Quotes about TV
page 4

Dejan Stojanovic photo

“When I want to be reminded of stupidity, especially my own, I turn on the TV.”

Dejan Stojanovic (1959) poet, writer, and businessman

Stupidity http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/stupidity-14/
From the poems written in English

Karl Freund photo
Manuel Castells photo
Christina Aguilera photo

“Even when I was little, I knew I was meant to perform. I would watch specials on TV or videos of Janet or Whitney, and I would start crying because I was like 'I want that so bad.”

Christina Aguilera (1980) American singer

A Christina Aguilera interview to Allure Magazine 2002 - Compiled by Courtney Watson http://www.bignoisenow.com/christina/allure02interview.html (2002)

Lorne Michaels photo

“When we do well, we do the best comedy on TV. That's not ego; that's just the way it is.”

Lorne Michaels (1944) American television producer

Bill Carter interview during 1975-76 season, quoted in the February 13, 2015 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine reprinted by Yahoo, Bill Carter on Covering 'SNL' and Lorne Michaels: "Many Lost Their Minds in Pursuit" of His Approval https://tv.yahoo.com/news/bill-carter-covering-snl-lorne-michaels-many-lost-180002192.html

Goodman Ace photo

“TV—a clever contraction, derived from the words Terrible Vaudeville. We call it a medium, because nothing's well done.”

Goodman Ace (1899–1982) Comedian, television writer and columnist

Letter to Groucho Marx, published in The Groucho Letters

Larry David photo

“Listen, this is crazy. I look like I'm 75 years old. Nobody wants to watch an old man being funny. That's just a fact. No one wants to see this old man on TV.”

Larry David (1947) American comedian, writer, actor, and television producer

When his show went onto a high definition channel.
Interview, Esquire, September 18, 2009 http://www.esquire.com/features/the-screen/larry-david-interview-0709

Eric Schmidt photo

“By the summer of 2012, the majority of the televisions you see in stores will have Google TV embedded.”

Eric Schmidt (1955) software engineer, businessman

Eric Schmidt: Google TV on 'majority' of new TVs by summer 2012 http://theverge.com/2011/12/7/2618225/eric-schmidt-le-web-paris-google-tv-majority-all-tvs in The Verge (7 December 2011).

Taslima Nasrin photo
Camille Paglia photo
Shreya Ghoshal photo

“Today kids are more advanced, smarter. When we came in reality show we were untrained in terms of facing television. That time TV was just starting out. We were nervous and shy. Today`s kids have seen it all.”

Shreya Ghoshal (1984) Indian playback singer

Talking about kids(2) http://zeenews.india.com/entertainment/musicindia/singers-today-have-more-space-and-work-says-shreya-ghoshal_132464.html

Marshall McLuhan photo

“The TV camera has no shutter. It does not deal with aspects or facets of objects in high resolution. It is a means of direct pick-up by the electrical groping over surfaces.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

Arts in society, Volume 3, 1964, p. 242
1960s

Edward R. Murrow photo

“When the politicians complain that TV turns the proceedings into a circus, it should be made clear that the circus was already there, and that TV has merely demonstrated that not all the performers are well trained.”

Edward R. Murrow (1908–1965) Television journalist

1959, Dons Or Crooners?: Three Lectures on the Subject of Communication in the Modern World, The British Association Granada Lectures, (Three lectures given in Guildhall London in October 1959 on the subject of communication in the modern world), Lecture Title: Television and Politics, Speaker: Edward R. Murrow, Start Page 47, Quote Page 75 and 76, Published by Granada TV, London.

Joan Armatrading photo

“In America you watch TV and think that's totally unreal, then you step outside and it's just the same.”

Joan Armatrading (1950) British singer-songwriter

Quoted in Spin magazine, May 1985 http://books.google.com/books?id=9ugCQfxwym0C&q=%22In+America+you+watch+TV+and+think+that's+totally+unreal+then+you+step+outside+and+it's+just+the+same%22&pg=PA14#v=onepage

Rachel Maddow photo

“When Pat is saying something outrageous, you know when you yell at the TV? I get to yell at him in person. I get to yell at the TV and it hears me.”

Rachel Maddow (1973) American journalist

"A liberal pundit soars to a prominent perch," Boston Globe (September 8, 2008)

Ani DiFranco photo

“My country tis of thee,
To take swings at each other on talk-show TV.”

Ani DiFranco (1970) musician and activist

Tis of Thee
Song lyrics

Pat Sajak photo

“It's hard to get burned out on doing a TV show.”

