It's not worse, but prior to the late 90's you didn't see this sprawling degenerative wasteland for what it really was. The oddities were still out there, as a

It's not worse, but prior to the late 90's you didn't see this sprawling degenerative wasteland for what it really was. The oddities were still out there, as a subculture, but no one was actively shoveling them to the forefront of television in hopes of a slight ratings bump at the sheer spectacle of yet another train wreck. TV didn't have to try hard back when the only competition was movie theaters. In the 80's, before cable became a fashionable norm, some television stations could still rationalize "going off the air" between 1 a.m. and 6 a.m.