Reality TV

Jake G
Professor Mow
English 101
11/21/2012
Real Verses Reality: An Analysis of Stereotypes in Reality Television “Manipulation: to control (others or oneself) or influence skillfully, usually to one 's advantage” (thefreedictionary.com). This is what reality television manages to do to the world we live in today. Reality television in fact, is not always real. Many shows on television create a false sense of reality for their viewers. This influences people to think, act, and feel certain ways about others and the world around them. These reality television shows use stereotypes in many cases to continue to have an audience, and because people continue to watch these shows, these stereotypes are not only in television but they disseminate into society, too. Reality television does not only stereotype one subject, either. This analysis will help prove that reality television stereotypes gender, self image, and race. Many people might not really think these stereotypes are shown too often, and have an effect on them, but believe it or not, they do. Although viewers think reality television does not use stereotypes, based on many findings, stereotyping of gender, self image, and race does exist in reality television, and is done because these shows know viewers will continue to watch, which leads to influencing the way society thinks. Gender is a huge stereotype in reality television. There are many reality television shows that portray women as stupid, catty, jealous, gold diggers, and easily manipulated. Jenifer L. Pozner discusses this topic in her book Reality Bites Back: the Troubling Truth about Guilty Pleasure TV. Chapter three of this book is titled “Bitches and Morons and Skanks, Oh My!: What Reality TV Teaches Us about Women” and the author goes into further detail of the stereotypes of women shown in reality television. Pozner provides her readers with examples from reality television shows, such as The Real Housewives of New Jersey, The Bachelor, Americas Next Top Model, The Hills, Flavor of Love, and many more to help prove the point that reality television stereotypes women. On shows like these women are shown getting in something called “catfights” often. These fights are over so many dumb things. Most of the time it is fighting over men. When viewers see things like this they begin to get the idea in their head that women are catty back stabbers. Pozner acknowledges the fact that “If millions of TV viewers believe that sisterhood is not powerful but spiteful, it becomes all that much harder for women to achieve any further social progress in America.” (Pozner 108). Her point is that women need not let these shows affect them in the real world. Not only are women shown as backstabbers, but they are also shown as stupid. Just about everyone today has had to herd of the saying “dumb blonde.” This saying is influenced by reality television but not only for blondes, but for women in general. Pozner emphasizes on the fact that “Time and time again, we learn that the female half of the population is cringe-inducingly stupid.” (Pozner 108). She continues to say, “In embarrassing scenes across unscripted subgenre, women are portrayed as ‘the dumber sex’” (Pozner pg. 109). Pozner also provides a great example from the popular show Bridezilla that mostly women watch. It is a quote from the show that say’s “Thinking is a waste of time. Thinking is for people who have no brains” (Pozner 109). This is only one example, but it clearly proves that reality television is trying to get this idea into women’s heads and make woman look stupid. Another example for the stereotypes of a “dumb blonde” and woman in reality television, are the shows The Simple Life with Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie, and The Newlyweds with Jessica Simpson. All of these women are publicized doing and saying stupid things on the shows. For example, Jessica Simpson was not sure if Chicken of the Sea Tuna was tuna or chicken, which made her look stupid. Both these shows are known to be reality television shows but they are actually scripted. According to Pozner, “Both Hilton and Simpson have said they were just ‘playing characters’ on The Simple Life and The Newlyweds. These media-savvy young women have intentionally played up their airhead images to heighten their fame and their already-overflowing bank accounts” (Pozner 110). That is smart on their part to make more money, but these fake reality television shows that are making them look stupid, becomes a bigger issue in society because people are starting to think that women are stupid. Pozner compares these shows to the bigger social issues that they cause by saying “After all, less than one hundred years ago, American women were still denied the ability to vote, partly justified by the allegation that they were less intelligent than men” (Pozner 116). She says, “Today, class action lawsuits are still being levied against Fortune 500 corporations that refuse to promote women out of secretarial and retail positions based on institutional biases that consider women not as mentally prepared as men for achievement and leadership.” (Pozner 116). People might not think that it is a big deal that reality television portrays these girls and woman as stupid, but it is leaking into society and definitely affects the way companies and people think and act towards women.
Pozner cites a fact that “According to Nielsen Research, U.S. television viewership hit record highs in 2008 and continues to rise. By 2009, the average American watched more than thirty-one hours of TV per week” (Pozner 132). If people are watching this much reality television it will definitely change the way society thinks because they are so used to seeing women as stupid on these shows so they will think they are stupid in the real world too.
Stereotypes of self-image in both men and women are very common in reality television as well. Most of the time these shows are more focused on the way woman look. Modeling shows such as Americas Next Top Model stereotype women as being very skinny and beautiful. According to Martin Eisend and Jana Möller, the authors of, The Influence of TV Viewing on Consumers ' Body Images and Related Consumption Behavior, “Particularly females have not only biased perceptions and beliefs regarding body shapes but they obviously feel pressure to conform to those standards as well” (Eisend and Möller 103). When woman see these “perfect” skinny and beautiful models on these shows, they strive to be like that, and sometimes it can be unhealthy mentally and physically. Eisend and Möller explain how “Biased media images of ideal female beauty seem to contribute to the fact that one woman out of every two is dissatisfied with her body.” (Eisend and Möller 103). The stereotypes of beautiful women on these shows are manipulating the way women and men are thinking. Just because someone is so perfect on these reality television shows makes the viewer feel like they are not good enough or not good looking enough.
Jenifer L. Pozner discusses the issue of these stereotypes in the way woman look too. Pozner observed that, “nearly every reality TV dating show has reinforced the idea that women are unworthy of love and happiness if they are not stereotypically beautiful.” (Pozner 70). Pozner quotes Mike Fleiss, the executive producer of The Bachelor. He says, “When we are looking for the bachelorettes we take all kinds of things into consideration. There are physical tests, there are blood tests, but most important – they have to look good in the hot tub.” (Pozner 71). This proves that these stereotypes of beautiful woman are put on these shows on purpose.
