Jon and Kate Must Seper'8 or...The Death of Educational Television

Hello all my Franklin Mint homies. Doc here crawling out of my self-imposed exile. I want to hear nuttin' more ever again of Brad Johnson, Blossom Goodchild, or any other maniacs/snakeoil salesmen associated with the 'Saviors' of the Earth.

I'm moving on to completely NEW maniacs!

In 1980 the television station calling itself 'The Learning Channel' was launched. In Canada we didn't recieve this channel until the mid-90's or so. What I remember of it was educational content. It hosted such things as nature documentaries, sciences and technology, medical shows etc.

Not bad.

Unfortunately the masses aren't into expanding their brains and learning about new things. 'Reality' television quickly took a foothold in the world and quickly became one of the top television formats. Television execs are likely thrilled by this. Often a reality series needs nothing more than a camera crew, an editor, and a few words thrown in to fuck people up.

The Learning Channel quickly picked up on this. The format of an educational television station was dropped and the name of the channel shortened down to 'TLC.' It quickly degenerated and filled the timeslots with the usual garbage of watching people argue. Discovery is equally, if not more, guilty of this practice as they are still touting themselves as an educational network. I believe their biggest hit right now is about crab fishermen. They also showcased a show based around those fellas arguing about building motorcycles (American Chopper) before passing the show on to TLC.

TLC touts itself now as a slice of life channel. TLC basically took the same ratings model that such degenerative talkshows as Jerry Springer and Maury Povich. Essentially the ratings model goes like this:

People want to see arguing.
People want to gawk.

I can't stress that second point enough. The majority of TLC programming would be considered distasteful if in another forum. TLC is to a circus sideshow what Maury Povich is to Jerry Springer....a wishy-washy forum that allows America to gawk at human oddities (I hate that word....). Under the guise that it's educational programming it takes away the stigma around the distaste many people feel about going to a carnival 'Freak Show.'

the whole Jon and Kate Plus 8 Fiasco is no exception. I find this show as distasteful as the fiasco of the Dionne Quintuplets.

Long story short....the Dionne Quints were born in 1934 in Ontario Canada. Such a birth (with all the babies surviving) was unheard of. The Canadian Government quickly took custody of the Dionne Quints and built a tourist attraction around them. The quints were put on display for all the (paying) world to see. The Canadian Government made a tidy profit on the exploitation of children. The semi-happy news is the quints were eventually returned to their parents.

All in all I find Kate Gosselin (and to an extent, Jon...that miserable bastard just doesn't want any part of it) just as monsterous as the Canadian government....exploiting children for profit.

Their OWN children which is 100x as shameful.

I do have some sympathy as to why a lot of these programs happen and why the subjects agree to them. Sometimes it's just not finacially easy to be born different. Little People, Big World for example. Very often a person born with some sort of genetic abnormality isn't given the same rights to life as many others benefit from in America. As far as I am aware many of the Roloffs are unable to acquire medical insurance due to their dwarfism. Compounding this is a lot of pre-existing medical problems caused by the dwarfism. The hotpital bills must be immense. I could go on a rant right here to everyone who ever called me a 'communist' for believing in universal healthcare but I will just say instead that I find it incredibly sad that a family has to resort to exploiting their personal lives on television in order to make ends meet.

The 'Slice of Life' shows don't end there. Frequently TLC has been showcasing entire marathons dedicated to the morbidly obese (and doing nothing for their dignity by showing them being carted around on forklifts, etc.), as well as a host of other programs with titles that could be found at the Coney Island sideshow (Mermaid Girl sticks out the most).

Is this trend going to end anytime soon? Are humans just pre-programmed to gawk?

-Doc