Poll: When did reading become so horrible?

[Ashhearth]

I actually really enjoy reading. Hardly a day goes by when I don't carry a reading book under my arm at school. Of course it doesn't help that half of my classes are stupid easy. I just do the work and read the rest of the period. I still get A's to the jealousy of my classmates.

 

[superbatranger]

I think it's because when they realize they have to read a book instead of watching the movie, it pisses them off. Nowadays, they need instant entertainment simply because they grew up with it. If you had asked this before the invention of the TV, there's the chance that it would be be different..that the kids back then would actually enjoy reading. But we live in a high-speed internet, HD radio, satellite TV, video game, Facebook world. Technology is overshadowing the written works. I'll admit that the business of analyzing and re-analyzing the books we had to read in class was tiring. I mean, couldn't we just read for our enjoyment?

Reading's fuckin awesome. Where movies and videogames continuously fail. Books will always have insane plots, dialogue and action.

Whenever I read a book that draws me in, sometimes I close my eyes and imagine what's going in the book. Granted, you can just watch the movie version, but then where's the imagination? You're not watching your imagination. You're watching someone else's imagination translated onto the screen. To me, that isn't the same as imagining it yourself, especially when you can add your own touch to it.

Reading became less popular when radio began.
Then came cinema. Seeing moving pictures were now the most popular thing to do.
Then came television.
Then came great advancements in technology.
Cinema and TV were then in color.
Video games started popping up.
Cinema and TV started using visual effects more often.
Video games started becoming 3D and more realistic.
Then there was a huge internet boom.
And now, you can watch shows online, listen to music and radio online, watch movies and video bloggers online...

It's a wonder that books still exist.

Frankly, it will be a dark day when publishing companies stop working, and the written word dies out completely for someone talking into a camera, but unfortunately that's the way it's going.

Let's hope that day never comes. I don't know what I'd do if there were no more books.

 

[SuccessAndBiscuts]

Like a lot of people have said there are a lot of people after "Instant gratification" these days but the biggest issue is that with this being a school situation most people see it as "more school work" rather than "a potentially interesting book" I used to groan and I used to read more than the rest of my class outside of school.

I blame Stephanie Meyer.

You think twilight is stupid, and I think thats adorable, but Stephanie Meyer has done more for increasing readership in young adults her own finances than you ever will.

The majority people who read twilight probably used to read before twilight too. I seriously doubt there are more than a handful of twilight fans who weren't harry potter fans before twilight came along.

 

[electric discordian]

I am of the opinion that Dyslexia is a contagious disease, having been working as a Teaching Assistant in a UK high school I was in a class one day when I asked "How many of you suffer from Dyslexia?" 29 of the thirty kids put up their hand kid 30 wasn't paying attention when I asked him a second time he said yes.

So I have come to the conclusion that one child actually has it and gets out of reading the difficult boring books, they then contract this "disease" mum and dad can't say no to them so they pester a doctor until the doctor says they are dyslexic.

Kids today are not read to by parents, have no imagination at all and are raised by the box.

Also to address a small point, teachers have little or no say in what they teach book wise or I would be teaching a Lovecraft module! Books are only as boring as you make them however!

I frequently describe Macbeth to kids and have them gagging to read it.

There is no excuse however for Twilight being on the media studies syllabus!

 

[Stu1701]

I used to hate reading when I was younger, but I think that's mostly to do with the fact that most school always forced us to read books that I completely boring and it just never occurred to me that it could be even the slightest bit interesting. It wasn't until highschool that I discovered books that I found interesting to read. Now my problem is that I just don't have the attention span to sit down and read a book for every long.

 

[Fingolfin High-King of the Noldor]

I love reading... Almost everybody I know hates to read or at least they say they do.

 

[Dr Snakeman]

There are three parts to why high school students hate reading.
First, most of them are stupid. Plain and simple.

Second, the books that high school English classes make us read are crap. (Lord of the Flies, anything by Jon Steinbeck, and the goddamned Handmaid's Tale)

Third, and most importantly, school excels at making learning a boring endeavor. It is a tragedy what they did to history, the most badass of intellectual disciplines. They do the same with English classes; even if high schools do allow a good book to be read in an English class, they require so much redundant talk about "symbolism" and endless essays on the text that it becomes a chore to read, not a privilege.

 

[CrazyGirl17]

I enjoy reading... but the problem with having something to read for class is that I usually forget I have to read it.

Not to mention the fact that sometimes the books aren't that great.

