By now, you’re probably aware that Our Lady of the Pancake Makeup, Kim Kardashian, has filed for divorce from her husband of seventy-two days. The news has left many members of the TV-watching and Internet-reading public feeling less than sympathetic, prompting a barrage of tirades alleging that Kim did not marry for love, that the whole wedding was a publicity stunt, and that the Kardashian krew is a klump of soul-less, disingenuous famewhores. To put it bluntly, people be trippin’. Of course, we here at DC don’t know what Kardashian’s true motives were (famewhorery seems plausible; so does Kim’s claim that she got caught up in wedding hoopla—hey, we’ve seen enough Bridezilla episodes to know it can happen to just about anyone who puts on a white dress). But assuming for a moment that it was all fake—gasp!—an interesting question emerges: why do we care? At this stage in the game, we all know that the word “reality” is used figuratively (almost ironically) in the phrase “reality TV,” right?
Knowing what we know now about Kris and Kim’s relationship, chances are we would still watch their over-the-top bedazzled affair. We do love juicy entertainment and sparkles, after all. When it comes to entertainment value, does it matter to you if reality TV is scripted, contrived, or overproduced?
Photo source: Wikimedia Commons
