But I Love Basketball Wives (Part II)

"My faux shame is fake.  These 'itches are making me RICH!  Lawd, I just have so much money to count...SMDH...."

~Shaunie O'Neal

Yeah.  I'm a total effin hypocrite.  I hate scripted drama between black women, but I love the real stuff!  It's shameful, I know...

Maybe it's the reminder that my life isn't all THAT jacked up.  Maybe it's cause sometimes, when I do something messed up, I need to know that people are capable of doing worse stuff than me.  Or maybe, I just like judging real people more than fake characters.

Sadly, the latter is probably the most true.  Oh well.

If I'm honest with myself, I can't really decide what makes a worst impression of black people--this or the God-awful Single Ladies.

Think about it:

The scripted show gives everyone an excuse to think that few black people are capable of making good film and television, and put us all in the Tyler Perry Coon category.  But at the end of the day, you can look at the characters and a rational person will think, "these are characters and not fully indicative of black hoes women."

And then you watch Basketball Wives (or RHOA) and most rational people think, "these are real women.  They behave worse than the black chicks on Single Ladies.  These people have a serious problem.  Also how do they walk in high heels with butts that big?  Isn't their center of gravity off?"

So, even if you can excuse the former, the latter show gives some credence to the "black women are crazy" mantra so many people want to hold on to.  And tragically, through my viewership, I support such shows continuing.  

Yeah--normally I take really hard stances on sh*t like that.  I haven't turned on BET in over a year, EXCEPT when they air positive things--I figure adding my viewing to their Neilsen Share will help aid in more positive programming replacing the trash I don't watch.  (Hasn't worked so far, but I'm still trying).

But VH1, part of the Viacom conglomerate which owns BET, MTV, and CMT, is only a part of the problem.  As am I, if I keep watching.

Maybe I'll go back to watching it bootleg on Megavideo the day after it airs.  I can feed my dirty habits without helping to corrupt the rest of the world...

Le Sigh.  I love my trashy reality TV.  I'm a coon.  Go find a copy of DuBois while I brace myself.