Cardinal Points

Issue date: 11/30/07 Section: Opinion

Remember a time when only a few television music channels existed and the material they aired was directly related to music or actual music itself?

You'll probably have to think long and hard considering MTV, VH1 and the likes have all been airing these cheap, fabricated reality television shows in place of their classic music video slots for quite some time now.

In the 1990s, the majority of programming on MTV, VH1, BET and CMT was composed of music videos from genres belonging to that particular station's formatting. You could turn on BET and catch the latest Jay-Z video, switch over to MTV to watch Metallica's "Enter Sandman" video, and then if you still weren't satisfied, you could click over to VH1 and watch The Goo Goo Dolls in their latest video single.

Now these stations, along with additional newcomers like Fuse, are so far from the traditional music television format that we might as well just change the stations' names.

These music-formatted television stations have been replaced by commercial teen-driven fake reality shows that have very little to do with music at all.

MTV is obviously the most guilty of this production sin, introducing the world to shows like "Next," "Parental Control," "Laguna Beach," "Yo Mamma," "Pimp My Ride," Wild'n Out," "The Hills," and the most recent fad, "A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila."

These shows are so far from what programmers had in mind when MTV was created, but no one seems to care now that contestants are wrestling around over an unsure bisexual.

People have no problem pointing the finger at music, blaming it for the harsh behavior put forth by America's modern day youth, but what about these television shows that have taken the place of our beloved music videos?

These fabricated "reality" shows depict a lifestyle meant to reflect everyday American culture and that is hardly the case. Watch a single episode of "Parental Control" and you'll see exactly what I mean.

A girl's parents who claim to dislike her current boyfriend skim through a pool of potential new boyfriends, each parent picking out one of their choice to go on a date with their princess.

The entire time the daughter and her date are out and about, the current boyfriend and their parents sit in a room consistently bashing each other.

I have seen guys grope mothers, swear at fathers and explicitly share plans for the near future behind closed doors with their daughter. People might not consider this any worse than what is observed in music videos, but there is one big difference: music videos are clearly not real.

Continued...

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