Whether you are watching American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, America's Got Talent, and the like, you have most likely been on the edge of your seat as you watch to see who will win. Reality TV caters to just about everyone; families, the overweight, the addicted, celebrities, even children have their own versions of reality TV. Interactive TV has taken over the way children watch TV.
So what is all the hype in reality TV? Apparently, Americans love drama. The new "escaping" reality, means to escape your own life and live through someone else's reality. And you can choose from the motherload! You can watch as a marriage falls apart, you can cry with the parent who is losing their child to a drug addiction, you can celebrate with the mother of 2 who just lost 100 pounds - every story is relatable or can be sympathized with. And while some American's watch and empathize -- other's seem to get lost in the "fantasy" of reality. We see things on television that we have never done, or would NEVER do, and so we are fascinated. Fascinated by the people who are so daring - or so stupid - to do the things we would never dream of doing. People who will eat live cockroaches or crawl into the carcass of a camel for "Survival". Reality TV is as fascinating as an automobile accident - you want to turn your eyes, but you can not help but be captured by what is taking place.
We have come a long way since 1928, when television was first introduced by John Logie Baird. From monochromatic to color TV, sitcoms to game shows, video cassettes to Blu-Ray discs, television has definitely evolved over the last century. In the 1950s, when television was becoming more popular, most shows were based around wholesome comedy. Shows like I Love Lucy, The Honeymooners, and Make Room for Daddy. There were the popular exceptions such as Dragnet, a drama series that focused on two police detectives and the process of police investigation, much like Law & Order and CSI. This show, because of it’s dedication to providing true-to-life information, led to some of television’s first reality shows like, Cops, and America’s Most Wanted.
As television has evolved, so has our taste in what we watch. Reality has always been much more interesting than fiction. As children, we read fairy tales of how they lived happily ever after, and as adults, we realized that fairy tales are just that; tales. We enjoy reality TV because it lets us live vicariously through someone else, or because it lets us live out some forbidden fantasy that we could never muster up courage to do, or even because sometimes we just want to escape our own life to watch how someone else lives. It may make us feel better about where we are in life and it may also make us envious for things we can not have. For some, it just makes us content to be where we are, and thankful that our lives are not being broadcast to millions of viewers.
Maybe we enjoy reality TV because it isn’t reality at all.
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