Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television

[3] This is the first book that collects information from various sources to determine how the wide availability of television affects society.

The author states that television makes it so that people have no common sense which leads to, as Cornell University professor Rose K. Golden wrote for the journal Contemporary Sociology, being "powerless to reject the camera's line of sight, reset the stage, or call on our own sensory apparatus to correct the doctored sights and sounds the machine delivers".

[5] A 1979 review of the book from The Cambridge Quarterly stated that 99% of American homes had a television with millions of people watching it for several hours per day.

[6] Michael Comber of The Cambridge Quarterly disagreed with Mander's arguments, stating that television has room for multiple ideologies and that "technology need not be viewed as a monolithic ogre, outside our control, incapable of reform, and at best fit for only elimination".

"[6] Kirkus Reviews wrote, "In the end, the author admits the dominant position of TV in our society and concedes he has no earthly idea of how to bring about its demise.