Last night, The Bachelorette‘s controversial Wes Hayden returned, reincarnated as The Bachelor‘s Rozlyn Papa. Papa was revealed as the scandalous bachelorette who was in cahoots (allegedly non-sexual but nonetheless deemed “inappropriate”) with one of the show’s producers. The 28-year-old coquette is an example of a female contestant who’s willing to play the publicity-hungry game on the ABC matchmaking franchise–only she just happened to get nipped in the bud from the start. No more rose petals for you!
In a larger context, Papa joins an ever-growing list of reality TV crashers–the Balloon Boy couple, the White House security breaching Salahi’s, Survivor‘s Russell Hantz, and ewww, Spencer Pratt and Heidi Montag, and even more ewww, Tila Tequila–who are trying to snag their 15 minutes and bank on their notoriety.
Almost instinctively and with immediacy, we vilify them, yet at the same time, we stay glued to the tube and obsess over their sensationalistic ways to make a buck and climb to D-list status. (And let’s not forget our attentiveness pays their bills). For those of us who’ve got their finger on the zeitgeist, reality TV shows like The Bachelor are a cultural embarrassment, a dumbing-down of the arts and entertainment. But then there are others of us that might see this phenomenon with a silver lining–a mass democratization of entertainment and celebritydom. And who the hell likes elitists?
So with the exception of the dangerous and illegal antics of the Balloon Boy parents and the Salahi’s, are the more generic reality TV crashers doing a disservice to the annals of pop culturedom and to us as a society? If they’re entertaining us and bringing in ratings for the networks, is there something really wrong with them cashing in for #1 (even if they are unskilled, talentless, brainless, and seemingly unconscionable freakazoids)?