KARDASHIANS, PAWN STARS, AMERICAN PICKERS...WHO CARES? WE ALL DO!

February 7, 2013

Kardashians, Pawn Stars, American Pickers…who cares? We all do!

Why do I care what happens to the Kardashians? What’s so important about American Idol? How does it affect me if Mike and Frank find the honey pot on American Pickers? Is it going to make my life any better to know that Rick Harrison from Pawn Stars got a great deal on a Pinocchio doll? What about Cajun Pawn Stars? Will we all sleep better at night knowing that they bought another gun from someone in The Big Easy?

These questions popped into my mind as I tuned in to History International and saw a show called Cash Cowboys, which is essentially the same premise as American Pickers except that these pickers are guys in the west who wear cowboy clothes that went out of style twenty years ago. There’s no point in elaborating on Cash Cowboys. It’s almost exactly like American Pickers except it doesn’t have a tattooed lady named Danielle. What I find significant about the show is that it prompted me to ask, “Why do I care about any of this stuff?”

As their names suggest, the History Channel and History International should feature programming that involves history…not alligator hunting in the swamps, ax men, people who drive 18 wheelers on icy roads, guys who restore dilapidated items, men who count cars or pawn shops. But that’s the voice of a history purist…someone who wants to see interesting documentaries about Ancient Rome, Ancient Greece, the Dark Ages, Genghis Khan, even Fatty Arbuckle. I want to watch original programming like last year’s Hatfields & McCoys. Alas, it is not to be for two main reasons: original programming in the form of a mini-series is expensive to produce and documentaries about the past don’t yield the kind of ratings that attract advertisers.

So the history purist faces a conundrum. Does he/she ignore the fluff of “reality” shows in order to hold out for more informative programming? Or does he/she embrace the “reality” trend? I submit that the purist should take the latter course. Why? Because reality is history.

What is that you say? Reality is history? How can Kim Kardashian’s tumultuous love life be history in any way whatsoever? To address that line of inquiry, I suggest you look at the Great Man Theory of History (GMTH). The GMTH asserts that the best way to understand a particular culture is to study the great men (and women) who defined that society. In our day and age, the “great” men and women are the entertainers. Now before you grab your pitchforks and run me out of the village, let me explain! I’m not saying that the Kim Kardashians of the world are great, I’m saying that they have the power to influence as many people as a medieval king because they command our movie screens, radio airwaves, television screens and even our blogs (like this one…sadly). We pay billions of dollars to watch these people entertain us. We adopt their fashions, their styles, their mannerisms, their beliefs. They both define our culture and reflect it.

When historians hundreds of years from now want to learn about us in the 21^st Century, they will most certainly examine our reality shows. How does that make you feel?