Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

this month? A date! with your sister. no offense. JK. hahah

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

Of society's collective dignity, yes.

Why? Why is this family anything close to remotely interesting? Mad Men gets a million viewers if it's lucky. This piece of idiot shiite collects ten million jackasses on its first night? I get the whole "shut my head off and just veg to it" attraction. I get the "so bad its beyond campy" thing. It can be amusing for a couple minutes, no doubt. But really, WTF? This is the most interesting thing for 10 million of our unwashed masses to yammer about every morning around the water cooler? The polished, dramatized home movies of a pair of Pennsylvania hicks whose sole accomplishment in life is amassing a large litter in short order? That's interesting?

I don't think humanity has a point. Generally, I think most of what we do with our existences is silly, frivolous and pretty much just amusing ourselves while we mark time, but this? I mean... Are we in a competition on every level? In addition to all the other superlatives we own, does America also feel the need to be the stupidest, most easily entertained country on the planet?

And I say this as a person who loves 80s metal and Shakes the Clown.*

*The Bobcat Goldthwait version.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

My wife used to think the kids were cute and that Kate was/is a bitch, and she enjoyed commenting on her bitchiness. That used to be the draw. Now that the kids are older, she no longer watches.

Two Vonnegut quotes address your second paragraph:

"I think William Shakespeare was the wisest human being I ever heard of. To be perfectly frank, though, that's not saying much."

“I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don’t let anybody tell you different.”

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

I used to think the movie Idiocracy was just a bad movie; now I'm thinking it was a documentary. We celebrate idiots all day long, for the most part.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

nbm.


I hope I remember this when the k race comes around in 6 months or so.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

Which is why I'm surprised Sebby even bothered to comment. Does he still have faith in humanity? Does that mean I will re-obtain it in the future? I hope not; I enjoy not being surprised by anything. But I am surprised at this. And I'm not enjoying it.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

really? because of Jon and Kate and that ilk?

would you rather to have lived in the era of Ozzie and Harriet and Leave It To Beaver? you honestly feel it's worse to look at the pathetic, and be glad you are not that, then to look at the fictionally perfect, and pretend you can be that? To me the human condition advances with the reality show.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

I don't really understand this post. However, I'll clarify that J+K+8 is relatively innocuous, and that there are much worse things to watch on TV. Frankly, the kids were cute and funny. My comment wasn't about the show or TV, but about what I believed to be Sebby's out-of-character comment about the show.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

where would the Flinty or Hank socks be if not for the celebration of idiocy?

think about it.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

"Well, you know, they say if you scratch a cynic you find a disappointed idealist."
- Carlin

Dirty little secret you probably already suspect: I'll never give up hope things could be a whole lot better, and that we have the capacity to make them so. I mean, I fucking hate 99% of lawyers I meet, but I come here and am reminded a lot of us are decent people just caught in that shitty trap known as "Not being independently wealthy enough to do nothing."

Don't ever get so cynical you can't get angry or lose the capacity to mock the shit you see. That's when I think people are truly fucked. It's totally cool to get your kicks however you want to, but at the heart of this fixation with low-grade reality TV (and I deal with media stuff a good bit at the moment, with all its coarse, scientific machinations involved in exploiting "demographics") are a whole lot of people consciously deciding to "dumb it down." The people behind this stuff are openly trying to lower the bar further and further because the build-outs on these shows get cheaper and cheaper the more pathetic and desperate the subject matter. Shows like Survivor or Amazing Race have actual costs associated with them. Hell, even the Osbournes required a premium to be paid for the celebrity at the center of the thing. But people like these Jon and Kate sorts? You can package that breathing garbage for next to nothing. And TV execs are going to keep looking for these low grade "products" to get better margins as TV's influence wanes. And they're banking on two audiences:

1. Smart people who want to tune off their brains, or laugh at the thing ironically; and
2. Dumbass, average Americans who are really into the show.

I laugh at the stuff when I watch it and for a second it sometimes allows me to feel this odd sense of superiority. Then I remember - the ironic laughs I think I'm taking from the show are contrived, set-up. That kick a lot of people get from thinking they're "getting" reality TV on a level a lot of the audience isn't? That's pre-packaged - a type of positive reaction anticipated from a certain sector of the audience.

"No shit," right? Well, if people are smart enough to realize that then why are so many still watching and laughing like they're in on an inside joke? Can't people find anything more useful to do with that hour of their lives? For Christ's sake, there's always masturbation.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

Simply, it's shit. And the more we like shit, the more they'll serve us shit. And the more shit they serve us, the more we're reinforced to expect little more than shit. Nothing wrong with people producing, watching, talking about and buying things in ads stuffed in the middle of shit. But at the same time everybody's doing that, we should always be vigilant about reminding each other, "Hey, this is a real pile of shit we're watching and talking about." If we don't do that, we run into a nasty cycle of shit. A cycle which could ultimately find us watching ourselves watching ourselves on TV, laughing at how stupid we look watching ourselves laugh at how stupid we look. It's only a Hollywood conversation away:

"Hey, Mel, what if we just stick a camera on top of people's TVs and beam their own image back them? Stick a random laugh track behind it and give everybody a template theme song and graphics. We'll call it 'You.'"

"Pilot cost?"

"That's the beauty of the thing. We actually make money on the set up. The cable company leases them a special camera for $1.99 a month. We own part of the Chinese manufacturer."*

"Greenlight."


*Through a Macau subsidiary of Shienhart Wigs, of course.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

How does the Real Housewives of New Jersey fit on the scale? Better or worse than Jon and Kate? I have never watched Jon and Kate and never will because I hate all children who aren't related to me, but I'm digging the NJ housewives. It has been added to my tv repertoire of Golden Girls, boxing, 90s Lifetime movies and soccer (if my boyfriend is over). And the odd Law and Order/CSI rerun.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

I hear that they're doing the Real Housewives of DC next.

I'm looking forward to seeing whether some of the moms from my kid's preschool end up on there.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

It cannot happen. You should see some of the crap that entertains the rest of the world. From Peruvian soap operas to the Japanese game shows. Albanian Idol. Bagpipes. And I am probably only scratching the surface.

Re: A fashion board in which sometimes we'll remember to post spoiler warnings
 

I'm shocked to hell that they haven't done Dallas yet.