HeiBlog

I have never been a big fan of “Reality TV.” Thought I will confess that some of the “makeover shows” like “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” and “Trading Places” do hold some interest for me. Of course one could argue that these are more in the vain of programs like “This Old House”, with some added fluff. Shows for pure entertainment value though such as “Survivor” and the like, to me are just plain silly. The mass audience appeal and low production costs are the only reasons that this type of programing pollutes our screens.

I saw an ad for a new series that just put me over the edge. “The Swan” will be airing on FOX soon. The basic idea is to take women (just woman) and do a complete makeover. They boast to cover everything, beyond hair and skin, they have a team of professionals: a coach, a therapist, a dentist, and cosmetic surgeons. This goes beyond AMC’s Extreme Makeover. These women get the complete physical, mental, and emotional makeover, tailored to there individual needs (as determined by the professionals). You have the normal, obligatory elimination rounds and the show ends with a pageant to crown one of the women “The Ultimate Swan.”

So what is my issue with the show, not even having seen it? I always have an issue with an image being placed on people. “This is who you really are?” or “This is what is best for you?” Here we are deciding for other people what they should look like and how they should be as a person. The women of “The Swan” are said to be “getting a second chance”. Why do they need a television network’s help? This show to me is the movie Seconds brought into reality and that was a fairly disturbing film. Your “second chance” is a complete change and overhaul and everything about the “new you” is decided for you. It seems that like so many other things in our society, a parts of us are disposable.

To what image are these women being modeled after? Isn’t there enough pressure in our society to look and act a certain way? It has been a long standing concern of mine that peoples’ ideals are being set to unachievable goals, for themselves and for others. I walk down the street on any given Friday or Saturday night and see all the college girls, dressed up and ready to do God knows what. They all look the same. Sure they look nice, but how did that opinion get in my head? They all look like the women on the TV, movies, and in the media that are depicted as “beautiful.” Over the last decade I have started to see the same pressures increasing on men. If it’s not the mass of your chest and abs, they are trying to get you to be self conscience about the size of your member. So we can now just break people down into a set of measurements and forget the rest of the person.

Maybe I am just to set in my ways or bent on challenging social conventions, but it seems that we are setting ourselves up for some destructive behavior.