Archive
‘X Factor’ – do audiences care that reality television isn’t real?
.
While sitting in on a talk given by Peter Ogden (TV Producer of X Factor), I felt compelled and provoked to consider reality television, in particular X Factor, in more detail. Unfortunately, despite Ogden being extremely talented within his job, he specialised in the production side of the programme. I found this interesting, but aside from the actual production process I prefer investigating how it all relates to the consumers and how the decisions made affects the audience’s response.
I understand the hype surrounding Reality Television to an extent and I don’t really watch any religiously, but admittedly when Big Brother was on I would watch the first episode so that I would have some sort of knowledge to verbalise in social situations whenever the topic arose. 
This in itself shows just how much of an impact these programmes have on society and despite being one of those pessimistic critical consumers that annoys everyone; I will not deny that I have fallen for the addictive nature of this genre on numerous occasions. The consistent popularity is in spite of the negative press that shows like X Factor have received, such as audition vocals being auto-tuned and voting being fixed etc. Stories such as these make me and no doubt others beg the question – how much of these reality shows is actually real? With the new breed of reality television such as The Only Way is Essex and The Hills legally having to broadcast with disclaimers, consumers are being shown narratives that are increasingly furthering themselves from the reality genre. These programmes are essentially dramas posing as reality shows, gaining a fresh new audience and therefore generating a lot more interest in dramas for many ungratified generations.
The main vexation I have with these programmes is the resulting new brand of celebrities that has been born and that many have termed “DIY Celebrities”. The fact that literally any ordinary person can apply to be broadcasted through this voyeuristic hybrid media form and achieve a level of fame and potential stardom seems, well, ridiculous. There is no obvious reason for their new found iconic persona like talent or intelligence as with the majority of famous people (e.g. singers, actors/actresses), but it seems the need is redundant as there is a constant public fascination with the whole ‘rise-to-riches’ narrative. Examples of this within the X Factor are successful contestants Susan Boyle and Alexandra Burke. The latter grew up in an impoverished background, whereas Boyle grew up in a council house as well as dealing with learning difficulties and bullying within the educational establishments she attended. This proved to be endearing to the public as they were such enduring figures, making the audience feel emotions such as “if they can do it, so can I!”
As Professor Skeggs cynically but truthfully states; ‘It’s a fantasy of another life in a country where social mobility is non-existent. The idea that people like Susan Boyle can overcome hardship because we’re voting for her makes it look like meritocracy is really possible.” The audience embrace the sense of control they get from voting on these programmes, feeling that they are putting right wider social wrongs by voting. As ever
yday life is being shaped by forces beyond our control (government/job losses etc.), the ability to vote gives us (the audience) back a much needed sense of urgency. Audiences get exceedingly involved with reality television, particularly as it seems to give some a dramatic narrative in their life that they otherwise may not have. This is why having it weekly has been successful, as it becomes part of people’s routine and part of people’s lives.
Perhaps with the existing and increasing dominance of social networking sites (such as Facebook and Twitter) where statuses are shared and the importance of ‘real’ friendships has seemingly been lost, audiences feel more comfortable engaging with someone through screen as oppose to in the same room. It is reported that half of the viewers say they watch the X Factor as an opportunity to spend time with the family. This in some ways is positive, but to me does it not seem worrying we need a television programme like this to bring families together? I know traditions have changed and technology now impinges on every part of children’s lives, but surely a shared audience experience is hardly family bonding? Sure, conversation could easily bounce around during and after viewing these programmes, but with half of the viewers watching it for mainly this reason, I can’t help question the impact it may be having on the basic and fundamental elements of family relations. Obviously television has been for years and is still useful for bringing people together or heightening awareness’s, but I feel this should not be relied upon in order to spend time with one’s family… Call me traditional, but I still feel there is a need for things like board and card games for children growing up. Afterall, Monopoly will teach them more about the reality and pragmatism of money than X Factor will!