For example, in my Writing Compsition classes I had in college, we did read some good novels like "White Noise" and "Brave New World"... but we also had to read books like "Sense and Sensibility", which went absolutely nowhere and was as boring as hell.

 

[Berserker119]

I absolutely love reading, and I surround myself with friends who like to read as well, so I try to avoid people that don't. Books like The Outsiders, That Was Then This is Now, Lord of the Flies, The Pigman, and Brave New World were all books I read on my own time, for fun, and I actually enjoyed them. Not the stuff I normally read, but it was good nonetheless.

 

[Cowabungaa]

I'll join the "it never did" crowd here. I know I had to read horribly dull books for reading assignments (at least for Dutch literature, fuck that), but that never made me hate reading as a whole. There are a lot more books out there than just the ones you're forced to read.

My little brothers is more lucky than I was though. He picked all the books he needed for his English class of my shelf (I pretty much only read books in English, screw Dutch); The Hitchhikers Guide, 2 Discworld novels and now he's starting Storm Front, book 1 of The Dresden Files. I never could've gotten away with those.

I myself will read Heir to the Empire by Timothy Zahn in about an hour or so.

 

[Double A]

I dunno, probably because half my generation shares the same brain cell. I personally love reading, I have several dozen books next to my bed that I have read in the past 6 or so months.

What pissed me off in school was how the teachers always picked the most dumb, slow readers who used to stumble and tumble over every word like their tongues were drunk.

I would just read ahead myself and then daydream while I waited for them to catch up.

In theory, practice makes perfect.

In real life, they make me want to facedesk.

 

[Napalm_Man]

I have never loved any book that I've had to read for school (because they usually don't apeal to my tastes) but I read non-school books quite often, Just this year I read A Clockwork Orange, 1984 and American Psycho. I have to say though The Uglies was the worst book I've read and that one was asigned by the teacher, of course I didn't really read it so much as scanned for answers which explains why my grades dropped.
ALSO
ITT: People who don't like english class but like reading.

 

[VanityGirl]

I'm a high School senior and for some reason whenever my english teacher assigns any kind of reading assignment it sounds like someone is being tortured, grunts and moans of dismay flood my ears and that got me wondering, when did reading become the thing of nightmares? Yeah sure it could be said that reading can be boring but they make it out as this horrible thing which is taking them to a dark room somewhere to torture them. I would like to know all of your opinions on this matter.

Even I groaned at some of my teacher's literature choices when I was in high school. While we did read some very good works, others were rather bland or just plain unenjoyable.

When I choose books on my own, I burn through them quickly. I have no problem reading, but being forced to do reading assignments (on works you do not like) is no fun at all.

 

[DazBurger]

Im reading now aint I?

 

[monkey_man]

reading costs time.
most people don't have time no more.
i personally don't think it's bad
hell! i love reading.

 

[UsefulPlayer 1]

Reading is fun as shit. Required reading, however, can die in some lonely place. I think it ruins books for some people, like me.

 

[bpm195]

Imagine being told that your assignment was to go home and play sections 1 through 6 of Assassin's Creed II and be ready for a quiz on it. Pretty sure it won't be as fun as playing through it on your own free will.

Personally I dislike fiction novels as the vast majority of the time I feel they're just long winded and no more entertaining than the cliff notes version. It really irritates me that people for some reason think that reading a novel isn't a waste of time but gaming is. So while I do go to the library every three weeks, it's pretty rare that I pick up anything from the common library and much more likely that I picked up useful things from the non fiction sections.

 

[DoctorWhat]

I love reading. And I generally don't mind when others around me don't... However, nothing pisses me off more than someone coming up to me and sayi something along the lines of "oh you're reading something? That's cool. Wait, it's Harry Potter? The hell? Why're you bothering to read that? Just go see the movie! It's way better." It's just blissful ignorance until that last sentence. Up until then I will calmly argue my case, and win 99.9% of the time. The last sentence just makes me want to tear their head off and take a shit down their throat for being so fucking STUPID... I'm sure I'll get some rebuttal, but I can't formulate my responses in advance properly. I shall wait...

 

[Tharwen]

I think it's because books prescribed by teachers are generally boring. Good, but boring. Sometimes they aren't even good.

 

[Jagers1994]

I love books, and support books so much more than tv/internet. Reading a book is like having a conversation where as tv is like a speech or a lecture. That being said the last book I read from front to back was sphere by micheal crichton and that was 6 years ago. I know it doesn't make any sense.