i am scared of trolling now
2004-12-24

I have to talk about something that everybody else has talked about on God's green earth! Because I can't sleep! The power of words compel me!

OK, the topic is everyone's favorite new evil reality TV super-stah, Jonathan Baker. If you haven't been playing along at home, Jonathan is on "The Amazing Race," where he and his wife Victoria generally yell at and beat on each other while they do cute tasks and eat nasty things, etc. The usual things one does in a reality tv show that does not involve variety-hour style dancing. Anyway, at one point Jonathan decided that he had to be first to the finish line, because he had to be badder-ass than Jonny "Fairplay" Dalton or something. So he dropped his pack, which his wife promptly picked up for him so it wouldn't get stolen. Jonathan suddenly got THE RAGE because his wife lagged behind as she was carrying two heavy packs, and since he didn't come in first he punched the packs and sent the poor woman flying sideways. Much crying ensued, leading up to a shot of the host and crew staring at the two in embarrassment. Jonathan was told that perhaps he should talk to his sobbing wife, the implication being that they needed to get their fucknuttery together. Then the show went on to something else which involved people running around in a less hostile fashion.

CBS got a lot of heat for showing this scene. A lot of people wanted Jonathan eliminated from the race (they had a good point, but it's a fully taped show so there's nothing that can be done at this point). And a lot of people said that CBS was, by showing this scene without a disclaimer or by showing it at all, condoning the actions that Jonathan took.

I hate, fucking hate to defend CBS because they have done evil in the past, but I have to side with them on this one. Especially because saying that this is a sudden burst of misogyny for entertainment - that's like pointing out a stick in a forest. Unless you count pay channels with such fine titles as "Teen Sluts 16," reality tv is the most misogynist genre out there. Jonathan's flying fists were definitely viewer-attracting in a train-wreck sort of way, but as far as I can tell he wasn't encouraged to degrade his wife. It was, let's say, a purely organic display.

Meanwhile you have shows that deliberately play on women's insecurities, on stereotypes, whole shows built around misogyny. I mean, "The Swan"? A show where we take sad cases, insert some plastic into their bodies, then trot them out to compete against each other to get the maximum wreck-n-stare effect? Come the fuck on. If that isn't a nasty trick on the female half of the human race, then I'm Lady Charity with a scalpel. Free fake tits for everyone!

Or what about this season of "The Apprentice"? Gee, women are all stupid, screaming bitches who want to take their clothes off in public (of course, if they do so, they are automatically whores)!

I'm not even going to go into the classic "15 girls competing for a man" format.

I'm not saying that if you watch any of these shows you are DOOMED to a life of unwitting slavery to the patriarchy. I watch some of these shows myself. But shows like "The Swan" never bother to apologize for the misogynist shit that's built into their plots. "The Swan" should be the show with the disclaimer in the front, saying "We do not condone carving up depressive women and inserting plastic into all parts of their bodies." But that would never happen, because, well, everyone's cool with that. It's not cool if you show what possibly made those women so fucked up in the first place, though.

What's worse, showing a nasty incident between a jerk and his wife or airing an entire series that can basically be boiled down to "Is This Woman a Whore?" Which has more effect on the kiddies watching at home (although really, kids shouldn't be watching "Amazing Race")? Anybody who feels such deep empathy with the sleazy yammering jackass that is Jonathan Baker that they have to go out right then and beat on somebody, well, I think that they're too far gone for a disclaimer to reach them. Everybody else should know that it's not cool to beat your spouse, and fan reaction seems to bear out that most people are sane.

Maybe there should have been a "Viewer Discretion Advised" sign flashed up before that particular segment aired. Or maybe the number for an abuse hotline should have popped up at the end of the show, although that would be problematic as well, as that might imply that the show was accusing Jonathan of criminal behavior - something that he would be sure to challenge, and that his Stockholm-Syndromy wife would back him up on. This isn't "The Real World" where people are selected because they will confess to problems that are convienently associated with hotlines.

"The Amazing Race" is one of the few reality shows out there with strong women, which is part of why this incident is so shocking. But in a genre where there's so much misogyny just lying there in the background, maybe it's better that we see how horrible it actually is when human beings stoop to that level. If one person sees Jonathan in action and learns that "pimps" aren't glamorous but really fugly delusional whiners who have glaring mental problems, then I salute CBS for doing one good thing in its collective network life.

I just got wished a Happy Life Day! I plan to spend it totally wasted, at Bea Arthur's bar. Life Day rules.