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The Reality Fantasy
 The evening news begins with a report about how many were killed that day by insurgents in Iraq. This is followed by a stand-up on the White House lawn, during which a correspondent blandly reiterates the latest proclamation from the President about why “we must stay the course” in a losing war. Next, a senator running for reelection is interviewed. He proceeds to parrot a series of his party’s talking points about why, after 9/11, it’s now acceptable for our government to violate human rights or to eavesdrop on the phone conversations of its citizens. He also discusses why entitlements for health care and hunger-abatement are anathema to the fundamentals of America’s Puritan work ethic. The anchor accepts this without question.
After a commercial break that includes advertisements for pharmaceuticals that cure erectile dysfunction, chronic digestive disorders and depression, the program moves on to various pre-recorded news packages. These briefly report on how many workers will be laid-off in the latest, necessary restructuring of an American automaker, and which corporate executive has “resigned to spend more time with their family,” while under scrutiny for a crime. The stock market, the anchor tell us, is down.
Another commercial break features ads for employee-discounted SUVs, shown smashing through rugged terrain, with red, white and blue flags unfurling in the background. The broadcast resumes to report on the continued increase in gas prices and then moves on to coverage of a sensational murder trial. The defendant is a handsome man who has allegedly killed his pregnant wife. The next commercial shows highlights of a network crime drama depicting bloody assaults on women and their subsequent, bloodier autopsies.
Inevitably, the newscast ends with a feel-good story about a baby panda born in captivity, showing that, in the end, all’s right with the world.
Despite the Orwellian obfuscations that are typically part of news broadcasts today, Americans on both sides of the political divide who bother to watch— and ratings show it’s a dwindling crowd — are witness to half an hour or more of death, justifications for death, the death of jobs and social responsibility, a murder or two and the birth of a cute zoo animal (that can no longer reproduce unaided in its desiccated, natural habitat). In other words, after a hard day of, as playwright Edward Albee once said, “making ends meet until you meet the end, “one is assaulted with all the ingredients for a full-blown panic attack. Pass the Paxil, please.
If the nightly news, though only a shadow of what it could be in terms of providing vital information, can serve as any kind of gauge for what Americans experience as reality, then what is real for most of us today is an ever-growing fear that the world is terrifying, government is full of ineffectual liars and that the Social-Security-free future will likely necessitate generous helpings of nutritious cat food.
But when the going gets tough, the tough change channels. Luckily for us, television — that most powerful and pervasive arm of the mass media—has a tried-and-true antidote to the very terror it encourages. It’s known as fantasy, and under a number of different euphemisms, it’s beamed by satellite into our living rooms 24-hours-a-day.
Fantasy has long been Americans’ refuge from the threat-du-jour —whether it was known as Hitler, communism, the bomb or Al Quaeda. During the Great Depression the movie business flourished while other industries faltered, because, while Americans learned to live without the bread, they found they could not forego the circus. False hope, after all, is better than none.
Today Paris Hilton has replaced Shirley Temple, the movies don’t have the clout they once did and, while the Internet has made tremendous inroads into Americans’ lives, for the time being, that ever-expanding screen in the living room is what most of us rely upon for our escapism.
Ironically, one of Americans’ most popular, escapist fantasies is known as “reality.” Reality programs have titles that mimic both our anxieties, like Fear Factor, and our dreams, like America’s Next Top Model. These shows generally consist of humiliating contests, in which the contenders are vying to win a million dollars, a career in show business, or both. In an era where hard work is increasing seen to be unrewarded, there is no illusion so dear to our hearts as the one that tells us we can get rich quick or be discovered overnight — and that all it takes is the fortitude to spend eight weeks being shamed by Donald Trump or Simon Cowell.
That it‘s commonly understood by viewers that most of these shows are highly-scripted affairs that are anything but true-to-life, has not diminished their popularity. It’s possible, that the very success of reality shows may be due in part to this etymological collusion with the audience. Because, the euphemistic shenanigans serve to psychologically manipulate the watcher into feeling a maddening, yet oddly-empowering mix of emotions. When watching reality shows, we can simultaneously feel empathy for, and superiority to, those, who like most of us, will lose the game. And whether we respond with tears, laughter or apathetic inertia, we can rest assured that it doesn’t matter, because the blood on everybody’s hands is just make-up.
But, the danger in repeatedly calling what is false, true, is that the whole meaning of truth becomes diluted and confused. Constant exposure to cartoonish portrayals of human difficulties inures us to our genuine, emotional reactions to misfortune. So, eventually, we can feel the same ineffectual mixture of pity and contempt for the very real people being kicked out of their jobs on the newscasts, as we do for contestants being kicked off the island in the course of a game show. In time, as a result of swimming too long in this contrived, morass of cognitive dissonance, we no longer question things like, why the government has begun calling toxic air pollution, “blue skies,” or why news shows reward every, meaningless glimpse of a celebrity with Pearl Harbor-worthy coverage.
Of course, some of us are too cynical for all the celebrity worship and amateur gladiator battles. Maybe we occasionally question the double-talk from those who market both consumer goods and wars in the same brightly colored, disposable packages. For us, television provides a more sophisticated form of reality programming. It is called satire.
Satire in the form of parody news broadcasts, like The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, is all the rage with the cynical set these days. On these shows, clever comedians help Americans contend with life’s genuine tribulations, not by ignoring them, but by pointing out their inherent absurdities. They mock the government, the media, religion and anything else they can get away with ridiculing without losing their FCC licenses. In the hands of pros, this is funny stuff.
However, just like with reality programming, where the viewer falsely believes the joke is not on him, because he’s in on the joke, there are psychological risks involved in trading the big, bad news wolf, for the winking news wolf in sheep’s clothing. It leads to the belief that if we can still watch anyone on a national broadcast —if only an actor – take the powerful down a notch-or-two, then somehow things can’t be all that bad.
If reality programs allow us to stop questioning, then satirical programs exist to do the questioning for us. Though these comedians may be the only ones consistently drawing attention to the clay feet propping-up our cherished, communal lies, it’s still dangerous to forget that their primary job, like that of everyone on television, is to create a rallying point around our TV sets and not in the streets. The revolution may very well be televised, but we’ll be too busy yukking it up to notice whether or not it’s going our way. Maybe this is why more people voted for the contestants on American Idol than bothered to show up at the polls during the last Presidential election.
Throughout our country’s history, Americans have embraced escapist entertainments in order to catch a break from bleak realities. But it used to be that, once we burned that witch, we went back to planning to overthrow the king; once we satisfied ourselves with a peek at the two-headed calf, we went back to our labor organizing; and once we finished watching John Wayne save the Allies, we went back to fighting the war ourselves. Of course, that was a different war, and maybe those are all just bedtime fictions they show on TV.
In any case, many Americans have reached the point where they are wiling to believe in just about anything that will relieve their depression, impotence and justified terror. Unfortunately, that might mean continuing to sit on our collective behinds — equating the act of watching paid performers, dressed as Indians, throwing fake tea into a harbor built on a back lot, with bonafide action that could truly right some wrongs.
Then again, there’s always that baby panda.
©Suzanne Rush 2007
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