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Originally Posted by Angeline
I don't know what's in the American psyche that makes these shows popular. Yesterday I was watching where male contestants were told they would participate in some sort of Fear Factor show. They came prepared to eat worms and found out, at the last minute, that they had been tricked. The contest is in actually a beauty contest.... with them dressed in drags.
It was funny I suppose. But there was a sadistic element to it. To see exposed the lengths at which people are prepared to humiliate themselves to get money. And, more to the point, the lengths at which producers are willing to go.
Let me contrast this with a show that ran in Quebec last year. It was a sort of American Idol type of show with local talent. Came the time when some of the contestants had to be eliminated. They had the usual humiliating bit where they are told basically that they aren't good enough to be the next idol and are booted off the show. In this particular show, the score was determined by a pannel of judges.
Well, they had so many complaints from the audience that they had to change their format. They changed it to a secret vote. The participant was simply told he was not choosen. They skipped the whole humiliation bit.
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Personally...
I think the American desire to see fellow humans shamed and humiliated is a product of our materialistic culture. We are a very materialistic country... we have inadequate spiritual bonds to humanity and the collective, we worship the false idols of wealth and status above all else, even before meaningful human relationships (e.g. family, husband/wife relationships, roots, and in general transpersonal/spiritual relationships with other beings).
Status and wealth seeking behaviors are at odds with family/emotional/tradition preservationist ones. The two drives exist on an axis, and one pulls against the other.
Seeing as America is a country founded on the former principles (status, wealth, and productivity being greater than anything), if our country is to sustain itself that means our culture must condition its people to share similar views and to hold those ideals in high regard. We carefully condition our people toward being fearful, distrustful, anti-social, and isolated. There are numerous examples of this... for example, our nightly news (which would have you believe all people are criminals and exist only to somehow try to exploit you), the slow deterioration of family/social structures, and what passes for entertainment (reality shows where people are debased into objects for exploition and humiliation). The goal of all of this is to condition the individual toward hyper expression of individual/selfish/me-first nature, and away from a collective/selfless/community/empathetic oriented one. People would prefer to work 40 hours a week to afford material things, instead of live a modest life and spend more time with family.
It's important that the American be conditioned in this way. When individuals worship only themselves and their base desires, they naturally seek superficial augments to it - status, wealth, clothes, items, industry fuel and fodder. When individuals are more spiritual, when they value intangiable, permanent things like heratige, culture, family, roots, tradition, the soul, or have some kind of religion, when they are more socially aware and better socialized, they are less focused on their superficial individual sensual desires/wants/goals. They are less likely to look for self aggrandizing augments like buying the biggest house in the suburbs or the most expensive SUV. By logical extension, spiritual people tend to live modest lifestyles and do not support industrial growth nearly as well as materialistic people.
Other countries are much more balanced between materialism and spiritualism. Their culture reflects this, and so the individuals within are better socialized... they don't tend toward being as fearful, hateful, and otherwise anti-social as your average american. Generally speaking, in Canada a trashy show where people are humiliated wouldn't be nearly as successful, because canadians have a much more sophisticated eomtional awareness for fellow human beings. They feel more of a sense of community with people, they have a stronger neighborly spirit, and empathy would kick in. They would feel
bad for the other people and not find their misery a source of entertainment, instead of objectifying them and laughing at their plight like an American audience might do. The sense of community and brotherhood and unity with a collective has been so utterly demolished in your average American.
Unfortunately I would not fare well there because I don't have a lot of weight to lose and therefore at the elimination round, I would probably be the first to go 
They should really change that because I don't think that's fair. Just because a 150lb woman loses less than a 300lb woman doesn't mean the former is lazy or not working as hard.
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