Turn it off!

I was watching the local news last night, as I often do, and 7:00 rolled around.   I should have switched to the News Hour, but I was messing around in my kitchen and didn’t change the channel.   As I continued watching (well listening to) KGW their programming begins taking a journalistic nosedive.  From 7:00 to 7:30 I was treated to “Live at 7:00”.   This is a local news show that has a softer, more entertainment oriented theme.   It’s okay.   From 7:30 to 8:00 though, they play Inside Edition.   My goodness, what a load of crap that show is?

Last night they were running a story about a “reality star” who had been arrested for fighting.   (You can read about it here)   It was complete with some sort of “expert” who was explaining that these “reality stars” have trouble changing from the television show personas back into real people.    I would like to be clear about something.   “Reality Star” is the worst kind of oxymoron.    These people are not stars.   Stars (meaning real Celebrities) are called that because they shine.   They are nice to look at.  They have talent and they perform in some way.   People who are on Reality TV are, generally speaking, train wrecks.   I will distinguish here between “Reality TV” and “Game Shows”.   Game shows are television where real people compete for things.   Some examples are Jeopardy, Top Shot, The Big Break, and even Survivor.    Reality shows are television where a person’s disability, unlikeablity, stupidity, or bad life situation is exploited.   In either case the people who appear on the shows are not stars.  I do give credit though to anyone who can go on a game show and win something.   I deplore reality shows and giving stage to the unpleasant.

Jenelle Evans of MTV’s Teen Mom was arrested and charged with misdemeanor affray.   I really don’t care that she was, although I did look up from my cooking last night and saw a clip of the fight which was caught on camera.   It looked like she won.   I was saddened though that this passes for something that people would want to watch on television.   I’m not sure why MTV has a show about teen moms.   I’m not sure why Inside Edition wants to show clips of girls fighting.   I’m not sure why we have experts in the area of reality TV cast members behavior.   I can really find only one positive thing about this whole situation.   I learned what the word affray meant.   (public fighting)