Pozner talks about a show that’s called More to Love and deals with overweight people instead of the ideal beautiful woman. The show attempted to help viewers accept fat people a little more but it still continued to stereotype a lot. Pozner argues, “Plus size women who embrace their curves; have happy dating histories, and enjoy exercise, vegetables, and sex exist in the real world – but not on this show. Instead, viewers were treated to near-constant shots of zaftig women chowing down on pizza or meat-on-a-stick and crying about how they’d be doomed to a spinster’s life if the three-hundred-pound male star didn’t pick them” (Pozner 74). More to Love was supposed to be an inspirational show for people who are not in the best shape or not as fit, but failed to be inspirational and stereotyped fat people even more.
America’s Next Top Model tried to be inspirational with a woman named Toccara Jones, and failed to do so too. Toccara was one of the first plus size models on the show, 180 pounds and a 38DDD. Throughout the begging of the show she was a fan favorite with a lot of confidence. As the show got later in the season the judges started to dislike her, and Pozner says she was put on the show as a “plus-size participant, who are set up to be broken down” (Pozner 81). Pozner revels that, “Toccara is recognized as one of the most successful African American plus-sized models working today. To reality TV producers, she’s just a fat Black girl who needs to lose weight” (Pozner 82). This is a perfect example of how reality television stereotypes looks and body image.
It is more than just a little bit of stereotyping too. There are much bigger social issues that are leaked out in to society because of this stereotyping. There was a girl named Luisel Ramos who worked for a modeling agency over seas. She suffered a heart attack and died right after a beauty pageant contest because of health issues. She only weighed 97 pounds and had a body mass index of 14.5, which is very unhealthy. This is because modeling agencies want all of their models to be as skinny as possible even though there are health hazards and risks involved. Even though this terrible tragedy happened, modeling agencies still want there models on diets, keeping them from gaining weight, in fact, they want them on diets that make them lose even more weight. Pozner talks about a judge from Americas Next Top Model named Janice Dickinson who said, “I’m dying to find kids who are too thin. I’ve got 42 models in my agency and I’m trying to get them to lose weight. In fact, I wish they’d come down with some anorexia. I’m not kidding. I’m running into a bunch of fat-assed, lazy little bitches who don’t know how to do the stairs or get their butts into the gym… Models are supposed to be thin. They’re not supposed to eat.” (Pozner 84) This goes to show people how ignorant and terrible these modeling agencies are, even after knowing people have died from being so skinny and unhealthy. This proves that it is not only in reality television anymore, but it is a terrible and dangerous stereotype in the real world, too.
The stereotype of a so-called “ugly” person is another problem in reality television. It is not only weight that’s involved, but there are also stereotypes of people who are not good looking enough. Susan Boyle is a perfect example for this. Su Holmes wrote a scholarly article on this subject called “Dreaming a Dream: Susan Boyle and Celebrity Culture”. Holmes talks about Susan Boyle who was a contestant on the reality television show called Britain’s Got Talent. Susan Boyle is not the best-looking person out there and she suffered a mental defect since birth, but she has so much talent singing opera. Her singing surprised the judges and so many viewers around the world just because the average stereotyped “ugly” person on reality television normally is not perceived as having much talent. Holmes referenced a quote from Tanya Gold who was a journalist for the Guardian, which is a news company in the UK. Tanya Gold said, “Why are we so shocked when ‘ugly’ women can do things, rather than sitting at home weeping and wishing they were somebody else?” (Holmes 75). This is very true. It was only a big deal to people because she was ugly. If she were the “average good-looking woman” her talents and story would not even be a big deal. This is why reality television needs to stop with all of this stereotyping because it is interfering with the way people see things and interfering with true talent.
A very big stereotype in reality television is race. Many viewers of reality television it seems as if minorities or other groups of people that are not white are stereotyped and pointed out in some way. Thomas E. Ford, a Western Michigan University graduate wrote a scholarly article titled, Effects of Stereotypical Television Portrayals of African-Americans on Person Perception. As read in the title, his article obviously talks about stereotyping African Americans. Ford examines that African Americans portrayed on reality television “were more likely to have low socioeconomic status” (Ford 267). This is a quite common conception that blacks are poor and that blacks don’t have the same socioeconomic status as whites do. If reality television continues to portray this idea, the minds of viewers and young people all across the world will slowly continue to believe ridiculous things like this. A more recent scholarly article written by Mark P. Orbe called Representations of Race in Reality TV: Watch and Discuss also gives great example of stereotyping race in reality television. Orbe gives an example from the show The Real World on MTV. Many times in the show, black males are seen as violent. Orbe agree to the fact the society starts to think this way too. Orbe said, “Other work has drawn attention to representations of African Americans males on MTV’s The Real World, specifically to how it’s programming format contributes to the hegemonic power of racial images and reinforces societal fears of black men” (Orbe 350). These are only few examples of many, but clearly reality television does, in fact, stereotype race.
To sum it all up, reality television needs to change its way of portraying the topics of gender, self-image, and race. The amount of reality television that people are watching is only making it worse, too. The more viewers that are shown these stereotypes, the more it will become a reality, which is something that has happened slowly over many years. There are most certainly alternatives to stereotyping and still maintaining viewers for reality television. If producers keep it up and keep stereotyping, society will continue to be influenced by it. As mentioned before, these examples are only a few of hundreds of examples of how reality television stereotypes. Although viewers think reality television does not use stereotypes, based on all of these examples and many more, stereotyping of gender, self image, and race does exist in reality television, and is done because these shows know viewers will continue to watch, which leads to influencing the way society acts, thinks, and feels towards others.
Works Cited
Eisend, Martin, Jana Möller. “The Influence of TV Viewing on Consumers ' Body Images and Related Consumption Behavior” Marketing Letters Vol. 18 (2007). JSTOR. Web. 29 November 2012.

