LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
CAMPOut: Oh Big Brother, We're All Survivors! |
by Fay Jacobs |
I accidentally caught a glimpse of that reality TV show Big Brother last night. Ohmygod. This has got to be the stupidest, most annoying, harebrained ratings grabber yet. Since Survivor, of course. What are these things and why is America watching? One perfectly sensible friend of mine sat glued to the TV, watching a Big Brother participant stare into the one-way bathroom mirror and be videotaped brushing his tongue. EEEWWWW. "It's like a car wreck, you don't want to look but you can't take your eyes off it," was his defense.roots.htm In case you've been watching more sophisticated and educational shows like Hollywood Squares, let me fill you in. On Survivor, a squad of diverse, fame-and-fortune seeking exhibitionists get stranded on a desert island along with hundreds of producers, video cameras, sound engineers and catering trucks. Only the survivors have to forage food for themselves on the island and survive by eating bugs, rats and the occasional frond. Then, amid bickering, rat-eating and back-stabbing, they gather around the campfire, sing Puff the Magic Dragon and decide which person is the most annoying and should be sent back home to the city. Frankly, this is not a new concept. It's straight out of my 1960's summer camp. On Big Brother, it's the same idea, only the cadre of obnoxious people are stranded inside a badly decorated house, have to survive on what's in the fridge and have their every waking and sleeping moment videotaped. As the housemates sit around deciding which of the annoying people is so super-annoying that they should be banished, teary-eyed participants admit their fear of being bounced with phrases like "I wanted to make my parents proud." Too late, Bunky. Meanwhile, oh-so-serious anchor persons interview the parents and spouses of those prospective losers as if they were Ehud Barak or Yasir Arafat. Then, relationship counselors tell the audience at home exactly what kind of neurosis the banished has that made the person ripe for expulsion. Has the CBS brass lost their minds entirely? That flipping sound you hear is the late great Edward R. Morrow, orbiting in his grave. I particularly liked when the aforementioned relationship counselor described a video moment when Jordon confides in slut-puppy Jamie. Good grief, she's confiding in him and six million viewers. It's absurd. Apparently, sometime in September, when the next to last occupant has been evicted, the sole housemate left standing will walk away with $500,000. A half a million isn't enough to live with those scuzzballs and their live chickens (really, they have chickens). Can you imagine if they produced the show with all gay men and called it Big Sister? First off, they'd have to make sure the house was stocked with politically correct vodka, fabulous window treatments and a fully-equipped kitchen, right down to lemon zesters and pie weights. Those boys would be so busy partying and entertaining, they'd never have time to vote anybody out. In fact, it could become the biggest circuit party of all time. Quick, tell CBS. Conversely, a house full of gay girls would find the housemates, their cats and dogs holding interminable tribal councils to decide who would be banished. They'd be so busy making vegetarian dishes and processing their banishment selections they'd end the ratings period with everybody staying. And sharing the money for kitty litter and crystals. Just kidding. In our version the girls could send half their number to the boys' house to fix all the broken stuff while the boys deport six sous chefs to cook a decent meal and bring some feng shui to the girl's quarters. Frankly, if CBS wants a pilot combining Big Brother and Survivor all they have to do is come to my house. With Bonnie confined to quarters recuperating from her knee injury and various arterial adventures and the dogs just back from a month in the country, our own dysfunctional family could be a ratings grabber. It's banal enough. All the elements are here. We've been surviving by foraging for food. While Bonnie was hospitalized, a band of short order cooks dropped by the house and stashed stuff in our freezer. Every night at dinner time we play a version of "I wonder who left this stuff and what do we do with it?" Sometimes it takes three or four phone inquiries before we find the matching chef and re-heating instructions for the mystery meat. But let me tell you, there have been some damn fine meals come out of that Tupperware. Down the road we're going to have a reverse Tupperware party where people show up to claim and burp their kitchen ware. As for the diverse types confined to the house, they are us. We've got some serious role reversal going on. While the traditionally outdoorsy Bonnie rests up on the sofa, I've made my first-ever trek to the backyard shed where the lawnmower lives. Not that I actually used the mower. That's way too scary. But I did show a saintly friend of mine where it was located and ran after her with a plastic bag for the clippings. One time we failed to secure the clipping bag properly and gave ourselves an enormous mulch shower. Covered as I was with grass shards, it really wasn't a tragedy when I learned my second lesson of the day: turn the sprinkler off before you move it. Not even the rat-munching Survivor cast contained somebody as pathetic looking as I was by the time I got back into the house. I guess people are aware of my temporary need for a yard-work support group, because along with many offers of help, I received one clipping from the Hammacher-Schlemmer catalogue featuring a robot lawn mower. I wouldn't even have to go near the thing. Alternately, it was Bonnie cautioning "take your filthy shoes off!" Bizarre. Not only that, but she was quickly getting into my house business. She actually managed to find our telephone book, figure out our friends' last names and make her very first independent phone calls. The hell she stirred in our social calendar is only now being unraveled. As for our tribal council, Alpha-dog Moxie narrowly escaped being voted out of the house for a shoe-chewing indiscretion. But my favorite comparison between this spate of reality programming and real life is the viewer advisory. On the Big Brother web site, and the television screen, there's a warning that goes like this: Big Brother is not scripted, but is a result of the participants reactions to their environment and interactions with each other on a day-to-day basis. Life is full of surprises, as anyone will tell you. t's important to realize that the unexpected may happen;...and, you may be exposed to incidents, language or other situations you may find objectionable." Hello. I think that's a viewer advisory for life don't you? Oh Big Brother. We're all Survivors. I'll take the $500,000. But tell CBS they can keep the live chickens. Fay Jacobs, a Vice Versa award winning columnist, is a regular contributor to Letters from CAMP Rehoboth. You can find more of her CAMPOut columns at www.camprehoboth.com. |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 10, No. 10, July 28, 2000. |