The TV Showdown: Who Controls the Remote?

by Leslie Bennetts

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Such conflicts are virtually ubiquitous, it seems. Since more than 98 percent of American homes have television, negotiating its use is a nearly universal challenge in this country.

Back in the dark ages when a household was lucky to have one television set, families used to argue about what to watch. Now that people have multiple TVs as well as VCRs and TiVo, couples don’t need to make either/or choices. But they still have to work out who gets to watch what and how, and where.

Clearly I’m not the only wife who doesn’t want to experience certain kinds of programming. “Living in an entirely male household, I’ve come to the conclusion that men will watch any sport that involves muscle and sweat and blood,” observes my friend Judy, a writer who lives in

Washington, D.C., with her husband and two teenaged sons. “Their favorite is blood; they like unlimited blood. I think programs should be rated according to the amount of blood spilled. They could rate them by buckets.” She herself likes cooking shows, but she can’t seem to get her family to watch with her. “Guys have a chick sensor, and they won’t go near those shows,” she says sadly.Ask any couple about their television-watching habits, and chances are you’ll hear about the gender wars. “My husband likes these stupid shoot-em-ups, and I won’t let him watch them in my presence,” says Ann Abram, a psychoanalyst who lives in

Westport, Conn. “I hate the noise and the violence; I don’t want to be subjected to it.”In her case, technology provided an easy solution. “I insisted he use headphones,” she says.Amanda Butterbaugh just sends her husband to the basement. Not only does Michael Mulheren gravitate toward war movies, he also likes to watch more than one at a time.”If you have two war movies on at the same time, you never have to miss a battle scene,” explains Mulheren, an actor on Broadway in La Cage aux Folles and on television in