Tv Addiction

In her essay, "Tv Addiction," Marie Winn compares "television addiction" to

other harmful habits, and tries to convince the reader that heavy television viewing is as harmful as drug and alcohol, and it should not be viewed differently than other serious addictions. In fact, the most important factor that backs up her argument is her simplified definition for the word "addiction," which is " a tendency to overindulge in some pleasurable activity. (608)" However, thinking logically, we could see that Winn`s definition is too broad, and does not provide an efficient explanation for addiction. In order to clarify what a definition`s being too broad might cause, we can consider a more explicit example, for instance, a fallacious definition of automobile; a vehicle that has four wheels. Now what is wrong with this definition is the fact that there are also automobiles that have only three wheels. Although Winn`s definition gives a sense of what addiction is to some extent, it does not set the criteria of addiction completely. Thus, in my point of view, Winn`s definition of addiction does not provide a proper explanation, and her argument about the correlation between heavy television viewing and addiction falls short of convincing the reader.

In order to apply her definition to tv addiction, Marie Winn mentions about the fact that most people can not stop watching television once they start by saying "television viewing for those who are vulnerable to addiction is more like drinking or taking drugs-once you start it is hard to stop. (608)"

Another point that she highlights is that, like drug or alcohol, watching television breaks people`s connection with the reality, and makes them get into a pleasurable but

imaginary world. Thus, we see that Winn sets her criteria for addiction as extreme desire, and the lack of self-control over the activity or habit, and also the breaking of ties with reality. When we take some other examples like heavy use of internet and cell phone, we can see that these activities would also fit Winn`s criteria. Moreover, we could find many more examples of addiction by taking Winn`s logic.

However, it is an obvious fact that, in real life, people would not refer to heavy

use of internet or cell phone as addiction, so at this point, we should determine what a more complete definition of addiction would be like. According to Cambridge Learner`s Dictionary, the definition of addiction is "the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice, or to something that is physically habit forming, as narcotics, to such an

extent that its cessation causes severe trauma." Hence, we could argue that "being hooked on television" is not a genuine addiction since it does not destroy people`s health

directly, but by weakening their ties to the real world and affecting their psychological states. Regarding its effect that makes people watch more once they start, we should consider