Reality can be hard to watch, and too much for some to bear

It leaves a bad taste when the faults of a society are harshly reflected back at us on the television screen, writes Eilis O'Hanlon

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Chinese money may yet save the world economy. Mainly because they're the only ones who have any of it to spare right now.

But can Chinese values save us from ourselves in other ways too?

The Chinese State Administration of Film, Television and Radio -- a bit like the RTE Authority with added teeth -- has struck the first blow by banning a TV show called Super Girl which regularly attracted 400 million viewers tuning in to watch would-be pop stars competing against one another for a shot at fame.

The ostensible reason for the ban was that the programme's grand final exceeded the two-hour limit imposed on TV shows by law. The underlying rationale was official China's desire to push back the advance of "vulgar" entertainment shows at the expense of more serious broadcasting. That the show allowed people at home to freely cast their votes probably didn't help either. That sort of dangerous nonsense might catch on.

It doesn't take Chairman Mao, though, to wonder if the Chinese might be on to something.

Popular entertainment reflects the society which watches it. In Somalia in recent days, the winner of a radio competition for children was awarded an AK-47 assault rifle and a collection of Islamic books; a runner-up got an RPG and a couple of hand grenades.

It's a long way from a Crackerjack pencil, but then Somalia isn't exactly South Dublin.

In this part of the world, meanwhile, we have The All-Ireland Talent Show, which seems to have been specially designed to highlight the fact there isn't enough talent to go round, and Celebrity Bainisteoir, RTE's attempt to pretend it's fulfilling a public service remit by producing a programme with an Irish word in the title.

You get the TV you deserve, but it still leaves a bad taste in the mouth when the faults of a society are reflected back so harshly on screen.

That much was obvious last week after the appearance of 54-year-old Welsh widow Ceri Rees on The X Factor auditions, where she was rejected for the fourth time for (and there's no point sweetening the pill) singing appallingly.

Personally, I've stopped watching The X Factor this year. Without Simon Cowell, what's the point? Therefore, I had to head to YouTube to find out what all the fuss was about. And I'll admit it, I laughed too, despite myself -- but it was excruciatingly nasty and mean-spirited stuff, and there was a whole eight minutes of it. They even let Ceri up to sing a second song after she messed up the first one, as if they hadn't yet extracted the maximum humiliation out of her.

Her disappointment at being rejected was painful to watch. Even diehard X Factor fans were feeling shamefaced at being dragged by association into this bullying, especially when friends of Ceri revealed afterwards that the poor woman was hounded for months by TV producers, desperate for her to return so that they could get a cheap laugh at her expense. Then again, I was one of nearly 200,000 viewers who have so far viewed the same clip on YouTube, and there were millions more tuning in on the night -- so what does that say about a society which gets its kicks by mocking the vulnerable?

There's been a lot of anguished debate during the week about how reality television programmes exploits those with mental health issues, which is a little presumptuous. There's no evidence that Ceri Rees is anything other than a socially naive woman who is deluded about her singing ability.

But it's hardly encouraging that a society not only enjoys humiliating the weak as a spectacle, but seems to have no end to its appetite for more of the same.

From The Only Way is Essex through Jersey Shore and Toddlers and Tiaras to Made in Chelsea, the schedules have become like some extended exercise in how far you can hold fame-hungry fools up to ridicule before they realise the joke has been on them and rebel against their tormentors.

Reality TV was a bit of fun when it started. The innocent early days of Big Brother. The surreal madness that was The Osbournes. Voyeurism has its place.

But the law of diminishing returns was such that audiences quickly grew jaded and demanded more extreme thrills. Or maybe they didn't and the networks gave it to them anyway, for fear viewers would lose interest if the ante wasn't continually raised.

Either way, the end result was watching Kerry Katona yelling unpleasantly at her young children, or a show like the planned series following 51-year-old Lost star Doug Hutchinson and his third wife, Courtney, to whom he was married in Las Vegas last year when she was only 16.

"Nothing is off limits," producers promised after signing the contract for exclusive access to the couple's life, a non-too-appetising prospect since the girl herself has already given interviews describing her husband as a "tiger in bed".

The whole enterprise feels so sleazy that you can't help feeling viewers should have to sign some sort of register before watching.

US show The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills has actually managed to notch up its first suicide to coincide with the second series. Russell Armstrong's disintegrating relationship with his wife Taylor was expected to play a major role in the latest run. Faced with being "crucified" on air, as he described it to family, Russell hanged himself in his garage.

He was clearly a troubled man, plagued with money problems and a failing marriage; Taylor has since revealed a history of domestic abuse too. But the added burden of public exposure can easily tip a fragile mind over the edge.

'It's hardly encouraging that a society not only enjoys humiliating the weak as a spectacle, but seems to have no end to its appetite for more of the same'

In China, they're replacing Super Girl with "shows that promote moral ethics and public safety, and provide practical information for housework".

Sounds thrilling. Given a choice, most of us would prefer to take our chances with trash. But it's not a bad rule of thumb that, once people start dying in the cause of 50 minutes plus ads of primetime entertainment, things may just possibly have gone a smidgen too far.

Originally published in