[neic]

From my personal experience with not having a TV for the last ~10 years. I think the reason this comes up a lot is because people talk a lot about what on TV. When I was one of the only people around who did not have a TV and the conversation turned to some TV program, I was "forced" to say that I did not have access to it and couldn't have seen it. I think some people took it as slightly condesending that I actively choose to remove some activity from my life they themselves enjoyed.

When there are only a few people in a group who do not do as everyone else and it's a frequent conversation topic, they stick out. I have been on the other side with veganism. I'm not vegan. People talk a lot about food. Vegans say they don't eat meat. I would be slightly disheartened that they can't relate to the tasty greasy burger I was taking about.

As a lot of my peers now don't have flow TV and a fair amount is vegan, the default of everybody, my self included, is not to assume that you have a TV or eat meat, but to ask if you don't know. When you don't have a TV program or some types of food in common, the conversation shifts to something else. I see a lot less friction now than a few years ago.