Pat Sajak (1946) American television host

2000s
Source: Chicago, Vol. 57, Nr, 1-4 (2008), p. 28

Karl Pilkington photo

“You know that guy Richard Blackwood? He went in for a colonic, live TV. Never seen again.”

Karl Pilkington (1972) English television personality, social commentator, actor, author and former radio producer

On Medicine

Narendra Modi photo
Noam Chomsky photo
Pauline Kael photo
Dana Gould photo
Jack Johnson (musician) photo
DJ Paul photo

“I'm just producing and writing for all my new artists I signed, Weirdo King and my nephews The Seed of 6ix. Also been writing a lot of EDM for kids. Doing more cooking videos and TV.”

DJ Paul (1977) American rapper and record producer

Interview with DJ Paul – Stream DJ Paul Kom's 'Undergroud, Vol. 17 – For da Summa Album http://www.xxlmag.com/news/2017/09/dj-paul-underground-vol-17-for-da-summa-album/

Tamsin Greig photo

“Greig, currently hot in the TV comedy Green Wing, has a dark, brittle glamour that isn't quite beauty (there's a disconcerting touch of Edwina Currie about her) and suggests an incipient unhappiness lurking beneath the ready wit.”

Tamsin Greig (1966) English actress

About her performance as Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing, by Charlie Spencer in The Telegraph. After reading the part about Edwina Currie, she refused to read any more of the article.
Criticism, A review of her as Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing

Robert Crumb photo
Rudy Rucker photo

“I think the Internet is to MSM what TV was to yellow journalism.”

Larisa Alexandrovna (1971) Ukrainian-American journalist, essayist, poet

The Big E: Ethics, Bloggers, and Independent Media http://radiofreeblogistan.com/2005/02/21/the_big_e_ethics_bloggers_and_independent_media.html.

Richard Stallman photo
Regina Spektor photo
Jeff Foxworthy photo
Ann Coulter photo
Marshall McLuhan photo

“Try not to have Emily exposed to hours and hours of TV. It is a vile drug which permeates the nervous system, especially in the young.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

Letter to son Eric McLuhan, regarding one of Eric's daughters, 1976
1970s

Ann Coulter photo

“Liberals don't read books – they don't read anything … That's why they're liberals. They watch TV, absorb the propaganda, and vote on the basis of urges.”

Ann Coulter (1961) author, political commentator

2002, Ann Coulter : Left Is 'out to Destroy the Country' (2002)

Ben Croshaw photo
Ann Coulter photo
Jack Osbourne photo
Paul Graham photo
Bruce Springsteen photo
Regina Spektor photo
Rudy Rucker photo
Jane Roberts photo
Marshall McLuhan photo

“The discarnate TV user lives in a world between fantasy and dream, and is in a typically hypnotic state, which is the ultimate form and level of participation.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

"A Last Look at the Tube." New York Magazine, 17 March 1978, p. 45-48
1970s

Alice Cooper photo

“Bin Laden's real audience is the Middle East, his other Muslims. I think he thought that, by this act, he would win large numbers of converts to his cause … [to] bring Arab regimes down. He would perhaps even take power in this or that country, preferably Saudi Arabia. That is where he is looking to; that is who is the audience. That is who his symbols are directed towards. So this is unlike anything else in the history of Islam. Early Muslims, when they left the Arabian Peninsula and entered the [Fertile Crescent], were conquerors. They converted peoples, and they gave them time to convert. So they didn't force them sometimes, and they were perfectly happy ruling over them. They were setting up a state, and then people converted over time. Syria remained Christian for hundreds of years after the Muslim conquest. So something different is going on here. The obvious sense in which the United States is evil is in the cultural icons that are seen everywhere. They are seemingly trivial things, the influence of the America culture, which is everywhere: TV, how women dress, the lack of importance of religion. So these are the senses in which they are rejecting the United States. But you're right; they don't see Americans as people. … They block that out. They only see as people the Muslims they want to convert to their side, and that's terrifying.”

Kanan Makiya (1949) American orientalist

"Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero" http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/faith/interviews/makiya.html, PBS Frontline (2002)

“1. If I should remain in a persistent vegetative state for more than fifteen years, I would like someone to turn off the TV.”

Paul Rudnick (1957) American playwright and screenwiter

"My Living Will," http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2005/04/25/my-living-will The New Yorker (25 April 2005)

Charlie Brooker photo

“… The result is the most nauseating display of artificial camaraderie since the horrific Doritos "Friendchips" TV campaign (which caused 50,000 people to kill themselves in 2003, or should have done).”

