Authors: Luvvie Ajayi
If you want to be famous, there are other shortcuts to take. If you want to sell sex, find a skill to go along with that, so at least you sell sex AND something else, like music. Or art. I don't know. And if you release a sex tape, please have some tricks up your sleeve. At least do something interesting, so we can try to learn something as we watch your pre-orgasm face. I've sat through some boring videos where not only was I mad that I let my computer almost get a virus but I would have gotten more excited from watching people mark down prices on amazing shoes. Are you really gonna do missionary the entire time? I need someone to contort themselves so bad they almost get a charley horse halfway through so I know it's real.
People used to aspire to be famous
for
something. Now they just want to be famous, without it mattering how they get that fame, but all notoriety is not created equal. It is not enough to want your name in the lights if the bulb is covered by the dust of the desperation that got you there.
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I relish trashy TV. Lord knows I do. I salivate when I find out a new season of my favorite reality television show is about to air, because the petty in me appreciates the guaranteed drama I am going to be consuming. All that performance, in one-hour spurts, and it's coming from regular people and celebrities alike. Yes, count me in for a watch! But it's a guilty pleasure because as I watch it, I am acutely aware that our culture does not benefit from glorifying these bad decisions by broadcasting them everywhere. Some people loiter and eat kale to contribute to the detriment of society. I watch bad TV. I consider us even.
Back in ancient times (aka 1992), a show premiered on MTV called
The Real World
. Seven strangers in their twenties, of different backgrounds, sexual orientations, and classes, were thrown together in a house for six months, with cameras on them 24/7. Their every movement was captured and edited into twenty-two episodes that attempted to show their experience as completely as possible. Six entire months were edited down to twenty-two hours, but what ended up airing was compelling storytelling.
Their joys, conflicts, and frustrations were laid out, and we saw people form real relationships with each other. The show's tagline was “When people stop being polite and start getting real.”
The Real World
was groundbreaking TV. In the second season, Tami decided to have an abortion and became the first woman to openly discuss that decision in primetime. Pedro, from season three, was the first gay man on TV to talk about being HIV-positive. Ruthie, from season eight, had an intervention and was sent to rehab for her alcohol problem after driving drunk. The show tackled real issues, and in the drama that played out, people at home saw themselves and their struggles.
We did not have a category for it then, but
The Real World
was quite possibly the grandfather of reality TV. From where it started to where it currently is, the genre has devolved. It is now a stop on every fame whore's express train to rock bottom, and I am judging us for allowing it to be a complete spectacle. There is nothing left of “reality” in reality TV, and yet it's taken over our idea of what entertainment is.
I don't know if any show since the early seasons of
The Real World
has been able to capture the authenticity of people coexisting without preset agendas. What made that show special was that because there had been none like it before, people did not have expectations of how to behave, what would get more them airtime, and what would happen. There were no templates, so people were mostly themselves, albeit the camera-edited versions. Some of the cast members on
The Real World
were able to parlay their time on the show into disc jockey jobs and other on-air personality work. Then it became clear that this reality TV thing could actually be a catalyst for some type of fame, no matter how fleeting. Shows like
Survivor
got bigger, and even the people who got voted off never went fully offscreen. There was always a reunion show or something else for them to come back to. When folks figured out that they could actually use appearances on these shows to get their names out there, reality TV started going to shit.
Networks realized how few resources they needed to put into these programs, and how big the return on their small investment could be. You didn't need writers, multiple sets, and all the expenses you had for a scripted show, but you could get the same ratings? Bingo. Then they started upping the ante on the shenanigans, because people love trash, and the more drama there is, the more eyes they'd get. All of this basically led reality TV to the dumpster level of quality it now inhabits.
Reality TV is now about getting people to behave badly under manufactured circumstances with instigated drama. The level of sensationalism is constantly being increased. I remember when people would be kicked off shows for making violent physical contact with anyone, castmates or otherwise. Many people remember the Slap Heard Around the World on season six of
The Real World
, when Stephen reached into the car to slap Irene as she was leaving. I can recall the sound his palm made connecting with her face, and I was like, GAHTDAMB. My feelings were hurt for homegirl, because it was such a sucka-ass thing for him to do. That was scandalous back then, and he rightly got kicked off the show for it.
If that were to happen now, not only would Stephen get more airtime, but he'd get a whole segment in the reunion show where he'd talk about how he'd do it again in a heartbeat. Irene might come running onstage, get her retaliatory hit in before producers pulled her off him. They'd let her go, as if she'd really calmed down, and then act surprised when she lunged at him again.
People have never been saints on these shows, but at least before, their conflicts were relatively organic. Now, people behave badly on reality TV because they are being told to, pushed to, or tacitly encouraged to. Adults are being told to act a complete fool on camera so they can get a dramatic clip for the trailer. Yes, the anger these folks feel toward each other is real, but the way the beef happens is usually the work of crafty producers and writers. Yes, these shows have writers now.
I was having a conversation with a producer who used to work for a major reality show and had quit his job. I asked why. He said, “One day, after sitting through a two-hour production meeting where we strategized on how to make one of the women hate the other so they could get into a fight on camera, I came home and asked myself what I was doing for a living.”
Let that sink in. There was a strategy meeting to create situations that would make two people actively despise each other. Holy shit, we're the pits. How did we get here? Nobody's supposed to be here. I asked him if the people are ever privy to the puppet-mastering, and he says absolutely. They fall into the trap anyway, because they know that if they do not do it, another castmate will, and that castmate will get more airtime.
