Myriad thoughts on a million things
Posts tagged TV Shows
The Real Moment of truth: People will do anything for Money
7As you might have gathered by now the three things I enjoy and write most about is going places, reading & TV shows!! So here’s a second blog on a TV show that is airing currently on star world. It’s called the Moment of truth and it runs with a tag line – ‘is there an Honest American left?’
For those unfamiliar with the show, let me lay out the format….The premise of the show basically is that Participants are asked to take a polygraphic test of 50 personal questions before the show. They don’t know if their answers to those questions are true or false and during the show 21 of those 50 are picked and they are asked to answer them as true/ false. If they get correct answers for each of their questions they can win up to half a million US dollars.
I’ve seen some episodes of the show and have realized that its popularity is hinged on the fact that participants are washing their dirty laundry in public and who doesn’t love some gory details of personal indiscretions?! It’s not so much of the viewer greed for gossip and need to pry into the personal lives of individuals they don’t know that bothers me so… it’s the readiness with which participants, for the greed of Money, answer questions that undoubtedly scar their relationships with their loved ones.
They are shows in which participants have agreed to cheating on their spouses, regretting marrying their spouse, hating their parents, stealing money, peddling drugs, Sleeping with over 100 partners and what not. It surprises me that people would be ready to hurt their families and friends through their gory disclosures on national television in order to make some easy money.
It’s not as if these people don’t know that they would b expected to answer these questions. They’ve already been asked the questions…! They come with full knowledge of what they are going to have to reveal and they are ok with it!! And this show is wildy successful in the US. People who have been shared the dirtiest secrets have become like celebrities…. Not only have they won money, they’ve become household names… chat show hosts are asking them to come over and share their dirty secrets in more details. Jeez. It saddens me that people support this kind of thing. Are these lessons we want to propagate to masses and to our kids? It’s ok to say whatever, hurt who ever, as long as you make lots of money!
I cannot think of another prime time show that destroys our social fabric more and yet no one seems to be saying anything/doing anything about it.
Instinctive Racism or Thought Through Typecasts?
4It’s been some time since I read Malcolm Galdwell’s ‘Blink’. At the time when I read it, I thought it was an eye opener. I especially liked his stories/ examples on how instinctively, without even knowing it, we make decisions about people, races, and things in the blink of an eye. In the book, some of his stories highlighted how black people in the US experience instinctive racism due to the type cast expectations/ views that white people have of them.
I didn’t think of the book again till a few days ago. I follow the show ‘Are you smarter than a 5th Grader’ that is currently being aired on star world (mostly because it makes me feel smart…. You have to see the Indian version to realize that the Indian level of required competence for the show is really much higher than the American) Jeez…! There I go blinking and type casting. Sorry.
So anyways, like I was saying I watch the show quite regularly and one day Alana (the one black kid that is part of the 5 member class) gave two wrong answers to consecutive questions. And of course the participant who was banking on her answer to stay in the show had to leave. It got me thinking…the show definitely has a way of fixing some answers and getting the kids get some of them wrong (it would appear very unnatural if they got everything right every time) and I started to notice which kids got how many wrong answers… and viola! For every wrong answer by a kid, Alana got more answers wrong. Was it coincidence? Was Alana not as smart as the other whit kids? Or were they making Alana get the maximum answers wrong because there is a general belief that black people are not so smart? I even started to notice that contestants tended to pick Alana early in the game, as they expected the easy questions early on.
It made me think of ‘Blink’… because I’m not sure if the producers of the show planned on doing this or instinctively every time they were decided who would get answers wrong, they think of Alana.