MTV Calls that Gloating

MTV plans to expand, “The high school football practice made into drama was a huge success” says marketing exec Billy McMullen, “so much so, that we’ve gone back to the drawing board to reconnect with audiences reeling for even more made up drama.” If being a high school student wasn’t enough drama, how much more can kids take, especially if it’s made up? McMullen claims teens are interesting people. I would say our pimply predecessors are interesting people to exploit and torment; extra made up drama added to the vat, which includes vaporous, steamy, hot peer pressure, would create more anxiety already wrought with living in that young, overexposed and primly tapped skin. What is more: teenage obsolescence presented by MTV.

Throwing real feelings aside, MTV preys on the teenage market – the most freely spending and influenced age group, and their insecurities. Instead of “Daria”, “Beavis & Butthead” or the innocent mid-nineties dance show “Grind” we now view altered realities: “Sweet 16”, “Laguna Beach” or “Next”. Who actually would ask a first date such personal questions? Why are these shallow kids revered with a tiara and a billion dollars? MTV is commercializing our mind, feelings and youth. They have enacted a way to move and decide. “OMG, Jen, did you see that girl look at me, I mean who does she think she is?” And they intend for you to relive what you reviled. They make you writhe in pain and in laughter, “At least that wasn’t me.”

It’s not that I had a forgetful high school experience; it’s just that I don’t want it touched, manipulated and changed!

McMullen was more than proud to announce MTV’s planned, third installment of 2-a-days, “20-a-days”, “Yeah, it’s in our best interest to view the lives of these entangled, pubescent kids.” One press present pondered whether “20-a-days” was possible, physically and emotionally. “Totally. Physically, it’s very demanding; watching these spirited kids lose their footholds in the grass at only the 18th hour is amazing. You clearly haven’t been to Texas; they are even pushing for 1 more hour of practice. Just think what specimens they’re going to be in the NFL or NCAA or a bar fight they start and finish in jail, after hearing they’ll back-up at Jackson State, a Division III school that’s predominantly black and when they realize they’re white and they’re admission was based on a quota system – reverse Affirmative Action – we’ll be there to capture their pain. Emotionally, that is where our fun comes in. All this pressure, 20-a-days et al., will bring these teens to utter despair. Coping skills will be taken out through cell phone waves that end in the woman, coherently and repeatedly, speaking ‘Please hang up and dial the phone number again.’ Our viewers enjoy their roller coaster ride to rock bottom-ville. And when the camera crews roll out on the last shoot day in that suburban Tex-Arkana, Texas town and leave “their” story behind – I’m getting ahead of myself; I’m gloating."