Even though I've posted this under "Rants," I'm going to try my best not to make this into a wild-eyed ranting entry. Really.

It seems nowadays nearly every minivan or SUV sold has a DVD player/console in the back. Perhaps automotive makers were reflecting on their experiences with their own spawn getting antsy and impatient during long trips, thus inspiring them to thing of new ways to keep them quiet other than traditional road games. Fine. Having been in that backseat myself for 6+ hours at a time, I wouldn't have minded the same sort of luxury usually reserved for airline passengers once in awhile.

HOWEVER. It drives me absolutely up the $#%^ing wall to see parents who have this "convenience" turned on every time they back out the driveway. I find it hard to believe that parents in the parking lot of the grocery store with their soccer-uniform clad kids are driving more than 30 minutes and thus need to put "Finding Nemo" in for the "long trip home." Bull. The real reason is that parents are recalcitrant to actually discipline their kids when they get bored, so the easiest thing to do is to shove them in front of the TV so they'll shut up and Mommy can yap on her cell phone.

Okay, so that last sentence is probably just a generalization, but you get my gist. What really gets me is that today's parents seem to care less and less about what goes into their children's heads.

To me, every time I see the flickering light of a DVD console in the back of someone's minivan on a weeknight, I think parents are directly contributing to the overall "dumbing down" of kids today. "Scientists have found that watching television before the age of three could damage a child's ability to learn. And research into children aged five to 15 discovered that those who spent the most time watching television were least likely to leave school with qualifications."

In reality, it doesn't matter how old children are when it comes to the negative effects of excessive TV. Another study by the University of Washington in Seattle, looked at the maths and reading abilities of almost 2,000 children. It found that television viewing among under-threes seemed to harm learning ability, concluding that toddlers learned far better when they actively took part in word and number games. In addition, it has been reported that children under two should not watch television because it increases the risk of them developing attention deficit disorder. "Watching too much television increased the child's likelihood of being unable to pay attention in school, and each hour a day in front of the TV increased by 10% the chance that the child would show signs of disorder," the study found.

I can't go on and on about the negative effects of TV and claim that I never watch it and it's a horrific invention, because that would be a total lie. When I was growing up, my parents limited the amount of TV I was able to watch. At the time, I absolutely hated the "half hour" rule, but looking back, I'm glad they instituted it. Consequently I became a reading fiend and was able to survive those long car trips by bringing along a stack of books.