Reality TV Is Good For You
Decoding the rumors and nastiness about reality television watchers
A man in women’s business? Just another Friday.
Last week I saw a TikTok of someone’s husband deciding that the Real Housewives franchise was maybe, slightly watchable. “If they marketed Real Housewives like the NFL markets the NFL…maybe guys would watch it...” While the comments eagerly welcomed this male validation, I felt strongly that maybe this show wasn’t for him. I am very protective of The Real Housewives, and reality television in general. What happens so often with women on television, especially in reality television, is that they get reduced to two words: Stupid or crazy. Think Skyler White. Her husband was making crystal meth but somehow she was the villain? It’s not that I don’t think this TikToker would enjoy watching, I just don’t know if he could really appreciate the show in the way it’s target audience does. While many see reality TV as a “trashy” thing to “turn your mind off” to, I see complex and layered interpersonal interactions. In other words, it’s not for you.
Reality television has long been villainized. It’s crime? Showcasing what people will do when a camera is shoved in their face. The lowbrow categorization of reality shows that center women does not surprise me. In fact, I wrote my senior thesis on this exact topic, so I do feel like I have a leg to stand on in this conversation.1
Not all reality shows are created equal. There are competitions, social experiments, ISO-love, docu-style, and soaps. The Real Housewives Franchise falls under the final two categories. I would argue earlier seasons of RH were more “docu” forward and as it has evolved over the years become a soap style reality show. Combining the style, soap, with the title, housewives, makes for an interesting analysis of why the franchise is so universally hated. Soap Operas started as radio shows and morphed into serial television in the early 1950s. These shows became defined by their audience: Housewives.2
Who were the housewives? A housewife was a good and successful woman because she stayed home with her children, cooked and cleaned, and spent only her husbands money. Today’s housewife? A woman who is looked down upon because she stays home with her children, cooks and cleans, and spends her husband’s money.3
Bravo’s Housewives are met with similar judgements—they’re dramatic, stupid, gold-digging, lazy, and classless. In true 2010 fashion, feigning horror about what women choose to spend their time doing, Marie Clare published an article about The Real Housewives with the byline “Why do we celebrate and reward these shallow, dumb, petty people?”4 The author shared her thoughts on the franchise:
“Before I even get started today, let me say that I know very little about the Real Housewives franchise on Bravo. I did not watch the first episode of the new season — Real Housewives of Atlanta — which apparently aired last night. I've barely seen any of the show's iterations, beyond a brief glimpse here and there, on the closed-circuit TVs at my gym. Those short viewings were enough to leave me appalled.”
Despite the article reeking of Pick-Me-osis,5 it got at my biggest pet peeve: People who don’t consume reality television but who choose to discuss it. “I don’t really watch trashy reality TV, but…” is a conversation I find myself having constantly. Oh you don’t watch reality TV? Should we throw a party? Should we invite Bella Hadid?6 When it comes to reality television, everyone is suddenly an expert on how these ladies should behave.
My passion for “trashy” television started at a young age. One of my fondest memories is convincing my mom to start The Bachelor with me on a school night and we stayed up until 2am binging Ben Higgins’ season. I still remember the glow of the tv, when she turned the big light off, hissing at us as we scampered out of our living room. We carefully tiptoed to bed, the light of the bathroom guiding our way, as we whispered that we thought Jojo was our favorite. It was a special moment between the two of us, another night in our long history of reality television consumption, that grew our appreciation of each other and of our lives.
The Bachelor was one of many franchises we devoted time to. I’ll never forget Ben Higgins telling two separate women he loved them…insane.7 Before “final roses” was the Runway, where I relished in watching up-and-coming designers race to finish unconventional challenges. Tim Gunn was my hero and Heidi Klum complimented my outfit when I met her.8 Survivor, What Not To Wear, and Dance Moms were on the schedule as well. We were booked and busy.
After moving home, I requested we finally dive deep into the one franchise we had never seen, The Real Housewives. For two frequent flyers of Bravo and TLC, it shocked many that we hadn’t seen it yet. My mom thought too highly of herself to watch “these women”9 and up until now I had gotten my housewife fix at the nail salon. Though she resisted, I knew how to get to her: Mormons. Nothing my mom loves more than screaming, “It’s a cult!” at our television.
