taking sides: sides

(not me: tho we did not own a tv until i was 7 as we were pore -> and when bbc 2 started in we cd not get that as our first tv wez secondhand and didn't have enuff knobs)

Can't remember what channels we watched - Poldark seemed to be on all the time though. We weren't allowed to watch ANY telly in the afternoons as the childminder was 'against it'. In fact we had to COVER UP the TV so her own children wouldn't be CORRUPTED.

we never bought the tv times, so until the radio times did itv/c4 as well we wouldn't have known what was on anyway. i don't think i ever saw anything on tv until i was 5 or 6, and we weren't allowed to turn the tv on without permission until we were 14 or so...

Did your parents think you'd electrocute yourself or something Toby? I think we probably were allowed to watch ITV as I have a very vivid childhood memory of lying in bed and hearing the Correr theme tune downstairs, also my mum used to watch Emmerdale Farm when I was in the room (young Emma's first introduction to soap! As in operas, I was regularly washed as a child). Also Press Gang (oh yes we saw a bloke off Press Gang on Saturday in a field in Clapton, well I say we, I was the one who spotted him).

I was discouraged from watching children's ITV yes. However, a blanket ban was never employed. This meant that if I happened to watch "Clapperboard", "Tiswas" or "Magpie", then my mother would come into the room at slag the programme off and strongly suggest that I watch BBC instead. She also took umbrage at me singing TV commercial tunes, although she never criticised my father from singing jingles from Radio Luxembourg that he'd heard in his youth, which struck me as somewhat unfair. If it were not for my nan coming to live with us in 1974, chances are that my parents would not have got a TV or a phone. She insisted on both. That said, she never had a tv at her old home, but simply went a few doors down the road to watch her friend's. She always called round at the same time(s) which meant that the only programmes she ever watched on our newly acquired tv were "Sale of the Century" and "Upstairs Downstairs", ie the programmes she watched at her friend's house. Of course, "Sale of the Century" was on ITV, "And Now! From Norwich! It's the Quiz of the Week!", which may have been whilst ITV was never ruled out completely.

We couldn't get BBC2. For some reason I can't fathom, watching BBC2 required the use of a different kind of aerial (2 diamond-shaped wires and a blue plastic base held on with Sellotape) to BBC1 and ITV (classic, "bunny ears" aerial) and I remember my father walking round the living room trying to get reception so I could watch "Play Away" featuring Brian Cant, Floella Benjamin et al. It was all in vain - the screen displayed a snowstorm no matter where he went.

You sound very proud Emma.

We had Toby's Radio Times problem, we never knew what was on the other side on switching over was a punXor journey into an unknown underworld. The silver coating from the TV from this era has completely worn away on the 1 and 2 buttons, but is *pristine* on all the others.

We were very much a BBC only household when I was a nipper, and then only certain programmes were permitted: Top of the Pops, Newsround and Tomorrow's World.

In fact, a sign of my backwardness where TV is concerned: When I was about 7 years old I asked my dad what a remote control was. He picked up a garden cane that was lying around for some reason, used it to push a button on the TV and said "That's a remote control". When kids at school said their remote controls got lost under cushions, I was always very baffled.

My parents specifically hunted for a TV that didn't have remote control - still just possible in 1989.

I wasn't allowed to watch ITV either. My parents obviously thought we were vastly impressionable and unable to think for ourselves.

Nor was I allowed to watch Grange Hill or Eastenders. We used to turn down the volume just before the theme tune came on, and then turn it up when it had finished, as mum was always making tea. The Eastenders theme tune used to have dad running into the room ready to do battle. Unfortunately we didn't have the nouse to tape it and then play it at random times, just to see him dashing about the house

I don't remember feeling hard done by though, perhaps I've got a very good selective memory. The cruellest thing my parents did was to refuse to allow me a pair of jeans until I was 14. Even then they were cheap, completely unfashionable ones.

Still, it doesn't seem to have affected me too much....

I wonder why parents think that they have to impose all these utterly random rules in order to be good responsible parents? It's all very strange.

My parents still insist that Corrie lost its way "around 1965". My Dad, in particular, was scathing about ITV sports coverage and sit- coms, but made an exception for "Rising Damp". He was also convinced that switching to ITV 'ruined people' - e.g. Morecambe & Wise, The Goodies, Benny Hill (I'm not sure BH was ever a Beeb personality myself).

There was no blanket ban, and no sense of snobbery, just "it's rubbish, don't watch it".

Well it's just a natural reaction to our hypermediated blah that shows every sign of etc. If, god forbid, I ever have children, they'll probably grow up to hate me just because I didn't let them watch "Total Decapitations Live" before Sunday pancakes.

"Rising Damp" must = most English TV title ever invented.

If "it's rubbish, don't watch it" isn't snobbery I am afeared of what you English are capable of in that department.

i was not allowed grange hill either, although i seem to remember watching it anyway, which suggests my mum was making tea or something so didn't realise we were watching it.

We were forbidden to watch Grange Hill by my dad who was never home in time to police this rule which was just as well as my mum liked it more than we did and we always watched it. I think his objection was that a) we would learn insolent inner city manners and get expelled and b) we would start talking all estuary-like and never get a job as a result or something equally dire.

their parents watched the commercial channel = they are jade

ps this is a joke abt snobbery not the actual thing itself

btw I think I'm getting better at this "being Nick Dastoor" thing. Which is ironic because my parents wouldn't let me watch "You Can't Do That On Television" because they told me it taught cruelty and put- downs as a substitute for conversation.