Charlie Brooker (1971) journalist, broadcaster and writer from England

The Guardian.co.uk,28 August 2009
On Microsoft's Windows 7 Launch Party ad campaign
Guardian columns

Philippe Starck photo
Carrie Ann Inaba photo

“When I was growing up there were few Asians on TV and now I'm one of many and that makes me happy. I see how far we've come, which is amazing. But diversity is still an issue and we have to continue to grow the message.”

Carrie Ann Inaba (1968) American entertainer

"Carrie Ann Inaba goes vegetarian, George Takei shops for a hybrid", in MNN.com (16 November 2011) http://www.mnn.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/stories/carrie-ann-inaba-goes-vegetarian-george-takei-shops-for-a-hybrid

Dick Cavett photo

“You can, after all, reduce the reasons for watching TV to but two: to be lulled, and to be stimulated. Some people do one sometimes, the other sometimes. Some people do all of one or all of the other.”

Dick Cavett (1936) American talk show host

Cavett http://books.google.com/books?id=CE4NAQAAMAAJ&q=%22You+can+after+all+reduce+the+reasons+for+watching+TV+to+but+two+to+be+lulled+and+to+be+stimulated+Some+people+do+one+sometimes+the+other+sometimes+Some+people+do+all+of+one+or+all+of+the+other%22&pg=PA331#v=onepage, co-authored with Christopher Porterfield (1974)
Excerpted in New York magazine July 22, 1974 http://books.google.com/books?id=kekCAAAAMBAJ&q=%22You+can+after+all+reduce+the+reasons+for+watching+TV+to%22+%22two+to+be+lulled+and+to+be+stimulated+Some+people+do+one+sometimes+the+other+sometimes+Some+people+do+all+of+one+or+all+of+the+other%22&pg=PA34#v=onepage

Katherine Paterson photo
George W. Bush photo

“Well, you know, I think a lot of people are in this fight. I mean, they sacrifice peace of mind when they see the terrible images of violence on TV every night.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

NewsHour interview http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/white_house/jan-june07/bush_01-16.html with Jim Lehrer in response to the question “Why have you not asked more Americans to sacrifice something?” regarding the Iraq War (January 16, 2007)
2000s, 2007

Neil Armstrong photo
Clay Shirky photo
Roger Waters photo
Barbara Ehrenreich photo
Elliott Smith photo
Flip Wilson photo
George W. Bush photo

“As you watch the developments in Baghdad, it's important to understand that we will not be able to prevent every al Qaeda attack. When a terrorist is willing to kill himself to kill others, it's really hard to stop him. Yet, over time, the security operation in Baghdad is designed to shrink the areas where al Qaeda can operate, it's designed to bring out more intelligence about their presence, and designed to allow American and Iraqi forces to dismantle their network.We have a strategy to deal with al Qaeda in Iraq. But any time you say to a bunch of cold-blooded killers, success depends on no violence, all that does is hand them the opportunity to be successful. And it's hard. I know it's hard for the American people to turn on their TV screens and see the horrific violence. It speaks volumes about the American desire to protect lives of innocent people, America's deep concern about human rights and human dignity. It also speaks volumes about al Qaeda, that they're willing to take innocent life to achieve political objectives.The terrorists will continue to fight back. In other words, they understand what they're doing. And casualties are likely to stay high. Yet, day by day, block by block, we are steadfast in helping Iraqi leaders counter the terrorists, protect their people, and reclaim the capital. And if I didn't think it was necessary for the security of the country, I wouldn't put our kids in harm's way.…Either we'll succeed, or we won't succeed. And the definition of success as I described is sectarian violence down. Success is not, no violence. There are parts of our own country that have got a certain level of violence to it. But success is a level of violence where the people feel comfortable about living their daily lives. And that's what we're trying to achieve.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

President Bush Discusses War on Terror, Economy with Associated General Contractors of America http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2007/05/20070502-2.html (May 2, 2007)
2000s, 2007

