I can admit it now. I’ve finally found my peace with reality television. Yes, I did spend several years believing that people would get tired of it quickly, like disco and Beanie Babies. Now I know that as long as there’s a gimmick left untried or a celebrity that needs a major career boost, reality TV will be a genre on television for many years to come.
It does make you wonder, though, if we’ll be seeing reruns of “Survivor” on Nick at Night in a couple of decades.
Yet there are some shows that still give me some problems. I’m not talking about the shows that pit people against each other in a valiant struggle to win a huge amount of money or win a wife or husband that may or may not have a huge amount of money. Those people are asking to be humiliated.
What gives me a problem are the fashion police shows.
These shows are usually underneath the radar. They are usually not in prime time slots. In fact, mostly networks that aren’t very famous or even interesting, such as the Discovery Channel and TLC, use these shows. You could say they’re even harmless.
Yet my heart breaks for many of the people on these shows. Many of the people either have more problems than the leisure suits left in their closets or have no problems at all.
A former roommate of mine introduced me to one such show called “What Not to Wear.” This show featured a woman and an effeminate man critiquing a wardrobe and overall fashion of a person. The victim for each show does not initially choose to be on the show; his or her family and friends set up the person.
The fashion police then confront the victim in an intervention-type atmosphere to offer a $5,000 budget for a new wardrobe. The catch? The fashion consultants are allowed to throw out anything from the old wardrobe.
This is, of course, an entertaining premise. We see the victim on an emotional roller coaster as everyone starts making fun of his or her old clothes and, in essence, sense of taste. We laugh and agree with the consultants because, of course, we don’t have to worry about the victim’s feelings.
What bothered me the most about this show is the definition of style. Yes, the consultants give practical advice. They help with dress etiquette (i.e. what’s appropriate for the office), but mostly they give a narrow-minded view of fashion. The victims I saw were only allowed to shop in expensive New York boutiques, so they can’t get the most out of their $5,000. They cannot buy anything from the sale rack, even if it is flattering.
Once I saw a slightly overweight woman try to shop in the stores the consultants suggested, and the highest size was a size 10. When she asked a sales clerk where the plus-sized clothing was, the clerk harshly replied that they didn’t carry anything that size.
I am a woman who has faced that problem many times and, let me tell you, that situation leads to despair.
Reality shows don’t only target clothing. One show that seemed to be a constant presence on television this summer when I watched TV was “Clean Sweep.”
Unlike “What Not to Wear,” the victims of this show are voluntary. The victims in this show suffer from being pack rats, and the consultants and designers help these people organize their stuff, redesign their house to look attractive and coerce them into throwing out old stuff.
Now, I agree that I find nothing more cleansing and liberating than throwing out old papers or finally getting rid of things like my old senior mug. But sometimes the organizers target the wrong things, and the volunteers suddenly become victims again. Instead of organizing piles of books onto shelves as practical decorations, the organizers usually tell their victims to get rid of half of their prized (and usually expensive) collections.
As an owner of four nearly-full bookshelves, I was heart-broken. Again, if someone happens to have an excess of, say, Star Trek figurines, the organizers try to get rid of most of it instead of making the figurines into eclectic decorations.
What tends to go first in most of these shows is personality. The fashion consultants pretend to take into account the personality of the victim, but they really want their victims to conform to the supposedly more attractive society. That’s the reason for the tears when people watch their wardrobe or memorabilia being thrown away.
Either by their own mistakes or through being duped by their family and friends, they are forced to conform to someone’s idea of them, rather than their own ideas of themselves.