobody gets hurt. But oh, how wrong I was. I’ll give you two examples.

One: Spongebob Squarepants. Sandy builds a rocket, and she’s going to launch it the next day. She retires early to rest up for her big adventure, and she says, very specifically, to Spongebob and Patrick that they are under no circumstances to touch the rocket, because they will most likely break it. And what do they do? They not only touch the rocket, they go inside and start it up and totally make a mess. And I’m watching this on a videotape that a friend has loaned me and I’m screaming at the TV, “DON’T TOUCH THE ROCKET!! DIDN’T YOU HEAR WHAT SANDY SAID?! SHE SPECIFICALLY TOLD YOU TO LEAVE THE ROCKET ALONE, AND YOU GO RIGHT ON AND TOUCH IT AND MESS WITH IT AND BREAK IT, JUST LIKE SHE SAID YOU WOULD!! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?” With which I pause the episode and go into the kitchen to make myself some chamomile tea. I’ve never seen the end of the episode, because I couldn’t stand it. I am assured by friends who have seen it that, while Spongebob and Patrick do indeed launch the rocket, wind up on the moon, and splash/crash land back at Bikini Bottom only to be mistaken for aliens, the rocket is more or less unharmed, and Sandy does get her day in space. But that’s not the point.

Two: Clifford the Big Red Dog. I love Clifford the Big Red Dog. John Ritter is the voice of Clifford, Mark Mothersbaugh from Devo wrote the theme song, Clifford’s a big sweetheart, and so on. But sometimes, something happens on Birdwell Island that makes me very upset. Case in point: Clifford lives next door to Mr. Bleekman, who’s kind of cranky, and he really hates it when somebody messes with his yard, especially Clifford and his friends. So one time, these kittens are messing around in Mr. Bleekman’s yard and hanging off his washing line and climbing up the trellis and cavorting in the flowerbeds after butterflies. Clifford is fretting on the other side of the fence and worrying that the kittens are going to mess up Mr. Bleekman’s yard and wondering what he can do to help, and I can hardly watch. And then you can hear Mr. Bleekman coming back from some cranky errand or wherever, and you know he’s going to be mad and sure enough Clifford gets blamed for the mess he didn’t make. It was horrible. No child of mine is going to be watching Clifford. I think I’d make a rather nervous parent.

Furthermore, I have to confess that I don’t particularly care for close games when sporting events are on the TV. No-hitters? No thanks. Overtime basketball or football? I’d prefer not to. Give me a blow-out every time. My nervous disposition is incapable of countenancing the tension of a nailbiter. At least with a blow-out you know very clearly who’s really good and who’s really bad. There’s no doubt, there’s no suspense, there’s no worrying. It’s a manichean world of good and evil where I can live secure in the knowledge of what is black and what is white, and that’s the way I like it.

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