This Aint News

I was in an electronics store recently and witnessed the clearest sign of the apocalypse I have seen yet. I saw a refrigerator with a TV in it.

Someone did not open a fridge and place a TV inside. No, this was a TV embedded in the door of the refrigerator.

I can understand keeping a TV in the kitchen so you can watch while you cook or do the dishes. But how dependant on TV, do you have to be, that you can't miss 30 seconds to get a sandwich? I know you wouldn't be getting a salad because TV-fridge people don't eat salads.

People are not buying this as a space saving measure. That would make sense if flat screen TV’s didn’t already exist. You can get a flat screen TV and a fridge for less than it costs to get a fridge with a TV in it. Kitchens are being phased out anyway. What’s the point?

The only reason to spend a few hundred extra for a set embedded into the door of your fridge is if you feel you can't miss whatever it is you're watching long enough to open it. If you're hungry, take a break from the program and make some lunch. And if your version of technology is combining your television and your refrigerator you just might be making hotdogs.

But then again, maybe the fridge TV is helping.
"Before my TV-fridge, I used to sit on the couch watching television while eating whole sticks of butter and drinking bacon grease. But now I make smaller portions and walk the two metres into my kitchen to get more food without missing any programming. With this new system, I'm burning three to four calories a day. Thank you TV-Fridge! You're helping build a better me."

The scary truth is this: TV-fridges make people fat. It’s the standard bearer for all new technology, designed to appeal to our laziness.

New technology is mostly great (excluding TV-fridges). Ultimately the purpose of technology is to make things easier and increase the quality of life. New hybrid technology is everywhere. It’s as if Inspector gadget has had his way with all that we own.

“Dude, have you seen my latest Mp3 player?”
“Dude, that’s nothing, my Mp3 player also is a mobile.”
“Well that’s nothing, dude, my mobile has a TV.”
“Still, that’s nothing, my TV has a fridge.”
“Yeah, well, my fridge has some… some… some butter… You want some?”“
"Sure”

 Technology has given people time to do things they could never have done before. Like eat pie while watching the latest episode of ‘Australia’s Biggest Loser’. Can anyone smell the irony?

 Despite all this, over the last two decades Australia has put on the pounds. More leisure time is spent watching TV than any other activity besides sleep. It was found that reducing time spent watching TV was the most important strategy for addressing the obesity epidemic. In 2002, 37.6% of deaths were caused by heart disease. Heart disease is the leading cause of death in Australia. The leading cause of heart disease is obesity. And the leading causes for obesity are too much television and bad dieting, in other words, TV-fridges. When it comes down to it, TV-fridges are actually the leading cause of death in Australia. Please, let’s not quibble over semantics.

Damn. And I really did have my heart set on that TV-Fridge.

You know what the worst part is? Half of you reading this are thinking, "Really, a fridge TV? That's kind of cool." And those same people are wondering why the TV is only on the outside of the fridge, since that means you can't open it AND watch at the same time.

There was a commercial a few years back. It is about a guy watching soccer on TV. So he doesn’t miss a play he has TV’s stashed all over the house. They were in the bathroom, kitchen, in his drawers, medicine cabinet, and in the shower. The great part about the commercial was that it was a joke.

Everywhere we look TV’s are popping up. The soccer fanatic is gone but the food fanatic remains. It’s like some sick version of the matrix. You can’t escape from Nigella Lawson and her awesome rack… of lamb. And since when did food become so sexy? If years of advertising have taught us anything, it is that sex sells. Gone are the days of meat and two veg. Food has been sexified, there is now a sexier way to get thunder thighs, and it comes with a cockney accent.

Celebrity chefs are like pop idols. Television identities like Jamie Oliver, Ian Hewitson and the Iron Chef have popularised food. Being able to cook well has never been so fashionable. A survey done by vogue showed that the ability to cook is a more desirable quality in a guy than a successful career.

So she doesn’t mind that you clean the toilets at your old high school, just because you can make one hell of a chicken chow mien?

So in the face of the obesity epidemic the government decided something had to be said. But how to tell people that TV is bad? What a moment… is it… TV?  And so the talking Sofa was invented. You all know him, he’s this talking sofa that plays basketball and tells fat kids to “get movin’!” Please, if I always did what talking sofas told me to do. I would now be in Mexico, leading a cult called the flaming burritos. I’m just thankful I had my wits about me.

So what’s the problem? Australians know the risks. They know that food and TV will kill you. They know that food and TV make you ugly. Then why are the TV-fridge people among us? Why haven’t they conveniently disappeared along with the boat people? I guess it’s cause we tolerate them.

 Australians are the most tolerant race that I have ever met. Political correctness is our god. We just love acceptance. What do you think the people with fridge TVs are watching? Do you think anyone is playing a jazzercise video? That the fridge-TV people are sweating while doing some squats? No way. Every last one of those sets is playing Dr. Phil telling the owner that it's okay to be fat and happy. And they'd say, "amen, Dr. Phil!" but their mouths are too full from that last stick of butter. The message in our media is that it is okay to be fat and happy. We accept you. Stay fat, we never judge.

Let’s introduce some new shows and get rid of some old ones. I’m seeing a sesame street special; the cookie monster o.d’s while snorting cookie dough. See kids, this is what happens when you eat too many cookies. Not appropriate? Then just replace Oprah with present day Kirsty Allen naked. That’ll get the message across. And please stop showing those B grade, day time movies, where the mom always says. “Finish your dinner son, or you won’t get any dessert.” How many times have we heard that? So my reward for gluttony is a sugary delight?

“Thanks mum! Can I go watch the sesame street special now?”

“Sure, but not on the TV-fridge, there is a cooking marathon on tonight, Ian Hewitson and Jamie Oliver tag team the Iron chef and Nigella Lawson in pudding wrestling, it’s going to be a nail biter, except I won’t be biting on nails. Mm… where is that pudding mix?”

Why attack the TV-fridge? Because it’s the unholy hybrid of the two leading causes of fat people; food and TV. It’s like Darth Vader and Hitler merging into one being. Except that this time, instead of being bent on world domination, it’s bent on making you fat.

It’s blitzkrieg all over again. On its own the TV managed to invade the bedroom, the computer, and the car. Now with an unholy alliance with the kitchen who knows what ends it has in mind. Concentration camps will be made to hold the treadmill and gym equipment. And then one day, the equipment will be taken for ‘repairs’ and never seen again.

On average each Australian spends 4 and a half hours a day in front of a screen. That’s a possible 4 and a half hours staring at a fridge. Your mind will inadvertently wander towards food. Little do you know that you are only one happy meal away from joining that big Doctor Phil special in the sky.

Imagine that. Getting there and coming face to face with god or Yahweh or whatever you call the force that gets you through the day, and having to explain that you died because you led a lifestyle that required a television set embedded in your refrigerator.

And you know what will happen? As the great judge looks down from his throne, the talking sofa in line behind you will say, "really, a TV-fridge? That's kind of cool."