Reality Bites, T.V. that is

Justin Vildosola 

10/10/2014 

Eng 101 

Blog Entry: Reality TV; Breaking the mold on reality 

Personally, I don't watch television anymore. Not that I don't have a T.V., but I spend a good majority of my time on my computer, playing video games, doing homework (as I am now), spending time with my girlfriend, or any other activity that does not involve me wasting time in front of a screen with no real benefits. That’s not to say that T.V. has done nothing for us, on the contrary, it has helped many in different ways. Television has evolved from what it used to be to what it is now; it used to be for news casting and a few T.V. shows such as the Andy Griffith show, I Dream of Genie and many more great series. Sadly, we now have shows like Jersey Shore, Keeping up with the Kardashians, and even Tiny Tiaras. This is not what T.V. was made for, this is not what T.V. is supposed to bring, this is not T.V., this is garbage that is labeled as "Fun, Entertaining, Amazing". I'm only persecuting those types of shows because they ruin the fabric of what makes T.V. so valuable, and how rich and flavorful culture used to be. Let's look at what made Television, what was once the family gathering and even poster board image of how a typical suburban family used to live. 

Go back to the early 1900's, around the 50's and you will see that America was in for its first world war. This was a time where the T.V. was in it's baby steps, and Americans were introduced to its earliest forms of entertainment. What was fascinating about this time period was the fact that, Television being brand new, no one knew exactly what to do with this technology. That is when they decided 'Let's do something with this, can we do this? Let's experiment and see what happens when we do this to the T.V.s. Thus began the first forms of T.V. Shows: The Honey Mooners, I Love Lucy, The Andy Griffith Show, these were some of the very first "Television Series" and they would be the foundation of what made a series great. Furthermore, this was also a time period in which people had said 'Hey, let's see how we can get people to watch the movie 'Casablanca' from their homes'. In retrospect, T.V. in the 50's was amazing, it was good, clean, fun for the whole family 

Up till the late 1990's T.V. was still at its pinnacle of providing great T.V shows that, at the time, pushed the envelope on what could be aired on T.V. before it would be titled as smut. It wasn't until the early 1990's when MTV (Music Television) had aired what America came to realize was "Reality T.V.", life that was televised and unadulterated. The general population was not used to such vulgar and abrasive language coming from a Television series; how do you go from clean wholesome family to fun, to an early college boy's frat years at university? Easy. Reality T.V. made that possible, it was taboo to swear on T.V. but The Real World made that fantasy into a reality. Granted The Real World was a great show, it was a bad basis to build future reality shows off of it; I say this because more reality shows nowadays seem to force the "Real" perspective that made Reality T.V. from the 90's so enticing.  

T.V., for the most part, is still great and clean, family fun for everyone. The best way to avoid shows that people view as demeaning or scandalizing, is to simply turn off the remote. Television has come a long way, some see the 1990's as the point in which T.V. became worse as media saw new ways to publicize smutty material and still label it "Reality".  

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