Ford, Thomas E. “Effects of Stereotypical Television Portrayals of African-Americans on Person Perception.” Social Psychology Quarterly Vol. 60 (1997). JSTOR. Web. 29 November 2012.

Holmes, Su. "Dreaming A Dream: Susan Boyle And Celebrity Culture." Velvet Light Trap: A Critical Journal Of Film & Television Vol. 65 (2010). Academic Search Premier. Web. 29 November 2012.

Orbe, Mark P. "Representations Of Race In Reality TV: Watch And Discuss." Critical Studies In Media Communication Vol. 25.4 (2008). Academic Search Premier. Web. 29 November 2012.

Poniewozik, James. "What 's Right With Reality TV." Time Vol. 175.7 (2010): 92-97 Academic Search Premier. Web. 29 November 2012.

Turner, Joel. “The Messenger Overwhelming the Message: Ideological Cues and Perceptions of Bias in Television News.” Political Behavior Vol. 29 (2007) JSTOR. Web. 29 November 2012.
The Free Dictionary, Farlex Inc., N.p., 2004. Web. 29 November 2012.

Self Reflection
I feel like a much better writer since I first entered this class. Honestly this was not an easy paper to write. In my opinion I have never been great at writing papers on that you needed to include sources because I am not great at finding multiple sources and quoting or referencing them all in one paper. I was pretty interested in the topic, which made it a little bit easier to do everything. I have never been a master at writing essays but I do think I did a little bit better with this one because it after writing two other essays in this course I think I’ve gained writing skills. More specifically, I had a lot of trouble with using all of my sources. I tried my best to include as many sources as I could though. It took a while to edit it and shorten it but I figured it out after a while. If I was able to go to the writing center I think that would be beneficial too. For the most part with my I don’t think my 3 most common errors were really issues because I proofread everything as much as I could. This helped me make sure that none of those errors were in my paper. The only thing that I might not be good at still is choosing the wrong word. Hopefully I choose the right word throughout this essay.

Cited: Poniewozik, James. "What 's Right With Reality TV." Time Vol. 175.7 (2010): 92-97 Academic Search Premier (2007) JSTOR. Web. 29 November 2012. The Free Dictionary, Farlex Inc., N.p., 2004. Web. 29 November 2012.