My parents didn't really limit screentime when we were little. We were allowed to stay up late playing Nintendo. We watched cartoons on Saturday morning. I remember the tv always being on.
When we were older (junior high+) and needed to study more, that's when they limited screentime. Although by high school my brother and I had our own tvs.
Did your parents limit screentime?
honeydew / 7488 posts
I don't think they really did on purpose. There was just a lot less kids programming available on TV at the time, so I only remember watching a little bit of after school TV and saturday cartoons!
squash / 13208 posts
In a way - I mean, as kids we were ALWAYS outside - so there wasn't time to sit inside and watch TV
GOLD / wonderful apricot / 22646 posts
Nope not at all. They laugh jokingly about how my concentration was so great...that nothing could distract me from watching TV :P....
They are so confused when I tell them that screentime for DS is a no-no in our house.
Esp since I did well/ok in school and in their eyes, didn't have any issues from TV...
bananas / 9899 posts
They limited it, but not really that much.
When I was a kid, we didn't have any kid friendly channels, like no Disney channel or cartoon channels or anything. The only time something that interested me was on TV was the 2 hours afterschool when there were some cartoons on and the Saturday morning cartoons. I remember at noon on Saturday and all of Sunday all that would play on TV were infomercials lol. That cut my screen time more than my parents did.
pomelo / 5720 posts
We didn't have cable until I was 10 and after that we didn't have a VCR or nintendo until much later. We were also outside all time time and only watched t.v. in the evenings before bed or cartoons on Sat morning.
blogger / wonderful cherry / 21628 posts
Not really. They were strict about what we could watch though. It was only PBS and educational shows.
pomelo / 5129 posts
We didn't have cable or video games, so there wasn't too much of a need to limit it until we were older and got our first computer. Even then, we didn't have the internet until I was in college.
There were a few summers where my parents tried to get us out of the house more by making us "bank" TV/computer hours by either reading a book or playing outside.
I'd read a book in a tree and bank double hours 
GOLD / wonderful olive / 19030 posts
Nope, I do remember on weekends mom shutting the TV off and saying "go play outside!"
wonderful pear / 26210 posts
All we had was TV and video games, there was no internet back then, so there wasn't that much to limit.
I watched A LOT of TV, a LOT. I am not a menace to society, lol.
pomegranate / 3401 posts
Yes! We were allowed to watch one hour (7-8p) and that was it. We read a lot and played outside a lot. But I'm addicted to TV now. 
papaya / 10343 posts
No. I didn't have a gaming system (mostly because I didn't want one, my brother had one but I didn't play). As far as tv went, the tv was always on in our house. But we only had the one in our living room when I was little and my parents didn't cater to kid shows. They pretty much watched what they wanted, which was boring to me, so I played (albeit in the same room) a lot. When I got older, like 8th grade maybe, I had a tv in my room. But at that point I liked most of their shows so I only really watched it at night (my parents had a rule I had to be in my room by 10pm. They didn't care how late I stayed up, I just had to go upstairs by then). I always got good grades so they never bugged me about homework or tv or going to bed.
GOLD / wonderful pea / 17697 posts
Nope. The TV was my babysitter before I was in school full-time. My dad was home, but he worked nights and was asleep. My mom wasn't there. They would set me up on a blanket in front of PBS (I think?) and I would watch Eureka's Castle, Sesame Street, The Elephant Show, etc, and after one of them it was time for me to eat my lunch, which was on a plate on the bottom shelf of the fridge. After I ate my dad got up and brought me to afternoon kindergarten (or before I was in school he would sleep longer and get up with later on to spend time with us when my brothers got home from school).
ETA: Once my brothers were home and on the weekends I spent most of the afternoon/evening outside playing.
grapefruit / 4582 posts
Nope. I remember coming home from school and watching TRL for an hour then getting homework ready and having dinner. We would also watch TV after dinner but I was always busy on the weekends. As a very young child I watched a lot of TV.
cantaloupe / 6164 posts
Nope. We always had the TV on, and I had one in my room from pretty early on. I always made good grades, and I think I'm pretty well-adjusted, so it can't be as evil as they say, right? 
honeydew / 7917 posts
Nope! I pretty much watched it all day long while my parents were working at the restaurant. I learned Cantonese and English by watching tv.
pineapple / 12234 posts
No but I chose to always be outside. They didn't have cable most of the time so I didn't mind.
