May 7, 2003

silhouette3.JPG From the desk of Jane Galt:

I'm not an enormous fan of reality television, but nonetheless, I'm currently watching American Idol. Every once in a while I like to see what the proles are doing with their time.

What I don't understand is why they have to drag out the agony by separating out the bottom two and making them, and the audience sit through two commercial breaks while wondering which one's going to get the axe. It's horrible.

Competition I understand. There is no true excellence without the possibility of failure. But is there really big market demand for slow ritual humiliation?

Posted by Jane Galt at May 7, 2003 8:55 PM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links
Comments
Posted by: John on May 7, 2003 9:04 PM

Isn't ritual humiliation the whole point of reality TV?

Posted by: markm on May 7, 2003 9:32 PM

I much preferred the quick ritual humiliation of "The Weakest Link" myself. ;-)

Posted by: Warmongering Lunatic on May 7, 2003 10:26 PM

Of course there is, Megan. That's why Raines still runs Krugman and Dowd.

(Okay, stupid catty comment.)

Posted by: jimbo on May 7, 2003 11:25 PM

The demand is for as many commercial breaks as possible. They have a half hour show (and sometimes an hour) to make an announcement they could do in 2 minutes, in the style of state lottery numbers. These guys ain't stupid.

But hey, at least Josh is (finally!) gone - after the inexplicable placing of Ruben in the bottom 2 last week, it seems America is comeing to it's senses...

Posted by: The Dark Avenger on May 8, 2003 2:34 AM

Anyone with a half-way decent Catholic education should be familiar with the following: St. Augustine's assertion that part of the pleasure of the Elect in Heaven is watching the torment of the Damnned Souls in Hell.

Posted by: Bolie Williams IV on May 8, 2003 9:17 AM

As said above, the long they can drag out the annoucements, they more commercials they can show.

Based on what I've seen of the romance based reality shows, humilition is the point. I tried watching them several times, but I couldn't stand to see these people devestated when they were rejected. Whatever their motivations were to get on the show, they apparently become emotionally involved, at least in the show if not in the bachelor or bachelorette or whatever.

Bolie IV

Posted by: fred on May 8, 2003 2:40 PM

But then again, aren't we all waiting for next years blockbuster multi-channel "reality tv" event. One winner gets to be President and the other suffers the humiliation of defeat. We are already seeing the first episodes of "Democrat Idol", and if only we could have had that Simon fellow at the debates giving his criticism of the event.


Fred

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