Bibliography
Book:
‘Reality TV – Realism and Revelation’ – Anita Biressi and Heather Nunn
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2010/nov/21/why-reality-tv-works
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2010/dec/13/the-x-factor-voting
http://www.wessexscene.co.uk/lifestyle/2010/10/17/how-real-is-reality-tv/
Gender Equality – women can be sexist too
.
With the recent news that young women are to face higher car insurance and with International Women’s Day just gone (8th March), I found myself in a heated discussion with a friend about the topic of gender equality. Now I am no feminist but to put my view bluntly, I feel gender equality will never be reached – or at least not in the foreseeable future.
I understand we, as a gender, have come a long way and I appreciate the feminists who helped get us here with fighting for permission to leave the kitchen and giving us the opportunity to finally apply for an actual job. But traditional views are still extremely prominent and are underlying in our society; we are still very much in the past be it a subconscious decision or not.
The latest promotion of International Women’s Day involves Daniel Craig posing as a woman and I feel is a very well-made a powerful viral. The facts that are relayed to the audience are important and need to be known, but even the fact that we have an International Women’s Day helps separate us as a gender – there is no International Man’s Day and doesn’t look like there will be. So how is this fair? Surely this is discrimination as well, just the other way round? But this to me is overlooked as it seems women discriminating men is an unheard of issue. Similarly, the fact that it has taken this long to raise the costs of car insurance for women is further differentiation between genders. Obviously when I first insured myself it worked in my favour, but even though it’s proven men are more likely to have accidents, I still don’t feel this justifies them having to pay practically double for their motor insurance in comparison to women. Coming from a business point of view, this makes sense in the way of losing as little money as they can, but in many ways it is still unfair. This is an example of how gender separation within the media does not help the case of gender equality, and this is one of the many reasons equality is likely to never completely happen.
As the lesser gender, a lot more is acceptable in the media for women to do that would be frowned upon if men did so. For example, the whole incident with Sky Sport’s presenters Andy Gray and Richard Keys accused and therefore suspended for sexist remarks would not result in the same outcome if the gender roles were reversed. As someone I know pointed out, the hosts on Loose Women make numerous remarks that could be classed as sexist most days but nobody bats an eyelid because women are allowed to. This is very hypocritical of what feminists and women stand for in the first place, and I know that we are always going to be the subordinate gender and yes this is unfair, but we do seem to facilitate it in some ways. Another way of expressing this situation is by referring to the Slave Trade. Due to this history and everything that happened, White British people cannot be seen making any comments that have any potential to be seen as controversial or racist towards a member of the Black community as it would cause uproar, but contrariwise nothing would be said. I know that whatever happens history is going to impinge on the present, but to what extent is this a good thing? I feel that over the years and by challenging the stereotypes we have learnt to be reality we have come so far and society needs to move on and accept that culture and stereotypes need to and will continue to change.
Bibliography
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIjiqeUx4fk
http://www.internationalwomensday.com/theme/
http://www.becauseiamagirl.org/WhyHelpGirls.aspx
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12608487
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/audio/2011/jan/24/andy-gray-richard-keys-sexist-audio
‘My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding’ – mockumentary or documentary?
.
Channel 4 has seemed to of successfully but firmly established a reputation for producing and broadcasting a variety of controversial television programmes. This joins other institutions such as BBC Three, with the main polemic production being in the field of documentaries. One of the most recent and seemingly popular shows is one called ‘My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding’, with one week’s episode having a peak audience of 7.4m views (Channel 4’s highest rating since 2008’s Big Brother). I personally have only witnessed the first two episodes, but even with this limited awareness of the programme’s entirety, I feel I have enough comprehension to anticipate the content of the other episodes.
