Welcome to Buster's Blog

Irregular commentary on whatever's on my mind -- politics, sports, current events, and life in general. After twenty years of writing business and community newsletters, fifteen years of fantasy baseball newsletters, and two years of email "columns", this is, I suppose, the inevitable result: the awful conceit that someone might actually care to read what I have to say. Posts may be added often, rarely, or never again. As always, my mood and motivation are unpredictable.

Buster Gammons















Sunday, February 28, 2010

Unreality TV (2010)


In the past few years, there's been an explosion in the number of so-called "reality" TV shows. They're suddenly everywhere. The reasons for this proliferation? Such programming is cheap to produce, and it is apparently popular enough. Lots of people watch. Do you?

Personally, I don't. Have never watched a minute of any reality show, ever. Why? It's all about as far from reality as you can get. It's fake-real. Having a video crew follow you around and film your every move is not reality. Under those conditions, everything becomes an act.

The first American reality show was Survivor. It has proved remarkably successful and durable, even without any help from me -- I've never seen it. I'm in the same camp with the late, great Johnny Carson. Just before the debut of Survivor, Carson quipped, " 'Survivor' my ass! They can just walk off camera and get a ham sandwich."

For my money, the only true reality programming is live sports. Which, I suppose, is why I watch so many ballgames of one sort or another. They offer a compelling and real "Situation".

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