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First Person Op-Ed: El Gant

Reality Bytes
My hectic schedule over the past year and a half has been a gift and a curse. The obvious gift is that my hard work is beginning to pay off. The curse is the lack of time I’ve had for everyone else around me including myself.

I seriously cant remember the last time I sat down on a weeknight and watched television because I'm always working. But after checking things out over the past week while I was laid up with a serious cold, I realized that I am missing virtually NOTHING.

Don’t get me wrong, there are a few creative shows here and there. Im still digging "The Simpson’s," and I was entertained with "Arrested Development," "Lost," and a few other random dramas and comedies, but my poor attitude with mainstream TV does not lie with this genre. Unfortunately, it appears America is neck deep in Reality TV. Although many assumed it would be a fad, it shows no sign of stopping.

Does anyone remember the Arnold Schwarzenegger flick “The Running Man”, when he was a fugitive and had to escape death on a game show? Isn’t it crazy that 15 years after this movie was made, a show like this in 2005 doesn’t seem too far off? I’m watching moms get switched, families fighting over wills, hot women eating pig testicles for 50 grand, and people playing guessing games about who their biological father is.

I think it’s safe to say we as a society have hit an all time low. Creativity has been literally stripped from the airwaves, leaving us with reality madness. Don’t get me wrong, some of these shows have been entertaining. I can’t help but laugh at Flav and Brigitte Nielson, but a good, creative reality show is few and far between.

We can blame network executives for the downfall of television but the real problem lies with our culture as a whole. We are officially in the dark ages. We now love relying on the past to move in the future. Throwback jerseys, Kangols, and Adidas are in. Lacoste and LeTigre came back, and we don’t even wait two years to remix songs and put them back out.

I think as a society we have moved so fast in the past 100 years, it was only a matter of time till we slowed down a little. This is what happened to television. The average “everything gets solved in 30 minutes” sitcom has passed away, and networks have been scrambling ever since.
Unfortunately Reality TV has been here for years, just not packaged to us in that fashion. How about this for a show, “We take a quarter million people, and watch them drown to death when a massive wave takes out there homes. 'Tsunami!' Tuesday at 8 on ABC” Or how does this sound, “We’ll take millions of people and declare they're not slaves anymore. Then we’ll attempt to keep them as uneducated and uninformed as possible. If they pass that test, then we’ll introduce crack and AIDS in to there neighborhoods and see who makes it out. 'Being Black In America.' Mondays at 9 on FOX.”. This is reality! And it’s way more interesting than four gay guys dressing some fat slob for a date. Reality is meant to live and not watch!

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