Why I Watch *gasp* Reality TV
I’m addicted to trashy reality television shows. Give me a show with someone snatching off her shoe and threatening to smack someone else upside the head. Or tipping over a table in a restaurant while (1) screaming that another guest is a “Prostitution Whore!” and (2) ignoring the horrified children in the room – and then saying with a straight face, “I’m a lady.” I’ll watch the body language and study the reactions of all the folks on all the shows.
Why? Well, for one thing my friends and I are NICE and KIND to each other. My family is supportive and loving. We don’t cheat, manipulate, backstab, lie, and threaten each other. But I’m a writer, and writing about nice, kind, supportive people is . . . um . . . er . . . boring. Add to that the fact that I’m mostly a writer of horror. I need nasty, cruel, snarky people to observe.
Enter Reality TV. All those Housewives of Wherever, in particular. Greedy, nasty, manipulative, dishonest, backbiting, backstabbing, lying inspiration. As one of my sons said a couple of weeks ago when he was visiting, “Mom, when you watch these shows, you’re doing more psychological research than anyone else I know.”
Yep. Research. You do it where you can.