I’m tired of TV.  Night after night I flip through the channels in hopes of stumbling across something decent to watch, but I have yet to find anything worthwhile.

The reality tv thing isn’t for me – it never has been. 16 & Pregnant, 19 Kids and Counting, A Double Shot of Love, Ace of Cakes, Addicted, The Amazing Race, America’s Best Dance Crew, America’s Got Talent (I especially dislike this one because I don’t like the word ‘got’), America’s Next Top Model, American Chopper, American Idol, American Gladiators, American Pickers, The Apprentice, Anthony Bourdain…the list goes on and on and on.

I don’t like the idea of sitting down and watching people do something I wouldn’t do.  Why would I want to watch a bunch of people in Louisiana catch alligators?  There’s nothing to the show.  People go out, bait hooks, go back out and bring in alligators.  As a career it sounds really boring, why make a tv show about it?  I doubt people would be interested in watching me on tv as I delivered mail day in and day out.

Granted, some shows were good to watch once or twice.  Ace of Cakes was a good watch – it’s astonishing to see some of the things they make out of cake.  But season after season of cakes?  Unless you’re in the field, or really like cake, I doubt the show has much of an appeal to the average viewer.

And I’m tired of the fighting.  It seems like every episode of every reality show has to have some conflict in it.  Girls slapping and pulling hair.  Guys chest bumping and yelling at one another.  Fathers and sons feuding over money.  Couples crying.  There’s enough real fighting in the real world that I try to avoid (shootings, bombings, massacres), so why would I want to watch it in my spare time?

I can’t stand the cut-aways, either.  Where the show reaches a high tension, and just before it’s shown the show goes to commercial, leaving the viewer in suspense.  But it’s been done so many times it’s not suspenseful anymore – it’s annoying.  The best example of this is the storage auction shows where people bid on abandoned storage sheds hoping to cash in on the winnings.  Two or three times we are left hanging before a commercial: The box is opened and Joe peers inside, “Oh…my…”  Commercial.  Then we are shown what’s in the box, and it’s usually nothing big – just an Elvis record or some statue that has value to one guy on the other side of the country.

What disturbs me is that reality show gives us a false view on the world in which we live.  These shows portray extremes, and occasionally the things of which we want no part.  Reality TV has given us false hopes, false expectations, heightened extremes.  It’s saying that it’s okay to punch another guy just because he said something stupid.  It says that dating can be done with multiple partners in a short amount of time and that love will develop quickly, eventually ending in marriage.  It shows us that with a few household items we can cook a fabulous dinner in 24 minutes.  It pits people against one another – doing almost anything to one another – for money.

I’m tired of TV.

much love. sheth.