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Dr. Jim Taylor: The Sahalis and the Great Gatsby
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Let me apologize in advance; I just can\'t help myself. The
more I read about reality TV, the more it just gets under my skin and
the less control I have over writing about it.
Reality TV is my whipping boy. It exemplifies and makes admirable
some of the worst values that exist in our culture, running the gamut
of the Seven Deadly Sins and adding plenty more to the list. It also
encourages the most shameful behavior. As New York Times columnist
Frank Rich suggests, reality-TV aspirants are victims of a culture
that encourages people to grasp for the brass ring of fame and fortune
without regard for the consequences of their actions.
Instead of honesty and hard work, there is deception and provocative
attention. Rather than patience, there is imprudence and risk. Fame
and fortune at any cost is the rule. What used to be considered
shameful and humiliating behavior is now considered chutzpah and
dogged determination. Golly gee, all of those reality-TV contestants
are really epitomes of the indominable American spirit!
Current events in the asylum known as reality TV (which is so far
from actual reality that the use of the phrase should be banned) have
set me off again, so here\'s another reality TV rant.
Recently, we were introduced to Michaele and Tareq Salahi, a
seemingly upstanding Virginia couple who allegedly (innocent until
proven guilty in the court of media opinion) crashed an official White
House state dinner for what appears to be an effort to help the wife
land a part on \The Real Housewives of DC,\ a new reality-TV spinoff
of the highly successful franchise on the Bravo television network.
What is driving such outrageous behavior? For many reality-TV
contestants, the motivation is money. But that doesn\'t appear to
explain the possibly criminal actions of the Salahis gaining entry to
the White House dinner uninvited. By all accounts, they are a
well-to-do couple (though his family\'s wine business went bankrupt in
2007 and there are reports of up to 15 civil suits filed against
them). So what was behind their chicanery?
According to her profile on Wikipedia, Mrs. Salahi was shall we say
creative about her professional accomplishments (telling people that
she had been a Washington Redskins cheerleader and a fashion model,
all evidence to the contrary). Mr. Salahi, in turn, appears to have
ridden the successful coattails of his father, who founded an
award-winning winery, and enjoyed living the high life of the social
elite in Virginia\'s horse country.
In reading about this couple, two words struck me: nouveau riche.
From what I\'ve gathered, they possess the least admirable qualities
of that social group: vanity, narcissism, and entitlement. Only in
possession of those attributes could a couple engage in such a fraud
as occurred at the White House without any sense of guilt or
contrition. To the contrary, despite the fact that their stated
explanation is at odds with all actual accounts of the events that
night, they continue to declare their innocence. Plus, and here is
real chutzpah, reports indicate that the couple is trying milk their
time in the spotlight for all its worth (which, in our scandal-hungry
culture, is a great deal) by asking for hundreds of thousands of
dollars for interviews (which they also emphatically deny).
The Salahis harkened me back to a college modern American literature
class I took and my reading of the Great Gatsby. Maybe they are no
different from its titular character, Jay Gatsby, one of literature\'s
most famous social climbers. Having gained his wealth through
misbegotten means (I\'m not suggesting that the Salahis did), Gatsby
gazed jealously at East Egg and, despite his wealth, wanted nothing
more than to be accepted by the old money across the bay. Perhaps the
only difference between the Salahis and Jay Gatsby is that he didn\'t
have reality TV or Facebook.
How much farther will people go to gain their 15 minutes of fame? I
don\'t think that we have even begun to plumb the depths of depravity
to which people will lower themselves in the name of this Warholian
American Dream. I can only hope that all of these wannabes quickly
learn that, like Oz, this bizarro version of the American Dream is, as
Dorothy learned, just a vivid nightmare from which they will all wake
up back in Kansas (metaphorically speaking, of course, and no offense
to Kansas).
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