Oriana Fallaci photo

“I am not speaking, obviously, to the laughing hyenas who enjoy seeing images of the wreckage and snicker good–it–serves–the–Americans–right. I am speaking to those who, though not stupid or evil, are wallowing in prudence and doubt. And to them I say: "Wake up, people. Wake up!!" Intimidated as you are by your fear of going against the current—that is, appearing racist (a word which is entirely inapt as we are speaking not about a race but about a religion)—you don’t understand or don’t want to understand that a reverse–Crusade is in progress. Accustomed as you are to the double–cross, blinded as you are by myopia, you don’t understand or don’t want to understand that a war of religion is in progress. Desired and declared by a fringe of that religion, perhaps, but a war of religion nonetheless. A war which they call Jihad. Holy War. A war that might not seek to conquer our territory, but that certainly seeks to conquer our souls. That seeks the disappearance of our freedom and our civilization. That seeks to annihilate our way of living and dying, our way of praying or not praying, our way of eating and drinking and dressing and entertaining and informing ourselves. You don’t understand or don’t want to understand that if we don’t oppose them, if we don’t defend ourselves, if we don’t fight, the Jihad will win. And it will destroy the world that for better or worse we’ve managed to build, to change, to improve, to render a little more intelligent, that is to say, less bigoted—or even not bigoted at all. And with that it will destroy our culture, our art, our science, our morals, our values, our pleasures… Christ! Don’t you realize that the Osama Bin Ladens feel authorized to kill you and your children because you drink wine or beer, because you don’t wear your beard long or a chador, because you go to the theater or the movies, because you listen to music and sing pop songs, because you dance in discos or at home, because you watch TV, wear miniskirts or short–shorts, because you go naked or half naked to the beach or the pool, because you *** when you want and where you want and who you want? Don’t you even care about that, you fools? I am an atheist, thank God. And I have no intention of letting myself be killed for it.”

"Rage and the Pride">Oriana Fallaci - The Rage and the Pride http://www.amazon.co.uk/Rage-Pride-Oriana-Fallaci/dp/084782599X - Universe Publishing; Intl edition, 2002, ISBN 9780847825998

Michael Moore photo

“The next wave of fascists will not come with cattle cars and concentration camps, but they'll come with a smiley face and maybe a TV show … That’s how the 21st-century fascists will essentially take over.”

Michael Moore (1954) American filmmaker, author, social critic, and liberal activist

" Michael Moore: Fascists Now Come With ‘A Smiley Face And Maybe A TV Show’ https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/michael-moore-donald-trump_us_5829c5bce4b02d21bbc97cab" - stated right after Donald Trump was elected President of the United States, and inspired by the 1980 book, Friendly Fasicism (November 14, 2016)
2016

Ann Coulter photo
Pauline Kael photo

“TV executives think that the programs with the highest ratings are what TV viewers want, rather than what they settle for.”

Pauline Kael (1919–2001) American film critic

Taking It All In (1983), Why Are Movies So Bad? Or, The Numbers (1980-06-23)

Marshall McLuhan photo

“World War I a railway war of centralization and encirclement. World War II a radio war of decentralization concluded by the Bomb. World War III a TV guerrilla war with no divisions between civil and military fronts.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

Source: 1970s, Take Today : The Executive as Dropout (1972), p. 152

“On May 17, 1969, a show which was to become the seminal exhibition of video art in the U. S. opened at the Howard Wise Gallery in New York City. That exhibition, "TV as a Creative Medium," effectively pointed to the diverse potential of a new art form and social tool. Subsequently, the show became renowned for the inspiration it provided for many artists and future advocates of video. The artists represented in the show, a few of whom are still involved in the medium today, came from varied backgrounds-painting, filmmaking, nuclear physics, avant-garde music and performance, kinetic and light sculpture-and their approaches presented a primer of the directions which video would soon take. Theoretically, they variously saw video as viewer participation, a spiritual and meditative experience, a mirror, an electronic palette, a kinetic sculpture, or acultural machine to be deconstructed. Ripe with ideas and armed with a heady optimism about the future of communications, these artists used video as an information tool and as a means of gaining understanding and control of television, not solely as an art form. In "TV as a Creative Medium" alternative television was presented as a stepping stone to the promised communications utopia.”

Marita Sturken (1957) American academic

Marita Sturken. " TV as a Creative Medium: Howard Wise and Video Art http://www.vasulka.org/archive/4-30c/AfterImageMay84(1004).pdf," in: Afterimage, May 1984

Narendra Modi photo
Eddie Mair photo

“… and if you want to hear more of that interview, fly to America and watch TV on Sunday night.”

Eddie Mair (1965) Scottish broadcaster

Mair (2003) cited in: " Eddie Mair again http://quernstone.com/archives/2003/06/eddie-mair-agai.html" in: The Daily Grind, Jonathan Sanderson’s weblog June 5, 2003.
From PM and Broadcasting House

Michelle Obama photo
Bob Dylan photo
Herm Edwards photo
Alice Cooper photo
Narendra Modi photo

“On that day I had put a ban on TV channels because they were actually provoking trouble. But it was only for one day.”

