Reality shows--- a double jackpot for the one percent!!!

[senseandsensibility]

I hate reality shows. But my hatred is not just a personal "entertainment" preference. I hate the way they cost basically nothing to produce, putting unionized and talented writers and actors out of work. Yes, I do hate that.

But you know what I really hate? Most reality shows pit the wide variety of people in the bottom 99% against each other. A friend of mine was recently complaining about some kind of reality show that features over the top "sweet sixteen" parties with stretch Hummers and so forth. The friend, very liberal, was disgusted. So now this well educated and liberal person is being propagandized to look down on and blame a fellow worker.

The sad fact is a doctor who works for a living has more in common with a food stamp recipient than he or she has with anyone in the top one percent. But reality shows keep us distracted, keep us feeling self satisfied, and keep us from blaming the real villians.

[Spazito]

1. Yes, it is the modern version of...

the Roman political strategy of "bread and circuses", imo.

[ddeclue]

6. not so much on the bread part though..

panem e circenses

[Little Star]

2. I also hate them! They really do put..

unionized and talented writers and actors out of work! Plus they also dumb down americans, imho.

However I do not consider talent shows like AGT,etc. reality shows. They cost plenty to produce and help make some very talented people gain employment.

[senseandsensibility]

4. I agree, but I don't categorize those shows as reality

shows. Maybe they are; I'm not exactly an expert in the genre. LOL.

[unblock]

3. i love that they call the broadcasting of a ridiculously artificial situation a "reality show".

they're game shows, plain and simple. the only real difference is that most contestants compete for longer than they do on wheel of fortune.

[Riley18]

5. I hate reality shows for alll the same reasons. There are so many talented writers and actors, and

hardly any shows on television anymore. I happen to like Mike and Molly and Hot in Cleveland right now. I refuse to watch any
reality show which sometimes leaves me out of the loop at work though.

[alcibiades_mystery]

7. There is an ideological function to them, it seems

They teach us that every single thing in the world is a competition (and, therefore, capitalism is the correct way to organize society). That this is a social choice rather than a natural outcome of society gets hidden by the very structure of the shows.

I think it was somebody on this board who once pointed out the meanness of it all; he or she said, regarding Top Chef and these other competition shows, that cooking shows used to be about teaching people how to cook. Now they just have workers competing to eliminate each other. That the whole form of these shows is capitalist propaganda is obvious to anyone who has ever slow-timed it on a line to stick it to the boss.

Similarly for Survivor. The whole notion of outlasting one's whole tribe is of course a mockery of the non-Western cultures that the show claims to celebrate: the person who eliminates his or her entire community is not a survivor, but a soon-to-be-dead sociopath. It basically takes the version of shopfloor or cubicled office community imagined in every corporate boardroom (Enron used to "vote" the lower 15% "performers out of the company, probably to some of their good fortune, ultimately) and presents it as primitive human nature, despite the fact that no tribe in history has ever functioned in this way, ever.

[cthulu2016]

8. You'll want to tighten up your criteria

The "sweet sixteen" families are the 1%.

You are thinking of the 0.01%

[NNN0LHI]

9. Besides politics I watch one TV show

Hell on Wheels. Thats it.

Don