Dumbass

Dumbassification

Or

Why Reality TV is Turning America into a Society of Nitwits

(an abstract)

Unbelievable amounts of distraction are a part of the American social order, you’ve heard me harp on this before. Then again, you may think I’m just rambling around a ball of confusion this month. Dumbassification is the mental meltdown of America through the non-stop selling and buying of culture by corporations turning everyone into consumers [. . .]
-Chuck D. October 18, 2003

Nearly five years after Chuck D. began railing against the increasing consumerism of the United States, fellow Public Enemy member has filmed is about to premier a third season of the hit reality show The Flava of Love. Ostensibly, the program is a "reality" dating show, in which Flava Flav looks for his true love from among twenty young women. Unfortunately for Flav, two seasons have not yet yielded true love. Perhaps the third time really is a charm.

The first season of The Flava of Love was so successful that it spawned a variety of similar programming by VH1, including a show for the two-season runner up, New York (I Love New York 1 & 2) and The Rock of Love with Bret Michaels 1 & 2 and A Shot at Love with Tila Tequlia 1 & 2. Each show has the same premise. A B-list celebrity looks for love from among twenty or so beautiful men or women (in the case of Tila, both) who share the same house with one another and the star of the show.

Give the formula for each of the show, one might expect ratings to drop after the first season. Instead, ratings continue to go up, and demographics continue to grow. Why? In this paper, I posit that there are three reasons for the continued success of these programs. The first is that they reinforce an explicitly consumerist lifestyle. The second and third are deeply intertwined, and it is that they reinforce racist and sexist stereotypes of men and women.