I don't watch TV at all, and haven't for years, other than a select few football games. However, every now and then when traveling and stopping at a hotel / motel etc, I'll turn the TV on to blot out the strange noises. It is like viewing a circus. It's very hard to find something that doesn't grate on your nerves if you're trying to sleep. Maybe AMC or Turner Classic Movies, but even then they are interrupted by some damn pharmaceutical company commercial blaring about how this drug or that drug cures your fingernail problems, but watch out for those pesky side effects, such as death. So I usually pick a Spanish language channel, which I don't comprendez, and leave it there.
I tried watching a few situation comedies, but the acting was so affected and fake I turned it off. It was like they were nervously reciting lines and hoping for the other actors' / actresses' approval. What hit me was the fact that so many people I know taylor their conversations to be just like these actors. Lol. They've borrowed a complete personality from the tube! You are in their movie.
By the way, regarding Playboy, I guess you all know that Hefner was a CIA asset. They used his Playboy Mansion all the time to get incriminating, valuable evidence against anyone who visited there. That's at least one way he was used.