We started The Real Housewives Of Salt Lake City during winter break, but didn’t make it past the first few episodes. I watched those episodes again when I got back to school, but never got beyond the Shah Chalet birthday party debacle. When I finally returned home and started the series with my mom again, I had seen Mary Cosby and Jen Shah duke it out over “hospital smell” 3 or 4 times. I hoped the season could progress beyond this.
Over the last four months, my mother and I have stuck to a routine. 1 episode a night, maybe 2 if it was really good, and I told her she couldn’t state the obvious during the commercial breaks (It’s a cult! Lisa Barlow is a narcissist! Mary Cosby is a predator! Yes mother, I would say, I know).
But more than that, my mom and I have found ourselves pausing the show and getting sidetracked by our own experiences that we see mirrored in the show. Through drunken arguments and the fastest conflict resolutions you have ever seen, at its core the ladies of Salt Lake reflected our lives, and the lives of the people around us. The core of a lot of their arguments were not that out of touch—feeling stabbed in the back by friends who gossip about you is not crazy. Neither is feeling left out, disrespected, or insulted. These women put real and painful interpersonal problems on blast, and at times handle it well (given the circumstances). I mean, imagine a camera in your face when you were trying to do conflict resolution with your best friend…not so easy, huh?
I think it’s important to establish that I don’t think this is a cast of good people. One of them is literally in prison for defrauding elderly people. But besides the occasional Jen Shah, the out of touch women are not that wrong about their feelings. I want to make it clear, this show is not for those seeking moralistic guidance by any means. But then again, why would we look to millionaires for moral guidance? Why is there such a demand for these women to be role models? These women are judged so harshly when their job is to make entertaining television. No one watches football because you think the players are really good dudes. Yet when it comes to reality television, there are constant value judgements of these women. Much like actors who make millions of dollars, the Housewives are doing a job. The job just so happens to be filming their lives, the good and the bad. I don’t look up to these women, but I do find them relatable. Sue me!
If anything, their fame is a cautionary tale. No matter how much money, fame, or power they have, they are still unsatisfied with their lives.
Lisa Barlow could have all the money in the world, but does she feel like her friends like her?
Friendships are not supposed to be material or transactional, yet on this show they are used as capital.10 You see it in the side friends who vie for screen time and manufacture drama to get fully fleshed out storylines. Monica is the perfect example of when it becomes a grey area: Yes it’s a job, but the connections the women make with each other aren’t fake. When they feel betrayed, they get explosive. I would too if I found out my friends were reposting tweets about me.11
Even though the subject matter of their fights ($60,000 rings, badmouthing each other on podcasts, and of course hospital smell) are out of touch, the emotions and feelings of betrayal, disappointment, and hurt behind the arguments are the same as anyone else’s. As my mother and I watched the show together, we saw ourselves behind the ski-goggle-sunglasses. These ladies were expressing their real, human emotions with one another. Sure they were screaming and calling each other grandfather fuckers (although rude is not inaccurate), but the rage they felt was something I think we all have had before. It just probably hasn’t been in a bar in full Trixie Mattel drag.
Beyond serious issues with the franchise, the heartbreak, manipulation, tears, and tough conversations these women have with each other end up showcasing an honest human experience. Reality, one might say.
As Whitney Rose unpacked her childhood trauma, we cried for her like she was someone we knew. When the women worked through their relationship with Jen, my mom discussed the emotional abuse she had taken from previous bosses and colleagues, relating to their experiences with Jen. The moment that sparked this whole realization though, was when Jen poured champagne on Angie K’s head. My mom and I gasped and looked at each other, shouting “whipped cream!” in unison.
Long story short, a friend from middle school and I had gotten into an argument that ended with whipped cream in our hair and me being entirely iced out of a birthday camping trip. What should have been a silly and fun activity, morphed into an awful fight that left me confused and alone in the woods (literally—I had to sleep in a tent alone to serve my time). When I saw the champagne on Angie K’s fresh blowout (the horror!), my own story poured out of me.
