TV does not care about you or what happens to you. It’s downright bad for your health now, and that’s not a far-out concept. I think watching the TV news is bad for you. It is bad for your physical health and your mental health.

Petty frames television—especially televised news—as an impersonal system that profits from attention rather than caring for viewers’ well-being. By saying TV “does not care about you,” he rejects the illusion of intimacy created by broadcast media and emphasizes its one-way, indifferent nature. His claim that TV news is “bad for your physical health and your mental health” points to stress, fear, and agitation produced by constant exposure to alarming narratives, as well as the sedentary habits associated with prolonged viewing. The quote reads as a warning about media diets: what you repeatedly consume shapes mood, outlook, and even bodily states, so disengagement can be an act of self-preservation.