I may be a booby, Dick; but I feel that your assertion, not in OP but in the post preceding mine to which you were responding, that tv was

"passive ... about sit back and be entertained or not"

was overstated, far too sweeping, and delivered in a tone which, if not 'self-righteous', would do at a pinch until a self-righteous one came along.

All very well to copy-paste a whole day's programmes from one channel as if that made your entire argument unassailable. Would you like anyone [I can't be arsed, quite honestly] to print off a day's programmes from the History Channel, or the Languages Channel, or the Schools Channel, or the Discovery Channel? Or did you not know such channels existed. But, just for the sake of argument, let's look at something a bit more mainstream. What about

The BBC Television Shakespeare is a series of British television adaptations of the plays of William Shakespeare, created by Cedric Messina and produced by BBC Television. It was transmitted in the UK from 3 December 1978 to 27 April 1985 and spanned seven series.

Every one of the plays in the Shakespearean received a tv production featuring our most distinguished actors and directors.

Or let's just have a quick look at random at BBC1 for today and see what I can find --

>small>5.15 Songs of Praise. Aled Jones interviews the singer Paul Jones, who also performs

6.20 John Craven visits Jodrell Bank Observatory in Cheshire

9.00 Britain and the Sea: David Dimbleby sails along East Anglia's coast to explore how the sea inspired artists, transformed architecture and created a uniquely British beach culture

Three programmes of what I would unhesitatingly rubricate as undoubted intellectually and culturally highly worthwhile content; the last of them of a sort of visual actuality which would not be well-served by any other medium.

I am sure they all achieved respectable viewing figures -- all parts of series which they would not continue if not enough people watched them. What do you mean by dismissing the viewers of such programmes as a load of "passive" sheep who just "sit back to be entertained or not".

Sorry, Dick. Priggish; self-righteous; and all the rest. What 'mood' I may be in has no effect on my maintaining this as a statement of obvious objective fact. Mood & opinion don't come into it. It seems to me as unacceptable a formulation as some of the animadversions against your musical professionalism that you have recently objected to on various threads.

Anybody differ?

~Michael~