Springer, "Reality" TV, and me
In response to Tim's recent post on Jerry Springer, because it's too long for the comment section there:

I'll out myself here to say that there's no hypocrisy at all in my saying I want to see some substance from Jerry Springer. Tim's been telling me how Springer is the best candidate for governor, but I haven't seen anything from him that might lead me to believe so. The three things I know about him are (1) that he used to be mayor of Cincinnati (but there are a lot of other people who used to be mayors of large cities who wouldn't necessarily make good governors); (2) that he once used a personal check to pay for a hooker (not displaying a lot of brainpower there); and (3) that he has been the host of a tasteless TV show for a long time. If he wants to become electable outside of his core fan group -- i.e., among those of us who find his show repulsive -- he's going to have to do something about that limited image and add a big number four to the above list that's good enough to overshadow the first three items.

Like it or not, his image is intertwined with his TV show among the general public, and I think it does him far more harm than good. I'm not the one who originally said that his show "exploits" people -- that was someone else at the table on whatever night it was we were discussing it -- but I agree with that assessment, to a point. I think the show is repulsive in that it takes the worst in human nature and flaunts it as entertainment; it sets up confrontational situations with the intention of provoking fights (hence the "bodyguards"). I don't think of the people who appear on his show as some kind of victims of a Springer machine, though. They go on there knowing full well what is likely to happen. I don't understand their motivation for doing so -- some kind of celebrity among their friends for having been on the show, whatever small bit of money the show throws at them, I don't know. I don't think it's a good model for human relations, though, and call me elitist, but I don't think that the people he showcases should be held up as any kind of model of normalcy. It's the old argument about violence on TV: when you see so much of it, you become inured to it and fail to perceive it as something out of the ordinary. We all have our peccadillos, leanings, and kinks, but I really don't want to see everyone else's paraded before me on TV. I don't want Joe Jones to watch the show and think that because Joe Smith is on there with his five mistresses that he's okay because he has only three. And yes, Paternal Jerry comes out at the end and does his little moral-of-the-day thing, but for me that just feeds into the question of why. Besides the money, why do this show? Why drag these people out of their closets to make asses of themselves on TV and then be ridiculed and patronized by the host?

If you want to be governor of my state, you'd better show me some gubernatorial substance, something that says you're capable of dealing with issues such as jobs and healthcare and responsible growth and highways and education and poverty, not just provide a built-in fan base that's capable of chanting two syllables. I'm not hot on Ohio jumping on the celebrity-governor bandwagon just because it's there.

I had a fascination with one particular "reality" show -- that would be Showbiz Moms & Dads, for those of you not already in on this conversation -- but I wouldn't consider electing its producers (or its host, if it had one) to neighborhood council, much less governor, if their affiliation with that show were the only thing I knew about them. And I still maintain that it's a different kind of show from the Jerry Springer show. The SM&D cameras followed the families around for two months or so; it wasn't a 50-minute confrontational setup. SM&D let the participants speak and act as naturally as you can with cameras all around in their normal environments; it wasn't "let's put the militant biker lesbians on the stage with the convicted rapists and see what happens." No one was leading the SM&D participants into any manufactured situations. SM&D focused on two issues: kids with "talent" and what their parents do to help them succeed. As it turns out, all but one of those kids featured had merely marginal talent -- enough to win a high-school talent show, maybe, but not enough to make a career out of. The level of delusion on the part of most of the parents is what drew me in, something that has fascinated me for a long time as a study in psychology and sociology. It's the subject matter, not the format, that interested me. It is far from being "the most humiliating of the reality TV shows." And if there is a second season, chances are slim that I'll watch it, because it will have become a manufactured situation now that potential second-season participants have seen the first season, and that doesn't appeal to me.

For the record, I like Bill Clinton. I just think he was stupid in thinking that no one would ever find out about his adventures with Monica and that they wouldn't care even if it did come out. We all do stupid things when it comes to sex, though, and I'm sure it's not the first time something along those lines has happened in the White House. The good he did in office far outweighs his personal quirks, which really aren't all that quirky when it comes down to it.

And yes, I do consider myself an independent voter. I find myself siding with Democrats much of the time, but not always. I registered for the first time as a Democrat this past March so that I could vote in the Democratic primary. I'm not above voting for a Republican if I think that person is better qualified and is more in line with my thinking. In 1998 I voted for Linda Lingle for governor of Hawaii, who lost that election by only a 1% margin in the most Democratic of Democratic states, and ended up winning in 2002 (after I left there).
- posted by Lori @ 11:57:00 AM | permanent link | |