Reality Tv Hi everybody! My name is Emma, and I'm asking for your help. In English at school I am writing an essay about reality tv (Big Brother, etc) I wou;d appreciate your opinions! Do you like it? If yes, why, and if no, why not? What do you think of the type of people who go on these shows? Please reply! xoxoxoxoxox thanks, luv Emma xxx
I hate "reality" television, which is no more "real" than any other television. It's all staged, hyped and pathetic. I think the kind of people who go on those shows are the kinds of people who want to be famous at any cost. Some of them may be fairly normal, but the majority seem like the kind who would sell their grandmothers to get their faces on TV. I don't have as much problem with American Idol or other contestant type shows ... unless the prize is getting to marry someone. Ish. How people can worry about gays violating the sanctity of marriage when we have shows like Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire is beyond me. The sanctity of marriage is loooooong gone, at least in the public arena. Shows where you get a prize for actually having some talent just seem a little more legit to me, and are nothing new. Star Search and the Gong Show come to mind. Not that I watch American Idol. In fact, since reality TV came on I've switched almost entirely to DVDs. For three years now, the only television I watch is kids' programming with my daughter, or the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, if I'm up late enough. But I read about this stuff and do enough channel flipping to know it's just not for me.
I am a big fan of reality shows. I have been hooked on them since the very 1st one, "COPS". Why do I watch them? Well, I'm not the average viewer, I think. I love to watch people, to analyze them, to try and figure out who they are and what makes them tick. To do that to family members, friends, work associates, well, that's just not nice. But to do it to random people on television, who have willingly put themselves under a microsope, well, then it's okay. I believe that most of the "contestants" want two things: money and attention. As Witches mentioned "Idol", I will continue with that example. Millions of people audition for Idol, even the ones who cannot sing. They stand and make a spectical of themselves because they want attention. They want to be on TV. Think William Hung really, truly thought he was a singer? The ones who can actually sing want to win. Even being in the top 10 (or is it the top 12, I forget) is a prize, because they get all the local attention, they get to cut an album and tour for the summer with the other finalists. For a summer, they are stars. And, what if it opens other doors? What if they can use their Idol notoriety to be discovered, to become a song writer, or to become a no-talent sleeze and write a "I slept with Paula Abdul" book? Money and Attention. Shows I do not like are the ones that humiliate the "players" or sets them up in some way, even if they willingly signed up for it. I despise shows like, "Punked", "Cheaters", "Fear Factor", and of course those horrible "talk" shows like Jerry Springer and Maury Povitch. Please leave these poor people some dignity!
Ah, but then you're being kind and assuming they had any dignity to start with ... I agree that there are many nontalented people on Idol, but the entire Gong Show was built around extremely nontalented people who were willing to make a fool out of themselves ... now THAT's entertainment LOL
Ooh. Good question, Babe. I'll post before reading the other answers. I avoid the mainstream reality shows like big brother. I have absolutely no point of interest in a bunch of wannabe non-entities. Having said that I have watched shows like Pop Idol (UK version of Amercian Idol) during the early phases but mainly because I find it so hysterically funny to see such bad singers trying convince the likes of Cowell that they have even a shred of talent. I've also enjoyed the "celebrity" reality shows (eg I'm A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here, the first series of Hell's Kitchen, and so on cos it is genuinely entertaining to see well-known faces being subjected to ritual humiliation. On the whole I think that the participants in reality shows are pretty sad. Whether they are Joe Public or just some faded C-list celeb seeking to reinvigorate a flagging career their raison d'etre for entering such a voyeuristic show has to be deeply suspect. To me an entertainer performs because he/she has a talent to share and the audience watches because the talent is good enough. Most reality TV shows are the entertainment equivalent of watching an endless loop of a man slipping on a banana skin. It is funny once, not over and over. (It takes real talent to bring out the humor of the same man slipping on the same banana skin several times in a row ... such talent is very rare and is even less often used in such a way because over-use also diminishes the effect.) Maybe in the future there will be TV cameras in every room on the planet and people will use the equivalent of Google to find something when they want to watch TV ...
Don't like them When I watch TV it's to escape reality and I prefer stories with plots--beginning, middle, and end. More than that, I don't care to see people making complete fools of themselves and being humiliated for the whole world to see, even if they asked for it by applying for the job. It just makes me uncomfortable. By the way, I think Fear Factor should be called Disgust Factor. I can't even stand to see the ads for it--eating bugs, for pete's sake. As for the people who participate, I agree with Kristalrose as to who and why. But I do like watching people in my real life, at home, at work, at family get togethers. It is definitely fascinating. Which makes the Sims so fascinating--how a computer game so cleverly mimics human behavior (much simplified, no question.) Ever put a plate on the floor for the family pet to get leftovers and think of the Sims? Do you look at the architecture of houses and buildings on the way to work and think of building in the Sims? This could go on and on and it's off topic . But the fact that a game where we create our own little soap operas turns into the most popular computer game worldwide has got to be a fascinating subject all by itself. Says a lot about people, I think .
(Kristal's sitting in her nightgown at the computer with her hair standing up wild) EWWWW, now that is a scarry thought, Mirelly!!
