18. I Refuse to Feel Bad About Letting My Children Watch TV

Michael J. Petrilli wrote an article confessing that as a father, he does not feel bad about letting his children watch TV. The reason was, "Pop culture, even "low-brow" entertainment, paves the way for appreciating the classics, and it'll help my kids connect with people who aren't just like them.". Unlike what he thinks monstly other parents would be against, he declared that TV including commercials and "crappy" programs can be helpful to their kids. Yes, he wants his children to also know classics, read books, play catch with friends outside, but he wasn't necessarily seeing television as a bad thing. He gave three arguments: the kids programs actually had value and were all related to the world's epics,  that an introduction to other epics (even via pop culture) will lay a sturdy foundation that will make their engagement and enjoyment of classics much more likey, and this kind of interchange betweent he kids and the culture can unite the "coming apart" social world going on in the U.S. 

Petrilli's introduction was pretty ordinary. He introduced his own situation of his kids starting winter break, and the concern of many other parents that are probably worried about the same thing; children watching television. Readers might wonder what's wrong with letting kids watching some tv, so Pretilli goes straight into explanation of what he exactly wants to say. He uses direct words to implicate beforehand of what he will argue about and which side he is on. By giving specific and clear reasons, it makes his points seem simple and easy to understand. As an ordinary father himself, he definitely knows how to provoke "father reader"s' sympathy and get them to agree with him. Another method that he uses to get the readers to feel sympathy is that he mentions the names of the exact TV programs that people watch. Overall I think Petrilli's article was fairly straightforward therefore I was able to quickly grasp the main point and understand the context. Although it wasn't as interesting as it could've been if he had included some humor, I think Petrilli's article delivered well of the author's message and succeeded in accomplishing its main purpose.

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/12/i-refuse-to-feel-bad-about-letting-my-children-watch-tv/282547/#comments