What is popular? Ask 100 people get 100 different responses. Try it now. Go ask the first person you see and then ask another. Bet you get two different answers. Popular depends on many things from age, taste, upbringing, environment, and more. What’s popular to an adult most certainly isn’t going to be popular to a 8-year old girl; except for Sesame Street. This list will not be a preachy, right-wing, ‘save the children’ list full of all things scandalous like bared elbows on MTV. No. Fundamentally there is nothing wrong with MTV; just some of their shows. Take it with a grain of salt and try to laugh. Here are the top 10 pop culture evils of 2011.
10) American Idol is still on the air. Why is this only #10 and not higher? Because the show is fading fast into the twilight of its once (in)famous career. No show has done more to unjustly teach the youths of society that instant gratification and fame can come without having any discernible talent whatsoever than American Idol. This is not a talent competition, it is a popularity contest. If it were a talent competition nobody would ever win it. This show is case-in-point proof positive that what pre-teens like is generally rubbish. What would Guns N’ Roses, circa 1988, think of this? This show is all lipstick and smiles and no soul. Get rid of it now so we can return to a time when getting famous, through singing, actually meant that you had to know how to sing.
9) MTV’s 16 and Pregnant & Teen Mom. I am a firm believer that violent video games or song lyrics do not cause children to do violent acts. I also realize that kids do not emulate everything they see; as some extremists tend to believe. However, shows like these do nothing but add to the already-full-line-up-of-get-famous-quick shows clogging our airwaves like cholesterol for the eyes. If a show like 16 and Pregnant was on in 1989 it would be the exception which shows the harsh reality of babies having babies. Today though, every other show is showcasing somebody who did nothing to earn their fame other than be stupid. Kids want to get pregnant so they can be on this show. In 1989, or even 1999, this show would have done what it intended to do – scare kids enough that they use birth control and be safer.
8) YouTube-created successes. Quick, what is the dumbest thing you’ve seen this decade? How did I know you would say Chocolate Rain? YouTube is a wonderful addition to the world. Where else can I see old 80s commercials featuring The Kool-Aid Man and GI Joe? Unfortunately this medium is overrun with stupidity. Chocolate Rain, Rebecca Black, people dancing with their hands, and all of your annoying and embarrassing babies…enough! Go back to working at The Gap where you belong.
7) Everything is marketed towards pre-teen girls. Is there a more annoying segment of the population than 12-year-old girls? Didn’t think so. Throughout recent history look at what they have made popular – New Kids On The Block, NSYNC, Backstreet Boys, Barney, High School Musical, Glee. It’s fine to market towards this demographic but when everything is aimed at them it is time to say enough is enough.
6) Cop, lawyer, and doctor television shows. These are the vanilla, bland, repetitive, vanilla, bland, repetitive types of shows that appeal to those with attention spans of your average high school drop out. These shows wore out their welcome decades ago. Why is it that they just keep multiplying like religious-right (nice oxymoron if there ever was one) conservative rabbits? These shows are the easiest to create because they don’t need writers, they just need somebody with a dvd of Cagney and Lacey or St. Elsewhere or LA Law. If those are unavailable they can try ripping of the 90s version of those shows – NYPD Blue, E.R., or Law and Order. Bon Jovi was right when they said “It’s all the same. Only the names will change.” Each fall the networks churn out more for the masses. It’s sad that make-you-think shows like LOST come around but once in a generation but there are currently 78 NCIS’s airing tonight.
5) Hip hop is no longer rap. Rap used to be about something. It used to start revolutions. It used to make a statement. It used to evoke change. Now it evokes nothing. It’s not even about sex anymore. It’s just a pointless medium that has run its course and needs a Nirvana-esqe kick in the backside to bring it back to its once glory days. Why do they settle for mediocracy? Eminem keeps the torch burning. So do a small handful of others but most of it is tissue music (transparent, disposable, and indistinguishable from its many clones). Hip hop has become the cop, lawyer, and doctor show of music. Where’s N.W.A. when we need them?
4) Political correctness. Everything is so tame, lame, and without blame that there is no flavor. Janet Jackson shouldn’t have apologized for her breast. Howard Stern shouldn’t be censored. Jackass should be a permanent fixture on MTV as a reminder of what not to do but what to enjoy watching. When a minority of people (not talking race here, talking sheer numbers) ruin it for the majority it is time to look in the mirror. Everybody is afraid of their shadow and their neighbor’s lawyer (who is probably getting a new TV show this fall). We’ve removed all traces and possibilities of originality or freedom of speech/expression through the over-sanitizing of everything!!! Just once let us see a boob, here the f-word, allow a difference of opinion. The world has been here for a few billion years. A nipple won’t stop it.
3) Movie remakes/movies made from classic TV shows. Here is your task for the day. You need to find one, just ONE movie remake/movie made from a TV show that comes anywhere near being as good as the original. Go. And True Grit doesn’t count. Why? Because it is the exception to prove the rule. Whoever green-lighted remakes of The Karate Kid, Clash of the Titans, or The Pink Panther should be placed inside an Iron Maiden. The even more unforgivable sin is those who attempt to destroy our childhoods by making movies like Garfield, The Smurfs, GI Joe, The Flintstones, Speed Racer, Fat Albert, Dukes of Hazzard, or Scooby Doo. There need to be police lined up outside these theaters and they need to arrest every single person who pays money to see them. This is not entertainment it is exploitation.
2) Everybody is a tough guy. Remember when the lines between good and evil were distinguishable? Take pro wrestling for example. Good guy – Hulk Hogan. Bad guy – Roddy Piper. Good guys were good. They were kind and lead by example. They didn’t sound like thugs or embarrassing fools. They were the exact opposite of bad guys. Bad guys were delinquents. They did bad things. They were people that you did not want to be like. Nowadays everybody has to be tough. It has blurred the lines between good and evil to the point that the lines do not exist. This makes wrestling or certain shows/movies utterly boring. We no longer have a hero to root for. Everybody looks the same, everybody says the same thing, and nobody smiles. It’s all rough, tough, dark. Yawn.
1) There are no rockstars. A rockstar is not just somebody who plays rock and roll. A rockstar is somebody who has an original personality, a refreshing attitude, talent, charisma, the ability to make you want to be like them. Here are some rockstars from the past few decades – Bruce Springsteen, Arnold Schwarzenegger (from the 80s), Motley Crue, Eddie Murphy (circa early 80s), Crockett and Tubbs, Magnum P.I., Madonna (80s), J.R. Ewing, Archie Bunker, Ozzy, KISS, Run DMC. Get the idea? Who’s the closest we have today? Is it Charlie Sheen or The Situation? Nobody cares. They are replaceable. How about Justin Bieber? Child please. Embarrassing. Everybody shies away from the rockstar mentality today. Everybody is built for the now and by doing so they sacrifice tomorrow. Rockstars are not built overnight. It takes time. Want more rockstars? Steve McQueen. James Dean. Elvis. Sorry, but Josh Duhamel, Taylor Lautner, The Black Eyed Peas, Taylor Swift, Simon Cowell, and the cast of Glee are most definitely not rockstars. Can somebody please wake up John Wayne. We need him.