Narendra Modi (1950) Prime Minister of India

2014, "Narendra Modi on the Role of NDTV during the 2002 Riots", 2014

Marshall McLuhan photo

“TV is not good at covering single events. It needs a ritual, a rhythm, and a pattern…[TV] tends to fosters patterns rather than events.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

1970s, Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder (1976)

John Derbyshire photo
Keith Olbermann photo
Arnold Schwarzenegger photo
Marshall McLuhan photo

“With TV, came the icon, the inclusive image, the inclusive political posture or stance.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

Source: 1990s and beyond, The Book of Probes : Marshall McLuhan (2011), p. 191

Angelique Rockas photo
Gene Wolfe photo

“People who get eyeball arthritis see only what they're supposed to see, like that TV screen.”

"Hunter Lake", The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, October/November 2003, Reprinted in Gene Wolfe, Starwater Strains (2005)
Fiction

Bill Hicks photo
Chuck Berry photo
Ben Croshaw photo
Drashti Dhami photo

“I don’t think any heroine’s marital status matters. On TV, it’s all about the character. We have so many married actresses playing lead roles on TV shows. We are probably more married on TV than in real life.”

Drashti Dhami (1985) Indian television actress and model

View on marriage http://www.hindustantimes.com/tv/didn-t-get-overwhelming-film-offers-drashti-dhami/story-y8fDhD9tpuiZqM8HbfnGBK.html

Masaru Ibuka photo
Marshall McLuhan photo

“The TV generation is postliterate and retribalized. It seeks by violence to scrub the old private image and to merge in a new tribal identity, like any corporate executive. (p. 201)”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

1990s and beyond, The Book of Probes : Marshall McLuhan (2011)

Ta-Nehisi Coates photo
Louis C.K. photo
Gary Gygax photo

“Pen-and-paper role-playing is live theater and computer games are television. People want the convenience and instant gratification of turning on the TV rather than getting dressed up and going out to see a live play. In the same way, the computer is a more immediately accessible way to play games.”

Gary Gygax (1938–2008) American writer and game designer

As quoted in "Dungeon Masters in Cyberspace" in The New York Times (27 February 2006) http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/27/arts/27drag.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all

Clive Barker photo
Gore Vidal photo
Neil Gaiman photo
Ron Paul photo

“Chris Matthews: Let me ask you this: the '64 civil rights bill. Do you think a [em]ployer, a guy runs his shop down in Texas has a right to say, "If you're black, you don't come in my store". That was the libertarian right before '64. Was it the balanced society?
Ron Paul: I believe that property rights should be protected. Your right to be on TV is protected by property rights because somebody owns that station. I can't walk into your station. So right of freedom of speech is protected by property. The right of your church is protected by property. So people should honor and protect it. This gimmick, Chris, it's off the wall when you say I'm for property rights and states' rights, therefore I'm a racist. I mean that's just outlandish. Wait, Chris. Wait, Chris. People who say that if the law was there and you could do that, who's going to do it? What idiot would do that?
Chris Matthews: Everybody in the South. I saw these signs driving through the South in college. Of course they did it. You remember them doing it.
Ron Paul: Yeah, I but also know that the Jim Crow laws were illegal and we got rid of them under that same law, and that's all good. Government —
Chris Matthews: But you would've voted against that law.
Ron Paul: Pardon me?
Chris Matthews: You would've voted against that law. You wouldn't have voted for the '64 civil rights bill.
Ron Paul: Yes, but not in — I wouldn’t vote against getting rid of the Jim Crow laws.
Chris Matthews: But you would have voted for the — you know you — oh, come on. Honestly, Congressman, you were not for the '64 civil rights bill.
Ron Paul: Because — because of the property rights element, not because it got rid of the Jim Crow law.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

2011

Trevor Noah photo

“He really is a TV president. […] He loves the performance of doing things. But a lot of the time, nothing's actually being done. Essentially, Donald Trump wants to be president, but he doesn't want to do president.”

Trevor Noah (1984) South African comedian

6 June 2017
The Daily Show
Source: Visibile at 02:00 di Trump Touts More Phony Accomplishments: The Daily Show https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FY5IwndHDLQ, YouTube.com, 6 giugno 2017.

Craig Ferguson photo

“I'm TV's Craig Ferguson, please sit down relax and: "take off your pants"; "dip your hand into a bowl of warm water and fall fast asleep"; etc.”

Craig Ferguson (1962) Scottish-born American television host, stand-up comedian, writer, actor, director, author, producer and voice a…

The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (2005–2014)