so why do we love rock of love so much? why is it that i have no idea when the show actually airs, but definitely know that they show reruns on sunday mornings on vh1?we love our washed-up stars. or, more accurately, our former mega-starts trying to hold on to some level of fame and notoriety. is bret michaels washed up? beats me. i haven't noticed him doing much since poison was in their heyday, but then again, i'm kind of square when it comes to music scenes [unless we're outside and i've got a blanket on a hill and everyone's well-behaved, i'm kinda not interested. phish concerts have gotten too rowdy for me, even]. anyway, we loved these people who are in that grey area of celebrity. celebs but not actively celebrated. and we love to watch a train-wreck of human emotions. we like to watch the car crash, the train wreck and smile while we're on the couch thinking smugly 'at least i'm not like THAT'.
simply put, shows like rock of love make us feel better about ourselves. do we care this much whether bret michaels finds love? whether he chooses one woman to 'keep rockin' his world' as he asks at the end of each elimination round? of course we don't. it doesn't effect our lives at all. no bearing, whatsoever. what we want is to watch a bunch of women act like drunk teenage morons to win the chance to sleep with someone who used to be incredibly famous. [and who slept with drunk teenagers.] we want to watch these girls act like nincompoops so that we can sit back and feel better about the times that WE acted like nincompoops. shows like this help us cement our perceived places in this world. the whole 'sure i've got a mind-numbing job and the only thing i truly look forward to is getting a seat on the subway so that i can listen to my ipod and pretend that i'm in maui but at least i'm not drunk getting a tattoo of some guy's name on my neck and screaming obscenities at other drunk girls who have all slept with this guy that i want to be my boyfriend because he's more famous than i am.' situation.
don't get me wrong: i watch the show. i was recently in a meeting and we spent the first 15 minutes discussing who we want to win bret's affection. i actually said 'while i like jess the best, i want heather to win because i think jess has more in store for her than just being bret's girl.' i said this in front of co-workers. people who i would like to take me seriously. people who i respect and who i'd like to respect me.
it's the new water-cooler talk. not everyone's a sports fan. not everyone is going to share my enthusiasm over seeing andy pettite pitch his 200th game on wednesday [in fact, it constantly surprises me how many people aren't sports literate, but that's another post]. but i guarantee you that more people know something about bret michaels, poison and his show rock of love. politics and religion polarize people. it's not ok to talk about these things at work. but rock of love and i love new york unite us. whether we're agreeing on how insane laci is, or how tango really does look like a teenage mutant ninja turtle, we're agreeing. we're united.
would i rather unite with people over appreciation of thomas hardy's novels or the sad state of health care this country is in? of course i would. but giggling over heather's use of the word 'tatters' is so much easier.
tee hee. tatters.
No comments:
Post a Comment