What was supposed to be a two episode night turned into an hour long conversation with my mom about what that friendship had been like for me. It was one moment in a ten year long friendship that always ended in tears. Why, I asked myself, did I stay friends with her for that long? It’s the same question my mother screams at the TV every night. But it’s hard to find the answer. It’s more than just history. I look at the fallout of Meredith and Lisa and find myself oscillating between whose side I’m on. Neither is fully in the right and neither is fully in the wrong. When I ended my own friendship, it shocked a lot of people, my mom included. But after watching three seasons of the show, she finally saw just how bad it can be from the inside. The same reason why Heather covered for Jen giving her a black eye is the same reason so many of us stay in these kinds of friendships. It’s hard to part with what we know. It’s hard to break cycles of manipulation. Yet somehow, as we sat and watched the Real Housewives, my situation no longer felt unique. If anything, I felt a bit more normal.
Similarly, when Jack Barlow got ready to go on his mission, I was able to ask my mom about when I went to college. Lisa opened up to the women about how scared she is for him to leave, “Once he goes he’s never coming back.” It was one of the rare moments that everything went quiet on the show, and the ladies rallied behind Lisa. Questions I probably wouldn’t have asked my mom felt okay to broach. “Did you cry when you got home after dropping me off?” I teased, but she answered honestly, finally relating to Lisa, a housewife she often disliked. My mom told me she cried, but also knew how important my sister and I leaving the nest was. “I’m lucky though,” she said to me, “you came back!” This moment solidified for me the importance of reality television. It’s more than just a show to turn your mind off to—there are authentic moments that help us understand ourselves and how we interact with other people.
We have all had a Lisa Barlow hot mic moment, where a friend just pushes you to the edge. Luckily, though, the majority of us aren’t mic’ed at all hours of the day. But this show has illustrated, intentionally or not, that friendship is complicated, messy, and yes, at times nasty. I think the housewives display the overwhelming nature of female friendships. When you are more vulnerable, you open yourself up for hurt much faster than if you keep a relationship surface level. But vulnerability encourages connection. That’s why the ones we are closest to can sometimes hurt us the most.
For years I felt a tad ashamed about my television watching habits (thanks mostly to judgy and uncultured parents of my peers), but what I think people often misunderstand is that television is a cultural artifact no different from art of books. TV sparks conversation, expands minds, and has the power to shift politics across the globe. A favorite professor (and now fellow sub stacker,
), made me feel seen from the first day I walked into History of Television, an 8am I never missed. Her class demonstrated how impactful television is from a historical standpoint, and more than that, Thamy validated my love for and appreciation of reality television.You are not a better person for choosing Succession over The Kardashians or Game of Thrones over Vanderpump Rules. If you watched both (like those as enlightened as me), you would see the glaring similarities: Messy family dynamics, traitorous friends, more money than I know what to do with, and even incest (kind of).12 It takes a true connoisseur of Bravo, E!, and Lifetime to understand the nuances and valuable interactions that are baked into 45 minutes of drink throwing and backstabbing. Sure it can be good for “turning your brain off,” but more than that reality television shows us what we’re afraid to see, reality.
I won’t bore with details, but if you’re curious about how women have historically been represented in television, read my thesis !!!
Lynn Spigel, Make Room for TV: Television and the Family Ideal in Postwar America, (Chicago, IL: Univ. of Chicago Press, 2010).
Nancy A. Walker, Shaping Our Mothers' World: American Women's Magazines, (Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi, 2000).
A disease in which women try so hard to get men to perceive their goodness, they disparage women at any cost. See also “beer girls” and “one of the guys.” Peace be with y’all!
There are somethings you never forget. This was one of them!
Zelda Lore includes my stint (3 minutes) on a reality show called Seriously Funny Kids, hosted by Heidi Klum. I would include a clip but the only place I have found it is on my roommates phone (she bought it on iTunes to watch when she was having a hard day).
Says the woman who watched 6 episodes of the bachelor with her 13 yo in one night…very Marie Clare article of her…
The rise and fall of Angie H. as well as of Monica demonstrates this perfectly.
I do think that Monica was treated unfairly during the reunion—she wasn’t wrong that the account was targeted at Jen. However, she should have taken full accountability for the hurt she did cause the women.
Mary Cosby is married to her step-grandfather. Which isn’t incest, but it is fucking weird.
the spigel citation 🙂↕️