The Reality

Posted by Cynical Sarah on November 24, 2007

I’m constantly amazed by the stars that are made by reality television shows. Not the ones that actually have some contest and some purpose the people on the shows are working toward.

At least with shows like The Biggest Loser, Survivor or even The Bachelor there is some sort of game element that makes it worth watching. There’s also an underlying reason, like a million dollar prize, for why these people are willing to make fools out of themselves.

However millions of people have tuned into the “other” type of reality television to watch the mess that was Anna Nicole Smith or the first couple years of the Jessica and Nick marriage. These people have voluntarily put themselves on display, in all their stupid glory, for the rest of the world to see. For each and every one of them, there has been something embarrassing revealed that normally a person might try to keep private.

In Jessica Simpson’s case, she had tuna and chicken identification issues. Or to be more specific, she was revealed to be brain cell challenged. Nick came away from his reality show experience fairly unscathed except for the fact that everyone in the world got to see that he’d married a bit of a dumb blonde.

Anna Nicole Smith let it all hang out in her show. I hate to speak ill of the dead, but she was just nasty. Any sort of high-class image she may have tried to affect as a model was lost during her public display of drunken laziness on her show.

Stupidity can be forgiven. People don’t even care that your life is a complete disaster as long as it’s entertaining. However, what they won’t forgive is a racial slur.

I’m sure by now word has traveled around the globe about Dwayne Chapman, made famous as Dog the Bounty Hunter in his reality TV series, using the n-word. He didn’t use it on his show, but because of the star-status he’s been given from the show, his personal life away from the camera is under just as much scrutiny.

I’ve never been a fan of the Dog, but his use of the n-word in a phone message to his son just solidifies my feelings for him and his show.

His show is just a weird version of Cops, except that he doesn’t really have any legal authority. He’s just a bounty hunter out to catch the people he posted bond for that are now trying to avoid going to jail. So he’s a muscle-bound, former convict turned good who thinks he’s a “robot on a mission from God” to catch criminals and, in some cases, try to straighten them out in the process.

So God’s robot decided to give his son a piece of his mind about his African American girlfriend. In the process, he dropped the n-word quite a few times.

In an interview the Dog said he thought he was “down” enough with the African American people to be able to use that word just like they do.

I don’t know what alternate reality he lives in, but a super blonde 80s mullet sporting, black biker leather wearing white guy is never going to be “down enough” to say that word in any context.

Where do they find these people anyway for their reality shows? I’ve never understood watching Dog track down criminals anyway. With his corny one-liners, his mission from God, bad fashion choices, and over-the-top enthusiasm for his job, he’s pretty ridiculous to watch.

Of course, it’s probably that ridiculousness that made him famous to begin with. A more contemporary bounty hunter with less rough edges isn’t going to make for good television. It’s Dog himself that sells that show as the viewers are sucked in by his strangeness.

But networks that look for these guys and make them famous need to look deeper. Eventually there’s going to be some personality quirk that’s going to bubble to the surface and embarrass everyone.

It’s more important than ever now that the writers are on strike as well. I much prefer the shows that are purely fictional with good writers giving me something entertaining to watch, but without writers working, the networks are sure to be filling in with as many reality show ideas they can come up with.

If they’re going to go that way, at the very least they can bring us some high-quality people to watch. No more skanks, no more dumb blondes, no more muscle-bound racists.

- Sarah L. Polson

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Tags: humor, television

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