“The narrow bandwidth of TV has made us think that we are stupider
than we are.” ~ Jordan Peterson
Occasionally I get this urge to sit in front of the TV and just watch the latest hit TV
show.
Either because people at work or school are talking about it and I want to feel like I’m
part of the conversation, or sometimes I get a feeling of nostalgia where as a kid I would
curl up in front of the TV and watch a classic episode of the Simpsons or whatever.
I vaguely remember TV being a nice experience.
But I think those days are well and truly gone.
I'm A Celebrity…
Get Me Out Of Here! has become a big hit.
Lots of people have been talking about it of late so I thought I better tune into a
couple of episodes myself.
In this one episode, three of the female contestants were lined up in front of some boxes containing
some not-so-appetising food (if you could call it food).
The middle box contained goat brains.
The middle contestant had to reach down inside without looking and try to guess what she
was holding.
If she guessed correctly, she wouldn’t have to eat it (but of course, that was never going
to happen).
Failing to guess, she was served up a raw goat’s brain.
She stuck it in her gob and tried to eat it.
The hosts of the show stood back and laughed.
What’s worse though, is that one of the hosts is a trained vet.
They often refer to him as “Doctor” on the show.
With all what we know about neurodegenerative diseases such as BSE (that is, mad cow disease),
surely it’s not too much of a leap to assume that eating raw goat brains poses a similar
risk.
I was secretly hoping that it was all fake, but even if that were true, these stunts could
still be encouraging a generation of young children to do similar outrageous challenges
on their YouTube channels or whatever.
Anyway, that’s when I tuned out and I haven’t watched the show since.
Love Island UK.
In this one episode I watched recently, contestants were given a challenge to create three different
cocktails.
They were given a table of ingredients and were lined up in a row.
The goal was to pass the ingredients via their mouths to the next contestant and so on until
the final person spat the remains into a glass.
This went on and on passing things like yoghurt and milk to one another.
Understandably in their post-challenge interviews, some of the contestants were rightfully disgusted.
But yet, they still did it.
Nobody protested.
Nobody said I’m not doing this.
They all did it.
You’ve got to ask yourself, why?
If you were at work and as part of a team-building exercise your boss lined you up and said that
today we’ll be making cocktails by passing liquid ingredients between each others’
mouths, then surely everyone would be outraged.
It wouldn’t surprise me if a number of people filed an official complaint.
But yet, the contestants on these TV shows don’t seem to show the same indignation.
Perhaps they are being pressured by off-camera producers.
Perhaps they feel that if they don’t do it, they won’t get airtime.
I don’t know, but I suppose if people choose to come onto these TV shows, there must be
some part of them that seeks attention or fame, but is this really the type of fame
they want?
Passing milk in their mouths between people they barely know?
It’s outrageous.
It’s disgusting.
And obviously, it’s unhygienic.
But yet, it’s on TV.
YouTube is heading down the same route depending on which channels you watch.
People are doing more and more outrageous things trying to compete with other channels
in the vain hope of attracting more viewers.
This constant pressure to be successful on the Internet is leading us down a dark path.
Joe Rogan used to host a show called Fear Factor where contestants had to do absurd
challenges to try to win some cash.
He commented on the ridiculousness of the show,
“It was a preposterous show, from the jump, and I always thought it was going to be cancelled.
But it was a giant hit.
Immediately it was like a hit.
I was like, ‘This is so stupid, this show is so stupid.’
And the reason why I got the gig was because I made fun of it.”
He then talked about one particular challenge that brought the show undone.
It was called Donkey Juice and required the challengers to play horseshoes.
If they didn’t win, they had to drink the seminal fluid of a donkey.
He said,
“They played horseshoes, but they could never win.
Even if you made a ringer you’d have to drink one ounce.
But if you f***ed up you had to drink 10, 11, 12 ounces.
These were jugs, jugs of … It’s so hard to imagine that was a real show.
Well, this was the one that killed it.
That episode killed it.”
Anyway, that’s the state of TV at the moment.
My question — Are these shows just a reflection of society?
If so, God save us all.