WHEN WILL REALITY TV, RADIO PRANKS RUN THEIR COURSE? Jim Boren – Fresno Bee Unlike much of America, I'm not a fan of most forms of reality television. So when "American Idol" began its sixth season last week, I was not among the more than 37 million people who watched.
I suspect I'll watch the season's final show when the winner is crowned in May, but the road to the next Taylor Hicks is not one I'll travel.
My colleagues say I'm missing good entertainment, as various oddballs and incredible talents meet on the Idol stage. This show is now ingrained in pop culture and not being an Idol insider definitely excludes you from the office conversations the day after the show airs.
But I'll take that chance. Now, if another William Hung shows up, I'll catch the re-run. Hung is the guy famous for being such a bad singer that it was actually entertaining listening to him squeak out "She Bangs." I suppose it's in the same category as watching the carnage as you pass a wreck on the freeway.
But if the idea is to see mediocre performers getting skewered by Simon Cowell, I'll pass. For every Kelly Clarkson, there are thousands of singers as bad as William Hung. It seems that this would get old for viewers, but "American Idol" shows no signs of losing its buzz.
My question is why would people go through the humiliation of being really bad on national television. Does TV continue to be such a novelty that getting your face on the tube doing stupid things sets you apart from your neighbors?
It isn't just on television
If you want to make a fool of yourself in public and need video to prove it, you can post your antics on YouTube.
Reality TV isn't the only area capitalizing on this phenomena. Everyday in America, radio disc jockeys find ways to embarrass some of their listeners and the participants seem to gobble it up. Someone in charge must think that contests, stunts and hoaxes drive ratings because many contemporary music stations have some variation.
Do people wake up in the morning and decide that they want to be on the radio so badly that they'll do anything the DJ says? Apparently so, and mostly it turns out to be sophomoric fun. I don't get it, but that probably says more about my age than my sense of humor.
"It's a chance to be a star for 15 or 20 minutes so they can tell their friends, family and co-workers they were on the radio," said Todd Lawley, chief executive officer of Peak Broadcasting, which operates seven stations in Fresno. He said the contests and pranks are "old-school radio" and it's questionable if they actually drive ratings.
But sometimes the contests turn tragic. It happened in Sacramento recently when the braintrust at a rock station dreamed up a contest to give away Nintendo's Wii, a just-released video game system.
They called it "Hold Your Wee for a Wii" and asked participants to drink as much water as possible without urinating, according to The Sacramento Bee. Jennifer Lea Strange, a 28-year-old mother of three, died five hours after the contest after drinking 224 ounces of water. The coroner said her death was consistent with water intoxication, according to The Bee.
There will be lawsuits and a criminal investigation into this incident, and there should be. The Sacramento station, KDND-FM, has fired 10 employees involved in the contest, including three disc jockeys.
Frat party mentality
You have to wonder what the people are thinking when they come up with such contests. Maybe the brainstorming session is like a frat party with everyone drinking and coming up with the first stupid thing that enters their minds.
Even if the Sacramento contest hadn't become a tragedy, does it sound like good radio? Everyone sitting around drinking a bunch of water until they can't stand it doesn't strike me as something that would keep me glued to the radio.
We've had our share of oddball pranks in Fresno, including a station that delivered a pornographic blow-up doll to the office of then-Assemblyman Steve Samuelian, who had been stopped in the city's so-called red-light district. After the KRZR prank, six California Highway Patrol officers responded, blowing the incident way out of proportion.
The prank was dumb and the CHP response was dumber.
I know I'm in the minority on this, but I can't wait for the day when reality television and radio station pranks have run their course — not that I'm paying attention. |