Reality TV Changes People

In class we read and learned about reality television shows and what they do to the people on them. We learned that the people on the show eventually start to slip into archetypes which are pattern or behavioral set that people fall into. Chuck Klosterman is the one who mentioned this in his article about reality television shows.

Basically, Klosterman said that people were becoming archetypes because of the situations they were put into with the shows. He also said that the producers of the shows try to have visible cultural differences so that it's very easy for people to pick out the differences about the group of people in the shows. So if a gay man was on the show, he would always be seen talking about being gay or if a black man was on the show, he'd always be seen talking about racism or being black and the difficulties or something like that. And come on, in real "real life" people like that don't always talk about those things. They are real everyday people who talk about class, grades, jobs, t.v., friends, family, sports, food and everything else. It's actually quite annoying when you think about it.

I do think this is a really good point Klosterman brings up, which usually I'm a bit against his thoughts because it seems like he just likes to rant and yell about everything. But I mean, at least with this idea, he's pretty on point; whether he agrees with it or disagrees with it is another story. In my own opinion though, I don't like that shows do this. I mean, I've been pulled in by reality television more than once and I was even on the "Jersey Shore" bandwagon, but only for like half a season and then it ended. But still, I got caught up in it and this isn't even the first nor the last time. I agree that the people on the shows fall into these types but I guess I don't understand why this has to be. I'm sure I'd watch a reality show about ACTUAL people instead of scripted or people just being stereotypical.