However, my supposed understanding was questioned when sitting in on a talk with Jake Fowler, who is a Romany gypsy community member himself. The way he explained his feelings about the programme gave me new insight and made me realise how improvident the stereotyped assumptions I made had only been furthered and perpetuated by this programme. Where some of the content he explained was positive, the majority gave the audience a negative representation. He expressed how he and his own community feel there is a lot of propaganda in the press surrounding gypsies. Unbeknown to myself and probably due to my naivety towards this community, I never considered gypsies as an ‘ethnic minority’ until Jake Fowler spoke about it. He then elaborated and explained how being a gypsy is defined by ethnic heritage as oppose to just the way of living they adhere to. Many don’t have the same level of awareness that we seem to have of other ethnic minorities and, despite viewing this programme and meeting Jake Fowler, my knowledge still feels somewhat limited. From this, I decided that to gain more of an understanding of the extent of negative representation I would watch the first two episodes again while bearing in mind everything I had listened to in the talk.
The unbalanced representation Jake Fowler was talking about was clear, but he also said his community saw it as more of a ‘sneering mockumentary’ as oppose to journalism. He emphasised how, from this programme, new stereotypes have been added to the old, which in some cases isn’t necessarily a good thing. For example in the show, the act known as ‘grabbing’ was shown. This is where if a male gypsy is interested in a female, he will pull her to the side and refuses to let go until she kisses him. I initially found this shocking as it appeared almost like a sexual assault and, as the majority of the audience probably did as well, I instantly judged the whole gypsy community. However, Fowler explained that this method of courting is not a tradition at all and is only used in a very small part of the gypsy community; which the programme should have made clear. With this in mind, it became clear that a lot of the content of this programme may not of taken into account the differences that come with the geographic locations gypsies are established. He also explained how the majority portrayed were Irish gypsies, whose traditions and ethics differ somewhat to the Romany gypsies (who account for 60% of the gypsy population). The programme, of course, did not divulge and state such information, thus giving the audience a disillusioned perception of the gypsy community.
It also showed the sheer importance of Holy Communion and marriage, particularly in gypsy women’s lives. This topic further illustrated for me how gypsies, despite previous ignorance, have very high morals. Their choice of attire, specifically the young women, would suggest otherwise, but they have very strict evangelistic beliefs about no sex before marriage. 
At the Holy Communions the programme documented, the children were dressed very smartly, with the young girls wearing corset-style dresses that visibly cut into their skin as well as heavy make-up and high heels. This was questioned and criticised within the media as obvious sexualisation of children, but just how many gypsy communities agree with this depiction? This programme is reported to of had an impact in the workplace and playground for gypsy women already, where previous nicknames of “pikey” have now been replaced by names like “slut”. Fowler explained how this sexualisation is more typical of an Irish gypsy family, but the majority of communities would not adhere to this stereotype that is being portrayed. Either way the fact that the media made such an issue of this just seems ridiculous and hypocritical, as they only help perpetuate and promote sexualisation themselves.
To conclude, I understand the uproar that ignited in the gypsy community by this broadcast as it did show a lot of unfair generalisation, but is this really enough to warrant such a reaction? Everything shown on television contains stereotypes of every ethnic minority or culture or age etc., so why must this unfair portrayal be any more important or discriminating than any other? Speaking from the point of view of someone who, prior to this documentary had only gypsy stereotypes to go by, I still found it beneficially educational. Parts of their community were revealed to me that I really had no idea about, but as with all stereotypes within the media, negative representations get more viewers than positive. With all stereotypes there are going to be elements that don’t apply to all of the community being depicted. For example the E4 programme Skins essentially shows teenagers as all being drug users, however for the majority and in reality this is only the case for a niche. I feel where the representation of gypsies is limited in comparison to most ethnic groups; there are very few other programmes to compare it to. This gives the audience an unchallenged and very biased view, which is likely to of been another reason for their disapproval of the programme. Jake Fowler voiced his plans to commission and produce his own documentary following the gypsy lifestyle of his own community. However, would this have potential to upset opposing gypsy communities?
Stereotypes are needed in order for the media to target their audiences successfully and therefore function, but with every portrayal there will always be audiences and critics that don’t agree and are prepared to make this known. However, maybe this a good thing about our society? Because if we didn’t inform the media when factors such as their representation had overstepped the line, gauging responses would be difficult and they may not realise how thin the line really is.
Bibliography
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12311604
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/feb/07/big-fat-gypsy-weddings
Jocelyn's Blog 