Is blood and killing the final frontier in shoddy reality shows? Is this the stupidest bs ever?
Last year we get Amish Mafia. These ex Amish are going to crack some heads! Lots of posturing and people carrying large sticks.
Ax Men is constantly showing guys yelling and shoving. Last Sunday’s episode had some redneck with a pistol and pepper spray guarding some logs in a river. Right on schedule the poacher shows up to steal the logs. But nobody gets shot.
They’ve been running promos for some stupid Gold mining show. Dig A hole in the Ground gets sung repeatedly while some Redneck tells us he doesn’t want to hurt anybody but he will if he has to.
How stupid do they think their viewers are? You are gonna crack some heads in front of a film crew? Even pointing a gun at somebody will get you a quick trip to prison.
Reality shows have jumped the shark. They are worse than the TP you wiped your ass on.
Unfortunately they are impossible to avoid. Theres nothing else on Sunday nights any better. Its Ax Men or you just go to bed early and count the cracks in the ceiling.
Thank goodness there are still some good Reality Shows. Shows like Swamp People focus on the real job of catching and selling Gators. They don’t waste time yelling and threatening each other.
Deadliest Catch is by far the best show. That work is so dangerous they can’t risk play acting for the cameras.
Both those shows have run for years and will probably get cancelled pretty soon.
And are you unable to hook up a DVD player to your TV and get a subscription to Netflix? Add chromecast and stream something? Pick up a book and read? Go online and kill orcs with MMORPG buddies? Invite people over and hang out - book club, playing board games, cooking elaborate dinners with recipes you found online that looked interesting.
Did installing a boob tube/hypnogourd short circuit your brain? Is TV all there is to do in life? Are you living Idiocracy?
You ever watch Cops? Suspects are given the option to blur themselves, but way fewer than half of them do so because most are attention whores who don’t mind being on national television having given their girlfriend a black eye, fleeing the scene, running when chased, telling the cops you don’t have any drugs, and having them find a big ole bag o’ meth. I have no trouble believing that most of (all of) these reality shows are staged to an extent, but people are happy debasing themselves for 5 minutes of fame.
Also, a bunch of Amish men did get jailed for forcibly debearding other Amish, mafia style. It’s not like they’re all a million times as humble as thou art.
That’s the point of the OP. So many new Reality Shows are complete total bullshit. It’s reached a point where it’s just insulting to viewers.
It wasn’t always that way. I mentioned Deadliest Catch and Swamp People. There’s certainly some scripted stuff. But the majority of the those shows are real. Ax Men was really good the first season. They did a good job showing how logging works. But it’s gone into pure Reality Show exploitation in the later seasons.
I don’t object to some scripted events. But when the entire premise of a show is obviously illegal that’s going to far. Like Moonshiners. There are serious, serious prison sentences for that. Making Moonshine or transporting it is heavily prosecuted. To even suggest a Reality Show could film that activity is so absurd.
Duel Survival is really good too. I’m not sure those guys really stay out and starve. They may return back to base camp when the cameras shut off. But it is a good show that demonstrates survival techniques.
Yea there’s new ones coming. They’ve been showing reruns lately gearing up for the return. Dual Survival is good but the guy who wears shorts and never shoes no matter what the weather kinda bugs me.
The hell with stupid reality shows. There are plenty of good unreality i.e. fiction shows on Sunday night. Once Upon a Time. Revenge. Betrayal. Witches of East End. Sunday is my fullest viewing schedule for good fiction.
Am I the only one who notices the plethora of manliness themes?
So many of them have zero appeal to females, the other half of the population.
Please, female readers, before you jump on me, I am generalizing. I’m sure there are many women who absolutely love to watch brawling, chest-pounding, hairy manly men doing manly jobs and killin’ for sport. And lots and lots of sports.
I get it. Most television is designed and produced by men. Men like blood lust, competition-based, loud, car-crashy stuff. Hang around an elementary school playground and see it play out daily. These television men produce what THEY like. Who cares if they’re steadily losing money and viewers?
I love shows like Amazing Race. I even like Deadliest Catch, but more for the human interactions. I liked Dirty Jobs, another he-man kind of show. But I do find myself ignoring most current reality shows, simply because they are so blood lust and masculinity-focused.
Frankly, it’s boring. You have a penis. Congratulations.
One thing I got a kick out of while watching Discovery’s “Naked And Afraid” was how all the men nearly crumpled within the first few days because “my training never prepared me for THIS.” Meanwhile all the women held strong, even the one who eventually gave up after her male partner had to leave the challenge because he drank bad water.
There’s about one quintillion wedding based reality shows on TLC. Or shows about “unique” domestic situations (polygamy, dwarfs, 57 children, etc). I guess those are bringing up the softer, gentler side of reality TV.
You could read a book. Call a friend. Visit a neighbor. Paint a picture? Exercise? Meditate?
Reality shows aren’t real. They take place in real environments but it’s just “entertainment”. A time waster. (A waste of time?) I’m not saying that people shouldn’t watch “reality” shows but they should have a realistic view of what they’re viewing. There are plenty of other options that don’t rely on artistic editing to make them “entertaining”.
Ye Gods. The wedding shows. And the baby shows. Which of course is all us little wimmin care about! Finding a man and birthin’ babies! No negative stereotypes there! Nossir!
It’s apparent to me that some of the guys in charge of programming have figured out how to appeal to the young and silly by reinforcing old gender roles and freak show stuff. The uterus as clown car, for example.
TLC stopped being The Learning Channel at the same time Animal Planet started filling its schedule with Finding Bigfoot, Mermaid Hunters, fish tanks and tree houses.
