MediaEnthusiast

On the way to take my kids to school this morning, I followed my ritual of listening to local radio.

Yet another morning “news” report on Kim Kardashian and her divorce ridiculed our drive. Her mother, Kris Jenner’s support from yesterday rehashed. Brother Rob’s sadness over his sister going through so much right now. Their pleas to the public to stop the rumors that it was a publicity stunt and that she was paid for it.

I’m sorry. But did they really say “rumors?”

The guest list itself was a joke. They are obviously not friends with the people invited to such a typically private affair. We’re now hearing quotes from Khloe predicting this to last six months; statements of witnessing them avoiding each other the night before their wedding. All by their guest, Kathy Lee.

And maybe the family crafted some clever verbiage on them not making millions but spending millions, yet there’s plenty to be skeptical about there too. Perhaps they didn’t rake in millions, but it’s not as if they didn’t make any money on the broadcasting of the marital episode. And as if they weren’t paid for pictures? Please. I know how media works.

It wasn’t just a stunt and a money making ploy by Kim, though. The whole family is cashing in and gaining even more publicity for this “joke” on their fans and the public. This might even lift “Dancing with the Stars” ratings!

And is there a suggestion with the family’s outcry against the public’s opinions that we have somehow over stepped our boundaries?

Because we haven’t. They invited us in.

But that we’re angry for being fooled? What a joke, you bunch of moronic Americans. The key in a Reality TV Show is found in the middle. Despite what the genre is called, it’s still just television. It’s entertainment. It IS a joke.

You may not get that you paid for the wedding; you paid to be duped; and you could have not subscribed. But we did. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have known enough to write this. Before you wag your finger at Kim and her family for not sending part of the money to help starving countries, just answer one question …

Do you subscribe to cable?

And for a bonus point …

How much of your money did you spend on food, clothes, monetary donations, other charities to help the suffering people in and out of your own country in the past month?

Think about it. And then point blame on people apparently smarter than you.

When you ask most anyone if they watch tv, you’ll either hear, “a little” (followed by a list of programs they like) or a little more rarely, “no” (also, oddly enough, followed by a short list of programs that they like). While not many are admitting to being viewers, if you talk about a show, you’re likely to get an opinion (good or bad).

While you might not be able to tell today, since I don’t get to watch much (any?) tv outside of Sprout, I’ve always been a super-fan. Okay.. An addict, even.  And you’d never know it by my recollections of commercials, programming, jingles, and theme songs from my youth, but it was actually a challenge to watch tv in our house when I was growing up. 

Being better parents than I am, mine tried their best to restrict my and my sister’s viewing habits. They went to great lengths to try to keep me in check, but I’ve always had a knack at getting around obstacles. As any normal kid, that included finding ways of getting around my parents’ disapproval of my first vice.

Before the days of parental controls built into televisions (and equipment), my mother watched closely as we selected programs and monitored how much time we spent with the box. When she went back to work in my youth, my parents actually put timers on the two TV’s in the house to keep them off before they returned from work. A good idea in theory, except that they were external timers, so my sister and I just unplugged them. (Note to parents: even the short, young kids with sweet, innocent faces aren’t dumb.. or innocent.)

Before I started school, the only shows I remember watching are Sesame Street, Romper Room, Mr. Rogers or Pinwheel (ok, I only remember the theme song) in the morning. Of course, we also watched M.A.S.H. after dinner. In elementary school, my parents became relatively early adaptors of cable. We got the equipment once lines were secured underground in our neighborhood (maybe, to my skeptical and conservative-spending father, finally making it not a fad and worth a look-see). But at basic entry in the early 80′s, it really added nothing memorable for a kid to watch for a few years (lots of cartoons and infomercials, but nothing unique or original..). Nickelodeon changed that when it brought “You Can’t Do That on Television” south from Canada, but I was in the 4th grade when that happened (which maybe says a lot about my “nothing unique or original” memory).

I remember when that program started in particular, only partially because of my life-long addiction. Having unplugged the timer so many times and seen a thousand promotional commercials, I was excited to see the first episode but knew that the timing of the first-air (during homework-time) was something that my mother would never allow. So, I told her it was homework: to watch this ground-breaking new series! (Maybe I was foreseeing my future?) But even though she had to have known I was lying, for some unfathomably uncharacteristic reason, she let me watch it.* (Maybe she was foreseeing my future, too?)

I wasn’t as lucky when a few other favorite programs launched. While my parents watched “Family Ties” with my sister and I, I was also sneaking off to watch a few extra shows on the TV in their room. There I was, crouching by the tv, the volume turned down nearly to mute, watching “Cheers” or “Bosom Buddies.” They were both forbidden in our house, of course. Why? Because my parents didn’t want us to think anyone spends that much time in a bar (we had a wet-bar in our living room), nor wanted me to think that men dress up as women (we lived just outside of San Francisco.. and, again, I was allowed to watch M.A.S.H., so Jamie Farr/Clinger had already gotten me over any oddity of that).

So, yes, kids.. It can happen! A little vice turned into a passion that actually became a career. (Media and television, not cross-dressing and drinking.)

*Thanks, mom.