Ariel Gore on how killing your television will make you happier

Ariel Gore is a feminist journalist and author whose books I've enjoyed for years. The daughter of hippies, she was once warned by her mother, "Commercialism is a vacuum. It will suck you in." Now three sociological and psychological research studies in the past five years are showing just what her mom knew way back in the 1970s: there's causation, not just coincidence, when a person says that they're happy, and that they also tend not to watch much TV. Ariel's advice:

And so, may I suggest, just as an experiment, just as a quick study in living: Kill your television.

You don't have to go smash it in the street. This is just an experiment, after all. Do what my mother used to do--just hide it in the garage.

Leave it out there for two weeks.