Reality TV of no worth

Editor:

What does Hollywood deem worthy of producing? Just turn on your television and look at the shallow reality shows that some actually call entertainment. Look at the people Hollywood chooses to glorify.

A&E, WE, the Travel Channel and MTV all have some kind of reality shows where the producers are so lazy they come up with lame excuses for entertainment and Americans lap it up.

It seems no one is immune from this phenomenon called reality TV. The shows usually highlight some untalented, rude, condescending idiot with an equally untalented family. Unfortunately, in many cases well-known people who had good reputations fall under the spell of this stupidity called reality TV, only to find their marriages mysteriously come apart.

Hmm. Maybe if you weren’t letting some guy with a camera follow you around everywhere including your bedroom and bathroom and letting the whole world see you argue with your spouse, you’d still be married.

Then there are the total airheads who get glorified for their gorgeous bodies: "Jersey Shore," "The Real Housewives of New York or Orange County" or the Kardashians — you know what I’m talking about. These dummies wouldn’t know their way out of a paper bag, but there they are being mentioned by everyone in the media and on the front page of every magazine in the country.

Heck, they even put prostitutes like the Playboy bunny who married the basketball player. I call her a prostitute because she basically does what any prostitute does, which is take off her clothes for money and sleep with an old man she couldn’t have possibly been in love, with for money.

How about those Kardashian girls, whose only claim to fame was that their dad was a famous lawyer and their stepdad was a world class athlete? How sad that Bruce Jenner sold out only to be ridiculed on every episode.

How about those glorified "Bridezillas"? These spoiled pains in the neck parade themselves around in front of the camera having their hissy fits, hitting anyone unlucky enough to be anywhere close to them. Little girls and big girls are looking at that and thinking, "This is how I am supposed to behave — after all, they get what they want."

Even cooking shows and food shows are not immune from this stupidity. There is the guy who travels the world trying different foods who thinks he’s so cool because he can’t make it one episode without cussing and getting bleeped out. What is the need for this in a food show?

Then you have the little girls who participate in beauty pageants. One spoiled brat after another, and only once in a while do you see a good girl who is loving and behaves.

Also irritating is Hollywood’s attempt to steal our children’s innocence with creations like South Park, Adult Swim and Family Guy, The Simpsons, Futurama and more, all of which are supposedly only for mature audiences, but with cable everything is a finger’s touch away no matter how old you are.

In the end it seems that only the worst of human traits and behaviors are worth pasting all over the television, and that may be why we find such a wide divide in our society between those who cling to traditional values and those who cling to everything and anything considered "pop culture."

In the end I guess what ties all these shows together is one word: "shallowness," and that is something our country doesn’t need any more of.

In comparison this 4th of July I had the honor of singing for the dedication of the San Benito Veterans Pavilion, and as I stood there and watched a Coast Guard officer salute a Navy officer I couldn’t help but think, "Now there is something that is really "cool." Our Americans who serve in the Armed Forces and who give everything they have every day to keep our country free, that is a life worth living.

Putting God and country before oneself: that is the real meaning of being an American.

Carlos R. Cañas
San Benito