If I wouldn't have been allowed, I'd probably still be mono-lingual. hahah Oh no, I know a bit of French German and Japanese. Anyway, why would you not be allowed? This confuses me. This probably says more about me and my parents being in sales - I would probably have been forced to watch it. haha

Ooh sudden flashback to watching Dynasty with my mum while dad worked late on Fridays. Our shared secret vice.

I am not "allowed" to watch it now, since it apparently doesn't travel well. I have no idea what a "Jade" is consequently (and thankfully).

If "it's rubbish, don't watch it" isn't snobbery I am afeared of what you English are capable of in that department.

Sorry, that was clumsy phrasing - my 'quote' was meant to reflect the disdain my Dad had for certain programmes, not necessarily the channel as a whole. Now, unless you're being super-pedantic on the definition of snobbery (e.g. ignoring anything regarded [who's doing the regarding?] as inferior), I don't see your point.

It's not as if my folks imagined themselves 'above' all that vulgar nonsense on Granada, they just didn't like it. I'm going to see them this weekend, so I can probe them on the subtleties of 'Mind Your Language' vs 'Reggie Perrin'.

(I suspect there's been a dozen threads on ILX about class and snobbery which I've missed).

Bloody hell, we never got the radio or TV times, we just checked the TV section in the newspaper. I watched all the channels, and made sure my dad tuned in channel 4 on the day it started! (the Munsters was on, the first time I watched).

My folks definitely thought themselves above Married With Children, and The Simpsons (quote from Dad: "I don't watch cartoons"), not to mention Family Ties, which came on right before the Cosby Show but which we couldn't watch! But for some reason Cheers was acceptable??

It's my experience that Dad's don't watch TV.

They're good at tuning it in, though. Watch in amazement as Dad uses his Dad-Power to affect the picture of the Magic BoX0r! What with cable these days Dads around the world have lost access to this delicate gift.

I asked one of my male flatmates, to tune my telly and video player for me. He fiddled around for half an hour or so, read the manuals, and still couldn't get it to work - so I did it myself in less than five minutes. That's woman-power (and no, it's not a situation like loosening the lid on the jam jar). It sure beat man-power and I reckon it would have a good chance against dad-power too!

Well your friend's first mistake was reading the manual. He lost precious minutes that could have been fruitfully spent destroying your equipment.... Real Men don't read the manual, they wiggle things until something breaks.... Dads however have become old and weak so rather than breaking during the wiggle-action the TV sometimes actually works.

tracer: perhaps cheers was acceptible viewing because it was a show about boston folk hanging out in bars instead of spending quality time with their families. family ties was too republican for my parents (alex p keaton), so i feel your pain on that one.

My Mum thought it was the height of vulgarity to put the colour up too 'high' on the telly.

Rising Damp *was* an exception. I've got a book about it.

Tiswas was considered very dangerous in our house.

haha andrew YES!! degree of colour saturation = continuation of class war by othah means!!

halfpint fwend to medium-sized mark s: "why do you even HAVE a colour TV?: everything is tuned to grey!!"

My Dad also though his recently graduated son had had a lobotomy when I was always watching the Simpsons. Then he realised it was subversive and he loves it now.

As a child the 9pm watershed was (quite correctly) enforced rigidly with the exception of The Young Ones which my Mum hated and my Dad would hide me to let me watch. (Under the sofa generally then he would distract my mum so I could sneak off).

to hide me under our sofa my dad wd have had to make me less than one inch wide: this he never did (bah! breakfast = hot gravel etc)

We had hot water instead of tea. And sometimes it wasn't even hot. But we drank it and we bloody liked it.

am i mad or did newspapers even print tv listings in the early 80s?? i have some memory of it being the law that the radio times was the only thing allowed to print the bbc listings and the tv times the only one to print itv/c4; surely otherwise other listings mags wd have sprung up earlier than they did?

Only allowed to print listings for the day of publication and the day after I think.

My mother wouldn't allow me to watch any TV at all (apart from early morning kids TV or something) until she emigrated. I have no idea that she distinguished the 'commercial channel' from every other odd channel in her strange psycho brane...

As a result I had to pretend in the playground that I knew wot the other kids were talking about when in fact I was thinking 'Scott and Charlene who'? I felt so left-out.

Aw.

But you must've developed excellent acting skills & skills of pretending to know what other people are on about when you don't have a clue which are invaluable in today's modern world innit!

Yeah.

I can't believe the horrible mix of overprotectionism and 'charwoman's channel' type snobbery that was inflicted on British ILErs. Children of freaky parents obviously end up here.

My mum wasn't overly fond of the TV Times but YOU HAD TO BUY IT. I mean, come on. We didn't get a newspaper every day so that wouldn't suffice as an alternative and anyway you've got to plan.

That means you lot never got to read Katie Boyle's problem page. She taught me everything I know.

I never watched much ITV, but that was cause it didn't seem very good. I'm afraid I was a Multi-Coloured Swap Shop boy, not Tiswas. And I don't even remember watching Magpie ever.

There was never a problem in my house with Grange Hill, either. Just staying up late.

What is the "being Nick Dastoor" th

-ing?

Archel: while dad worked late on Fridays = He was down the pub.

It's a shame Katie Boyle never tackled such important issues as What is Heavy Petting eh?

We never had Radio /TV Times in the house. We all developed psychic powers to guess what would be on TV. The main BBC / ITV fite I recall was my dad & brother wanting to watch Wurzel Gummidge vs me wanting to watch Basil Brush.

carmody to thread!!

We were only allowed to stay up past the watershed to watch 999.