Since I can remember, I’ve been a people watcher. When, as a young lad, I had to accompany mom on our annual trek to the factory outlet to buy school clothes, I would become so preoccupied watching other moms and other lads, that my mom would usually give up and decide that “hand-me-downs” and “let-outs” would “do just fine this year.” Once, as an adult needing to make a business trip by air, I missed my flight. I was distracted watching a mini real-life drama unfolding at the gate. I forget the plot of that real-life drama. I remember the plot of my real-life drama of trying to book another flight that would get me to my meeting before it was over.
To be sure, watching people live their lives can be fun. It can even be quite interesting and occasionally educational; but is it really prime time entertainment? Do we really need to see, in excruciating detail, other people going about the business of getting through their day, their week, their “real life”? Isn’t our own real life, reality enough?
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy watching television shows about real people in competition. I loved game shows as a child, and I eagerly anticipate the return of American Idol every January. I watch America’s Got Talent on occasion, and Dancing With the Stars on rare occasion. Last Comic Standing can be fun, but I could do without the segments where the contestants are forced to live together in the mansion (or is that another show? Anyway, in some large domicile) in hopes that plotting, or bickering, or worse, will break out (it always does, I wonder why).
I sometimes watch competitions based on cooking. Iron Chef can be tasty (pardon the pun), but a little cheffing can go a long way. I refuse to watch Hell’s Kitchen. When did bad manners, insults, and a surly disposition become a prerequisite for mentors? I’m also not a big fan of competitions around fashion design, modeling, spokes personing, or cake decorating, but my wife enjoys them, so I watch with her to show that I care about her interests (but mostly because she controls the remote after 8:00 pm).
Reality shows about real occupations, amusing, different or dangerous, can be interesting, although I might prefer, not to know that people are risking their lives to transport goods across a barren wilderness on roads carved out of ice. Or risking their lives in a tiny boat on a frigid ocean to trap the Alaskan King Crab that I so enjoy devouring, with drawn butter and a big baked potato smothered in butter, and fresh green beans drenched in butter (but that’s another story). Anyway, these are more documentaries than reality shows.
Definitely not documentaries, and having very little to do with reality, are these “reality television” shows. Shows like Big Brother, The Bachelor, The Apprentice, and The Biggest Loser. Shows like Real Wedding Crashers, and in a related vein, Here Come the Newlyweds, then Till Death Do Us Part, and then The Marriage Ref. Shows like Super Nanny and Nanny 911, My Big Fat Obnoxious Boss and My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiancee, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and Queer Eye for the Straight Girl (we mustn’t discriminate). Shows like Wife Swap and Trading Spouses, and of course, The Real Wives of… (insert your favorite city). Shows like Extreme Makeover and Extreme Makeover: Home (actually I kind of like that one, I used to be an architect).
And, of course, the granddaddy of them all: Survivor. “Two teams of ordinary people, abandoned in a harsh wilderness. Left to fend for themselves and compete in an effort to survive.” Really? I mean, really! It’s two teams of ordinary people plus a half dozen producers, plus a few directors, plus a crew of dozens more and a full writing staff. By the way, why do you need a writing staff when everything is extemporaneous and “real”? And let’s be honest (not required, I guess, to be “real”), how difficult is it to survive when “going days with little water and no food” can be remedied with a quick trip to the lunch buffet, required by the union for the writers and crew and never far away.
I really don’t understand the attraction of Survivor. And in these challenging times, I really don’t have the energy or inclination to try. I’ll be happy just to be one.
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