Simmermon: Leave me alone, CSI

Monday, October 29, 2007

A few months back, in the middle of the night, I bolted straight up in a cold sweat, “Too much CSI!” I said, without hesitation.

As I lay back down, the picture of my dead, mangled corpse still loomed in my brain. How many times have we all heard the whole, “there’s too much violence on TV” spiel? I always thought all that talk was a bunch of bologna, I mean, I played “Goldeneye” like eight hours a day as a kid and you don’t see me going around and shooting people in the head with a moonraker laser.

However, recently I had to rethink my opinion of violence in the media, after a distressing realization. I love to watch two TV programs: “CSI” and “Law and Order: Special Victims Unit.” After a long hard day, it’s like a sweet release. There’s nothing like brutal homicides and rough-around-the-edge detectives to kick back and relax to.

The worst is the Sunday night marathons. I can easily watch for four hours and be completely enthralled with the gory scenes in front of me. “She did it!” I’ll say, or “Come on Stab, you’ve got the wrong perp, this psycho’s throwing you for a loop.”

These shows have worked themselves into my way of life. General terms such as DB, GSW and through and through have become part of my everyday vernacular, along with referring to characters by homemade nicknames such as Liv and Stab. So what’s changed? I’ve watched these shows for years but recently I’ve found they are staying with me longer than I would like.

As the seasons progress, the ideas for crimes are running out, and each season gets more gruesome and more disturbing, yet I can’t stop watching. Now, if I watch too many episodes at a time I can’t sleep at night. I am convinced that there is a stalker living in my attic, and every ambient noise in my house turns into someone breathing or rustling around downstairs.

I’ve tried everything, but the paranoia has only gotten worse. Now, sometimes I’m too scared to get up to go pee in the middle of the night so I just lay in bed waiting to be raped while trying really hard not to pee the bed. Something has to be done! So I guess in the end I’ve decided this might be a personal problem, and the solution while simple might be easier said then done.

Maybe I AM watching too much “CSI” and maybe I should just not watch so much. I’ll force myself to stop after one episode, yes that’s it, one episode a day. Well, maybe two, but only if they’re over by eight o’clock; that way I can watch something happy like Global Guts on Nick GAS or American Gladiators on ESPN Classics. Or maybe I’ll just put bars on the windows and wear earplugs.

Simmermon is a Leawood senior in journalism.

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