Painterly wooden television showing a landscape beside books, a small carved hand and trailing plant.

Original artwork, not a still

Jack Paar

I have never seen a bad television program, because I refuse to. God gave me a mind, and a wrist that turns things off.

Behind the line

What it means

Our interpretation.

The speaker answers complaints about bad television with a joke about refusing to watch it. Intelligence makes the judgment, and a turning wrist supplies the simple action. Claiming never to have seen a bad program exaggerates how completely switching off can settle the matter.

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