GOLD / wonderful coffee bean / 18478 posts
No, I had a TV and Nintendo in my room. Pretty sure that was my babysitter. I always got all A's so it was never a problem. I also read a ton of books though.
honeydew / 7295 posts
Sometimes but not most of the time. We watched a lot of tv and my dad always had the tv on which I kind of hater personally.
nectarine / 2765 posts
Yup. TV was pretty non-existent I'm our house with the exception of the news. It's still pretty non-existent in their home. We read, played outside , etc.
honeydew / 7230 posts
Only the content (ie we weren't allowed to watch SNL??) but not the amount. Also we weren't allowed to sit really close to the TV because they thought it would ruin our vision.
Just remembered: when we were older we had to finish our homework before watching tv.
pineapple / 12802 posts
Nope. They limited content, but not hours. If I had homework, I had to do that first, but otherwise fair game. I remember getting home from school before they got home from work and watching tv until I heard the door open! Then I'd pretend I was doing my homework. LOOOL.
blogger / pomegranate / 3201 posts
Nope. The TV was always on at home and I had one in my own room starting in middle school.
I remember my mom going to my little brother's kindergarten back to school night and finding out that he was one of the only kids with a TV in his room and she came home and took it out!
pomegranate / 3917 posts
4 channels on TV, no game system, and computer was dial-up for longest time, so screen time really moderated itself in our household! We weren't big on it anyways, so long as we could watch hockey on Saturday night!
pomegranate / 3983 posts
No but we didn't have cable until I was in middle school, and Internet was dial up when I was in high school so it was sort of self limiting. I did watch a lot of TV though.
clementine / 849 posts
Only content. We couldn't watch anything on MTV. Other than that, we had TVs in our rooms and everything so we could watch whatever!
LOL going outside was punishment in our household XD
DH and I firmly believe in no tvs in the bedrooms and our kids will like the outdoors.
grapefruit / 4923 posts
no not really. but they did expect me to go to bed at a certain time (which cut out late night shows for me). i watched a shitload of tv growing up.
eggplant / 11408 posts
Kind of? We were allowed an hour before dinner, and my mom didn't like us to watch a lot more than that after school. But after dinner, the TV usually got turned on. She limited content, though.
When we were little, she swears that the only way she got anything done was to put in a Disney movie. It gave her 90 minutes of peace!
honeydew / 7504 posts
They definitely limited content (we weren't allowed to watch Three's Company, for instance). And we were never allowed to have a TV in our rooms. But otherwise, no.
cantaloupe / 6800 posts
@twodoghouse: same set up at my house!
Unlimited screen time, but we had rules about what we could/couldn't watch. As a young kid I played outside A LOT but if I wanted to watch TV all day I could.
pear / 1698 posts
No, but if we wanted TVs, computer games, or game systems we had to use our own money for them. Also, my mom got in a fight with the cable company for like a year when they took too long to bury the cable wire going across our yard so they cut us off so no tv during that time!
eggplant / 11716 posts
We got to watch a fair amount on Saturday mornings, but the rest of the week it was limited out of necessity. We had 1 TV in a house of 8 people. And the TV only got 3 channels by antennae. Also, my parents were super religious so *most* shows on TV were deemed innapropriate.
Not a lot of TV watching by anyone in my house growing up, to be honest.
blogger / coconut / 8306 posts
Yes! My mom used to put time limited on AOL so I'd get kicked off when my time was up.
Haaaated that.
hostess / wonderful honeydew / 32460 posts
Yep! My dad used to remove the plug from our tv cord before he left for work. Haha. Back in the day they came off!
coconut / 8234 posts
They did limit it. When we were really young we had to read our books, play in our rooms, and could only watch some TV. We had to play outside on warm days--all day. As we got older and were in school it was limited based on our school work.
We still watched a lot of TV though! TGIF, weekends, movies.
pomelo / 5093 posts
No. I watched hours and hours each day. It was a part of my parents just giving in, and never being active. I will raise my child very differently.
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