So you would willingly get into a fight with someone else because you don't want the shine off you? I do not subscribe to the “all publicity is good publicity” theory, because people are ruining their lives and chances at future careers, livelihoods, and relationships that do not require them to be human volcanoes that could blow at any moment. Most adults do not flip over tables at a restaurant when they are angry at their dining companions. Most stable, well-functioning people do not slam bottles on other people's heads because they didn't like the words they used. (Yes, this really happened on TV.) These shenanigans are phony, and people are being caught up in the web of lies, all because they think it will make them famous.
Then again, we gotta realize that twenty-six women, over two seasons, went on a show to compete for the love of Flavor Flav, a man who reminds me of a termite, was already partnered up in real life, and had a gajillion kids by many different women. People willingly went and competed for his approval on national television. I want to say they looked past all that to see the heart of him, but the benefit skipped out and doubt took over. The women who chose to be on that show did so because they thought it would get them some ounce of acclaim, when it mostly got them ridicule and embarrassment. I do think one of them got a janky lip balm endorsement deal out of it. And possibly a new wig.
Despite how terrible it was, I watched that show faithfully, along with many others that were shameless in their foolery enthusiasm. These shows feed my love of all things dramatic at someone else's expense, because there is a 98.2 percent chance of ample cussing, fights, and tears. Those of us who watch do it partly because we love feeling superior to other people. We might not want to admit it, but we love seeing that others are living worse than we are. We love trash and we revel in this virtual wasteland on our TVs.
On
Here Comes Honey Boo Boo
, we got to see the daily lives of a poor country family and their husky daughter with pageant dreams. When the matriarch lets the kids eat Cheetos for breakfast and ours just had cereal (full of marshmallows and sugar), we feel good about our decisions. We've fed our kids different poison in a somewhat more acceptable package, but they got paid $1,500 per episode for their fails.
One of the problems with our unending appetite for these shows is they constantly have to raise the bar for foolishness. There is a show for everything now, and the level of scrutiny that some people let the general public have over their personal lives is mind-boggling. Entire marriages become show fodder. Counseling and therapy sessions for serious issues are taped and disseminated for our entertainment. Celebrities are using reality TV to add to their publicity portfolios, which can backfire spectacularly. We've seen time and time again how famous people's shows have turned their reputations upside down. When you find out your favorite singer or actress is living a life in shambles, even worse than you are, they fall off their pedestal. Even our political process feels like a reality TV show; debates are playing out like reunion specials, and the person whose zinger against their opponent lands the best usually wins. We got dudes in raggedy squirrel hairhats running for president of the United States while acting like characters on the worst competition show you've ever seen.
We exploit children, lovers, heartache, family members, povertyâanything and everything. We even exploit death. Three months after a major icon died, her family had a reality TV show airing where we got to see them grapple with the loss of the larger-than-life lady. This makes me assume that TWO months after she passed, they were already signing up for the show. Sixty days. Eight weeks. That feels like nothing. That's no time to really deal with the sudden death of a loved one. In fact, I had barely gotten over it at that point, and I didn't even know her personally! It was too soon, especially when cameras followed them as they went to visit her grave for the first time. It felt crass. It was one train wreck that I felt uneasy about watching, because it was the epitomization of what is wrong with this reality-TV culture we now live in. We were supposed to be entertained, but it felt so dirty that we had turned what should have been this incredibly personal process into an aquarium exhibit, with humans in the tank. I was embarrassed both for her family and for those of us who tuned in.
We are scraping the bottom of the decency barrel when a woman can be watching her favorite medical reality show and see her husband die right on her screen. Yes, this happened. A woman in New York lost her husband after he was struck by a truck. While tuning in to the medical reality show
NY Med
one day, a story line that felt vaguely familiar played out in front of her eyes. Except this was not some fiction. She watched as doctors tried to save her husband, heard his cries of pain and how he called out for her. She watched as the doctors said he was coding and as they pronounced him dead. She hadn't known that his death had been filmed, and certainly not for a reality TV show. COMME DES FACKONS!
19
Did the dying man sign a waiver between being wheeled into the ER and losing his life? How is that okay? How are we so parched for drama that we've reached the point where watching people die is actually considered entertainment? And let's not fool ourselves. This is purely for entertainment. It is not to enlighten or educate. It is to pull us in, captivate us, and leave us wanting more.
Reality TV shows also reinforce dangerous stereotypes and tropes. These shows turn people into caricatures of the sassy Black woman, the dirty hillbilly, the voguing gay best friend. They are all there, filling their roles and adding to all our issues. What do they have in common? They want to be known. They don't consider the downside. Once they've been branded as the character they were cast for and edited into, that shadow follows them.
People have to realize that the Bethenny Frankel and Nene Leakes model of success is like hitting the lotto. It is rare! Reality TV does not catapult most people to lasting financial successâunless you're Kim Kardashian, whose mom needs to teach a graduate-level course on turning PR crises into prosperity. Most people do not go from fighting on a show to singing on Broadway. Most people do not get to turn their presence on
For the Love of Fuckshit
or
Real Housewives of No Behaviorland
into multimillion-dollar retail empires. For every Omarosa, there are a thousand Tecks. Who? Exactly.
People think they can act a fool, maybe turn it into a spin-off show, and pray that their dreams of stardom come true. The desperation that comes with wanting fame by any means necessary is alarming, because those types of folks will sell their own mamas for that “fame.”
I still watch reality TV shows, but not as much as I used to. Even my quota for ratchetness felt overfilled. I actually got to a point where the formula got boring, and I knew I wasn't missing anything. I could put the TV on mute and get the same information. I just needed to look up every fifteen minutes to catch some conflict.