A confession...

I have a confession to make...

A secret indulgence that some have snorted in righteous disapproval over...

I watch reality shows...

I know, I know...I know all the arguments against it, but I can't seem to help myself...

I don't even watch tv, I disconnected from it quite some time ago and had not watched one since (well, ok...there was that time I fell of the wagon and watched a couple back in late summer --but it was only for a couple of months --I swear)...

But by a series of events totally beyond my own doing (seriously now), I happened to catch a flash and I took the bait --hook, line and sinker.

I'm a people watcher by nature and the reality show phenomenon seems to be a heightened level of the more mundane day to day exchanges I've been known to observe...human beings fascinate me.

Damn it man, I'm a junkie...

I'm both intrigued and disgusted simultaneously as I watch in utter amazement the elaborate, yet simple illusions and charades that are constructed and enacted...and watch as the weaver of such tales actually believes the story they have spun...and then further amazed that their story is taken as truth by others...

"Hello?!?  Don't you see what is going on?!?", I have sometimes been known to yell at the tv in utter frustration at the voluntary blindness of another (my equivalent to the men who jump up and scream at the box when the ump calls a strike when it was clearly a ball...or the ref calls a foul when there was no intentional tripping being executed by your favorite player in the green jersey...or the quarterback fumbles...or..you get my point)

I sit in guilty amusement and then a rising indignation over the dynamics I watch unfolding..."Can they really be that silly, petty, self-absorbed, and at times out-right viscious?", I wonder to myself as a group of women seem to attack another women...and of course, this is done in the most weak and cowardly of fashions --behind her back, when they think she is nowhere near.  I don't even ask myself "why" anymore, for I know the answers to such --it does not take much for a pack mentality to form when individuals in a group feel threatened by the quiet strength of another.

Why am I drawn to watch these interactions when I already know the why's as to what motivates human beings to do what they do?  Is it because I prefer my drama to be a vicarious experience now, as I've had enough first hand experience to last me this lifetime (and  probably the next one, too)?  Is there some new depth of  knowledge that I am seeking that may perhaps be found in the  land of  reality show drama?  Or is it just  a pointless pleasure that is beyond my logical mind?

Ah, confessions feel good.

I wonder if anyone else indulges in this sport...