Humor, Laughter and TV Sitcoms

Re “Laughter, Anyone?” editorial, Dec. 22: Having grown up in the 1940s, my wife and I never developed the TV habit. We do not feel the compulsion to sit night after night and stare at whatever the commercial interests of America choose to send our way.

We do, however, laugh a lot and enjoy life in the best possible way. We actively enjoy the grandchild, we exercise and, best of all, we read. As a result, we are healthy, well informed and share a warm relationship with family and friends.

TV is an addiction. Maybe someone can come up with a 12-step program to help those unfortunates. Exercising your finger on the off button is a good first step.

David Strauss

Arcadia

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The death of the sitcom began with the steady cancer that is political correctness, and finished with a coup de grace administered by America’s Talibans.

Government censorship was not to blame as much as personal censorship.

The editors are correct. Humor requires contemplation and sophistication. We the people have abandoned not just the sitcom but the attitudes from which it springs.

Perhaps, after all, Aristotle said it best: “Humor is the only test of gravity, and gravity of humor; for a subject which will not bear raillery is suspicious, and a jest which will not bear serious examination is false wit.”

Tony Pereslete

Culver City

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You don’t get it and Hollywood does not get it. The reason people are not watching sitcoms is that what Hollywood has been putting out lately is just not funny.

It has nothing to do with what you write in your editorial -- “fear of terrorists, fear of corrupting influences, fear of those who are different.” It has to do with creativity and humor.

When I go to watch something light on television, I am not thinking about all the “fears” out there, I want to be entertained. I looked forward to the new “Joey” sitcom, but have you watched it at all? There is nothing even amusing about it, nothing to bring one back week after week.

“I Love Lucy,” “The Odd Couple” and “The Cosby Show” are still funnier as reruns than some of the stuff on TV today.

Where have all the writers gone?

Oh, right, they reached 30 and Hollywood put them out to pasture.

Lea Osborne

Woodland Hills