Reality Shows

Recently I read on the news that a girl got a paralysis attack after she participated in a reality show and the judges scolded her so much that she could not take it. She got a paralysis attack.

Reality shows have been borrowed from the US television and there are indian version of American Idol, music talent shows. In these reality shows in America, the judges say very mean things to the contestants when they don ' t like their performance. That is in their culture and the Americans take it in their stride and do not take it to heart. Even then it is not correct to say such mean things, you can say " Ok I did not like it, you can go " . But they do.

When our Indians copied these reality shows, they copied it frame to frame including their attitude. In our Indian culture, we do not talk so mean in the face. It has been like that always. Take for instance Sa Re Ga Ma Pa show when Sonu Nigam used to host it. It used to be called Talent Hunt show. Unfortunately it is called a Reality show now.

Anyways even then some participants used to sing very bad. But neither the judges nor the host said any thing mean. They always used to encourage the contestants. Now see what happens in that show. The judges themselves fight and say mean things about other judges and other contestants belonging to another judge ' s group.

Another example is MTV Roadies. I hate that show. People say a lot of mean things. All of this is simply aping the west. Americans are not as sensitive and emotional as we Indians. So even if you say the most mean thing, they will not take it to heart. But we Indians are emotional and sensitive. And I would call it our STRENGTH. But as we are always accustomed to aping the west and our affinity to anything foreign, we have learnt to be so mean that we hurt the other person.

I spoke to some of the Americans here and they say Indians are aping America completely and we should not lose some things which define India and Indians. We should only take the good things from the west and not copy everything without thinking.