Signs of Moral Decay in Modern Culture.

With the prevalence of reality shows hitting the airwaves, the relative cheapness to produce a seasons worth of episodes, and the plethora of channels out there looking for content it's no surprise that many times, reality TV hits a lowest common denominator. As you go higher up with the channels, the worse it gets. VH-I and their roster of 'I Love New York', 'A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila', and 'Rock of Love' are among the many examples.

The average cable subscriber has than a hundred channels. It's no surprise that some of the lesser known, more specialized channels needs filler. Infomercials can only fill for late night, early mornings but the producers need the red meat for prime time.

Original and syndicated shows cost more than most budgets allow. The cost of the stage, sets, cast, and crew starts to increase more than most ad revenues can allow. The cheaper of these is the usual round table type of shows with the moderator and pundits or experts in that field.

Reality shows will not be going anywhere and are much cheaper to produce in the long run. Instead of paying the actors whatever the SAG wage is per episode, there are 5, 10, 20 contestants vying for that $50,000 grand prize for being the last man standing. And it allows the producers of the channel to cite the ever popular, "Original Programming" to entice viewers.

To make their reality show stand out in a sea of hundreds others, it's easy to pander to the basest of behaviors. By putting on lots and lots of good looking women with questionable values followed by cameras to get every bit of it on film.

So when the Onion satires these shows with a mock round table and then travels full circle and ends becoming what it supposedly objected to, I wasn't going to repost that video here. I will, however, give Robert Stacy a link to where you can watch said video. I hope that was enough of a rant to justify the link.