The curse of must-see TV ; Even fantastic shows (yes, they really do exist) are threats to our underused imaginations

It happens almost every day. Someone whose judgment you trustrecommends a great TV show for you to watch, either live or on DVD.It could be "Justified," "Mad Men," "True Blood," "The Wire," "NurseJackie," Dexter," "The Killing," "Game of Thrones," "Luther,""Intelligence," whatever. Not that these shows are equally fantastic- the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's "Intelligence" towersabove all the others - but let's face it: There is a lot of good TVout there.

I call it The Curse of Good Television. I am no longer acceptingTV recommendations, no matter how enthusiastic. (A friend justinsisted that "Men of a Certain Age" is worth watching, which maywell be true.) Because then all you are doing with your life iswatching TV, and that is not a good thing.

I'm not a deranged anti-TV zealot. I'll admit I was tempted toraise my children without a television, and I'll admit that I was abit envious when all our TV-less friends watched their kids sashayinto Phi Beta Kappa, because they spent their childhoods reading andthinking. But I couldn't do it. I like TV. I can watch about 30minutes of almost any sports event, exception made for ESPN'sstultifying College World Series. In addition, I can accommodate oneTV show at a time. When "Justified" ended, I made the leap to"Intelligence," streaming on Netflix. I watched both seasons prontoand am now in the market for a show to follow, maybe.

What's my beef? In my book, "good TV" is an oxymoron. That's mycriticism of public television, which is generally much better thanits commercial counterpart: It is still television. You are stillsitting there, passively absorbing whatever soothing, corporatistpap the nice people at Archer Daniels Midland, Chevron, or somerailway monopoly want you to hear.

Public TV is to television as Nantucket Nectars is to Coca-Cola. The "nectar," a "real product with real ingredients," has upto 33 grams of sugar in 8 ounces. Coke, which is quite modest aboutany nutritional claims for its ebony-colored swill, has 27 grams ofsugar.

The nectar is the PBS NewsHour. Coke is the CBS Evening News.Similar product, different pretensions.

Radio? Not the same. First off, you can do a lot while listeningto radio: drive to work, bake a cake, or watch television. (Joke.)Even 21st-century radio remains a medium of dreams. I still listento baseball games on the radio. It's delightful and suspenseful.Ronald Reagan, a gifted fantasist, got his start creating imaginary"play-by-play" baseball coverage for radio, based on a telegraphicaccount of a faraway game.

Just last week the Journal of the American Medical Associationpublished a so-called meta-study of the health effects of TVwatching. The usual scary numbers are all there: Americans watchfive hours of TV a day. (This is a Nielsen statistic, which includeseveryone over age 2. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports thatadult Americans watch a somewhat less scary 2 1/2 hours a day.) JAMAnoted that your risk of developing diabetes and heart disease risesaccordingly as you watch more TV, and so on.

But that is not why I dislike TV. After all, you can exercise infront of the TV, as I did so often this winter at the YMCA, watchingthe soul-draining inanities of the Food Channel. A character inJennifer Egan's unusual novel, "The Keep," articulated my problemwith TV and with the armamentarium of mass distraction -smartphones, iPads, etc.

- thrust upon us in recent years. Her protagonist Howard haspurchased a dilapidated castle somewhere in Eastern Europe, with notelephone, TV, or Internet, and wants to create a theme park for themind.

Howard asks: What is missing from our lives? "Imagination. We'velost the ability to make things up. We've farmed out that job to theentertainment industry, and we sit around and drool on ourselveswhile they do it for us." He wants to make imagination "yours again,not Hollywood's, not the networks, not Lifetime TV or Vanity Fair orwhatever crap video game you are addicted to. You make it up, youtell the story, and then you are free."

Good TV, I salute you. I just wish there were a little less ofyou to go around.

Alex Beam is a Globe columnist. His e-dress is beam@globe.com.

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