Reality Bites

Chaos. Pandemonium. Well,the Guest-of-Honour sure seems to have gone cold in his knees. Security personnel cordoning off the auditorium and some of them try to drag an angry, bawling streaker away from the Guest. An aura of anxiety and panic fills the place, nails being bitten, sweatdrops lining the forehead…..………….I truly was amazed for a second, at the ascending levels of thrill and quality of Indian crime-thrillers these days...... In that moment of awe and respect for Indian television, I didn’t realize that I was glued on to the TV at the deadliest hour of the day-much better known as ‘primetime’- the time for the kings of the small screeeeeeeeeeeen……..The Reality Show(s)… Ta-ra!!!!!!!!!!

In the earlier days, only two things interested the Indian masses as regards general pastime, i.e. films and cricket. Even before you approached them, you’d get involuntary answers like, “Do sau dus pe paanch wicket” or “Woh picture kya tha yaar” – for questions unasked or not even intended to. But now the scenario has received a facelift. Films have ventured into the small as well as the big screens, and cricket has slightly taken a backseat. I say ‘slightly’, because our conversations, these days, tend to go,” Man, Sreesanth was awesome; I wish he could bowl as good as how he danced in yesterday’s show” Scheize!!
Reality…..yeah right. How more ironic could it be. Armed with tons of glycerine, awesomely bad limelight-hoggers and a bunch of ‘surprise’ celebrity guests(well, the Mumbai Mirror sure tries to guard that secret) thrown in here and there, maybe for the sake of promoting their upcoming flicks or TV serials or maybe just ‘cuz they were too bored looking at their same old rooftop everyday, and all of this humbug compiled and fed to the people for an-hour-and-a-half marathon; forget reality, that isn’t even humanity. And worse, half of these commodities are use-and-throw products, eventually proving that mainstream talent isn’t noteworthy unless you have a ‘bit’ of reality thrown in the game. Glamour sidesteps everything else to clinch the pole position in today’s ‘money-makes-the-mare-go-round’ world; which points towards a bigger yet a very disheartening picture - materialism has consumed our common sense and barfed right in our faces and few of us seem to ruminate on that dribble in the name of after-hours entertainment….Well,Mr. Bob Dylan,I recollect some of your lyrics here:-
Come gather round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You’ll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you
Is worth savin
Then you better start swimmin
Or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin

For the times are really changin’………..

Let this sudden cloudburst of Vietnam War-era hippie sentiments not lead to any misconception that I be a pessimist of some sort. N-ah.It’s pity, more than anything else and shame, to see the quality standards of TV shows hitting an all-time low. What began with Survivor Island and Amazing Race and American Idol now goes on with counterparts such as Big Boss and Indian Idol and what not. And I don’t know what the future may have in store for us……

That leaves me with a thought in my mind – Do we treat compromise as our pillion passenger? Is it that difficult to do away with the hype and hoopla? Do we eventually give in to commercialism? ….. If not, then why do these reality shows keep multiplying by the day? Aren’t we ourselves to be blamed for it?! It eventually corrupts us all, with a few of us showing keen interest in such shows and the rest hiding themselves in the closet
And yet if there are any remnants who are totally aloof or disregardful to this world of glam and greasepaint, they get easily panned by detractors and eventually slip into non-existence.

To conclude, all I could say is you could join the mob and be a part of the reality-show-loving fraternity or maybe preserve your sanity by selling off your TV sets and live in a world of tear-less, TRP-void environment. Thank You