Money or Masochism?

Can you put a price on self esteem?

Apparently you can. Ask any of the producers of any of these reality shows on any of these ever-increasing TV channels.

Or ask the participants on these shows.

Who would want to stand on national television and willingly be told that you dance worse than the domestic help that comes to that judges house (of course this is a very classist comment – who said domestic help can’t dance? Is dancing a skill that comes only with money?). Or be part of ,what can only be termed a juvenile sense of sport, a competetion that has girls vs boys (i mean, we did that in school at age 9 when all boys were so sick, and the girls were all ewwww). Why would you willingly want to be on a show on TV that is going to make you whine and complain and bitch and fight (all in the script dahlings)?!

There has to be a streak of masochism is all these people who agree to appear on these reality shows, especially if the format includes, from the beginning, the judges stripping you of all pride and dignity and revelling in it.

Or the fact that there are only so many saas-bahu* shows on television and there has to be a way to showcase all the talent there is in the field of drama and tears…oh and bad costumes and makeup!

That or you’re given a bundle of money (and it better be a hu-uge bundle) to strip yourself of all dignity, self-esteem, intelligence and perhaps common sense.

Nah...it has to be the masochism.

* - Saas-bahu shows are the staple diet of Indian television, mainly revolving around stories of women hell bent on ruining either the other women in their life, the men in their life, someone else’s children, steal someone else’s husband, try and seduce their own husbands, kill some one, try and hide the fact that they killed someone, bribe people to kill for them, have extra-marital affairs, cry, weep, howl, faint, fast, pray, dance, so on and so forth, all the while wearing at least three quarters of the gold in India coupled with some of the most garish outfits money can buy.