When TV remote fights ensue

Change the channel or please change the channel. Which of the two phrases do you often use when you are already tired of the programme she has been watching all day? Or worse still, when you are looking forward to that football match but she is helplessly bent on that soap opera.

It might not even be a girlfriend or wife, but a brother, sister or even a housemate whose tastes in TV are annoying. “I had a roomie at University who never used to get it! I always thought Telemundo was a feminine thing, until I met John. Man, he was loyal to- is it Second Chance and...” Jonathan Musiime, an engineer, pauses as he tries to recall all the other soap titles John was loyal to.

“It got even worse when my girlfriend and I started living together. Four years later after hustling with John, she never got enough of those translated Indian soaps on TV. That’s when I started doubting if that was the kind of girl I wanted to date or marry,” he said. He angrily counts the many times he missed a wrestling game, the Premier league and the news because she wanted to watch soap operas and channel E!

How to keep it in check
Little things such as taste in TV programming are bound to break a relationship. So how do you keep things together without losing the fuss to a dear one? For Bob Bwana, it’s all about compromise. “I would learn to compromise with my partner. It comes down to deciding; if you like this and I like the other, then she will have to watch the other channels when I’m busy and give me the chance to watch what I want too.

However, his friend Ruth Natukunda disagreed. She urges him to reason saying “women are the hardest thing to get off TV. How dare you tell me to leave the TV for you to watch what you want? She questions.

Natukunda: There is no room for compromise. Period!! The men should just leave the TV to women. My stepmum quarrels over the TV. She tells my uncles to go watch it elsewhere if they want particular channels, often it was news.
Bwana: You ought to give yourself a chance to watch what the other is watching. It comes back to sacrifice; you might like what they are watching. You would be shocked.

Natukunda: no, you go buy your own TV. Buy another one and let me keep my own.
At this point, they seemed to agree on having separate TV sets. Bwana agreeably said it would be wise to have one TV in the sitting room and one in the bedroom. Truth is, often time, women influence what the family (especially the children) watch. So, keeping a separate set for yourself might be a good solution.

Multitask
Natukunda maintains that, “Unless the woman is sleeping, there is no room to stop her from watching what she wants. Perhaps if she is a busy woman, maybe, but she is also the first to get back home and often the first thing she does when she returns (watch TV). Bwana interjects, “What if I want to make love?” Natukunda quickly adds, “Women are the only people able to multitask. I once watched a show where a woman was watching TV as the guy did his thing.”

Bwana responds with a hearty laugh, before he comes up with a different solution. “Perhaps I would buy the Dstv explorer package that enables us to watch different channels at different times,” he said. The only ground the relationship should stand upon is that the relationship stands regardless of petty differences like TV tastes.

To keep peace
Jonathan Musiime who still lives through these cat fights argues that women love TV more. “Unless the man is also very fussy, you have to let her watch and have your own TV set or watch something with her often to keep the peace.” He also suggests that if you won’t catch the game at home steal off a night or two at the nearest bar with friends to watch what you want there and let her know.