Column: Surviving the pseudo-reality of "Survivor"

By Thomas Winterhoff
First published on July 5, 2000
Copyright © Thomas Winterhoff


Television is a strange and temperamental master.

For all the quality programs that entertain, amuse, inform or enlighten us, there are at least an equal number of programs that appeal to our most base and superficial instincts.

One of those instincts is to indulge in TV’s guilty pleasures: the shameful little secrets that you would never admit to partaking of – not to anyone you work with, not a valued member of your family, not even the most liberal-minded priest in a soundproof confessional booth.

I have a pure and untainted soul for the most part (ya, whatever), but one arena where I occasionally fall from grace is the type of television programming that is so appallingly bad that you can’t help but watch. Almost against your will, your remote control trigger finger comes to a screeching halt in mid-air and you greedily soak up all the electronic sludge, all the while glancing over your shoulder for potential witnesses.

For a colleague of mine, his poison of choice is Xena: Princess Warrior. My sister tearfully confesses to faithfully watching Relic Hunter week in and week out. Although the mind-numbing blandness of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? has never caught my fancy, its cheesy theatrics continue to enthrall millions throughout North America each and every night.

Someone in our home besides myself (whose identity I have sworn to protect, under threat of her doing me a painful injury as I sleep) can’t miss a single episode of Making the Band – a pseudo-documentary about the next big, superstar boy band (that hasn’t even cut a record yet).

No one whom I know can claim total immunity from this descent into total, time-wasting pap, and I’m no more virtuous than anyone else. For a few misguided and embarrassing weeks, I fell victim to the highly questionable taste and transparent morals of Blind Date – a TV show based on the premise of “let’s select two egocentric sociopaths, send them racing towards each other at 100 km-h (fuelled by a few dozen umbrella-topped alcoholic drinks) and sit back with a jumbo-sized bag of microwave popcorn to watch the emotional carnage.”

Blind Date is hosted by a smarmy little pinhead who quite literally rubs his hands in poorly disguised glee when the borderline civility between the participants begins to break down. The couple usually ends up hurling expletives at each other, accompanied by strident “What the hell was I thinking, going out with you?” undertones – before parting with a mutual slamming of doors.

Granted, the couple has been paid a substantial amount of coin to bare their drunken souls and baboon-like courtship behaviour to the masses, but it still amounts to the social equivalent of a 30-car train wreck. It’s very sad – and makes you question your own morals for watching it – but you just can’t help it (for the first half-dozen episodes, at least).

If this show accurately portrays the state of dating today, I am eternally thankful for the faithful presence of my long-suffering wife – and I hereby solemnly swear never to divulge her Making the Band addiction to anyone. Her secret is safe with me.

Just when I had sworn off Blind Date forever, along came the latest entry in the parade of “reality-based” programming…Survivor.

The premise is deceptively simple: take a grab bag full of 16 contestants, split them up into two “tribes” and set them loose on a (somewhat) deserted tropical island. Supplied with some basic tools and first aid supplies, the tribes are left to make their own shelter, catch whatever slithering and still quivering prey they can for their dinner, and deal with the hodgepodge of diverse temperaments and attitudes of their fellow tribe members.

If you you’ve ever seen an episode, you’ll already know that once every three days the tribes are set against each other in a test of skill, leadership and team spirit, while competing in some variation of an obstacle course (or collectively staving off man-eating sharks with cocktail toothpicks).

To the winner may go a bit of survival gear – fire, a snorkel or a fishing spear. To the loser, nothing – or a summons to a meeting where each tribe member must scribble, with a stick of charcoal on a piece of torn sailcloth, the name of the one person in the tribe whom they wish to vote off the island. Needless to say, the participants get a tad testy (or sycophantic, depending on how they fancy their chances at the polls) in the hours preceding the vote.

The first person sent into purgatory was a sweet, older poet/musician. Initially, she was probably good for the morale of her tribe, but she ran into difficulty when her dulcet musings didn’t help put food on the ol’ banana leaf or contribute to her tribe’s quest for fire. She never stood a chance.

Never mind that a half-dozen camera crews dressed in Tommy Hilfiger T-shirts and L.L. Bean sandals nibble on catered hors d’oeuvres as they shadow each contestant’s every move. Never mind that the setting for the council meetings looks like something out of Raiders of the Lost Ark. This is television voyeurism at its absolute best.

In the weeks to come, depending on their proficiency at the game show challenges put to them, the tribes will either remain strong and united or descend into mere bickering rumps of their former glory. At some point, the remaining members of both tribes will be brought together to form a single group and then it’s everyone for themselves in the competitions that follow, until a single survivor remains.

That person, whoever he or she may be, will leave the island with a cool $1-million cheque for his or her trouble. Those who were voted off the island will share amongst themselves (in varying amounts) another $500,000.

It’s crass, it’s emotionally predatory and it’s incredibly manipulative – sort of like Lord of the Flies meets Gilligan’s Island. It also makes for irresistibly watchable television.

I’ve just arrived home, just in time to watch it, but for some curious reason my key no longer fits in lock on our front door. And what’s this? It looks like a tattered piece of sailcloth with a name scribbled on it in charcoal...

Column: A fine and noble bird? Not in my neighbourhood!

By Thomas Winterhoff
First published on July 23, 2003
Copyright © Thomas Winterhoff

Every neighbourhood has its own "signature" attributes – elements that make it stand out from other areas of the teeming metropolis and provide it with distinguishing charm and an individual flair.

For a community like Surrey on the Lower Mainland, it's the attractive arrangements of rusting car carcasses and broken beer bottles strewn with loving care across the front lawn. In Port Moody (where I spent much of my misspent youth), it was the distinctively jarring, yellow backdrop of piles of sulphur awaiting shipment overseas and the delicately pungent aromas of the mud flats of Burrard Inlet.

The neighbourhood where my wife and I now live, however, has none of that raw, industrial appeal that offers enchanting sensory stimulation to residents of those communities. In fact, the street where we reside is positively pastoral – some might say mundane – by comparison.

Instead of being dragged abruptly into the conscious realm by the dulcet tones of motorcyclists roaring up our street at the crack of dawn (as was often the case when we lived in East Vancouver), we now usually awaken to the gently melodic sounds of small songbirds who’ve made a home in the many flowering shrubs and trees that dot the neighbourhood.

When we first moved into our street some six years ago, the change of scenery and auditory atmosphere took quite a bit of time to get used to - say about 3.4 seconds. Nowadays, we can barely remember when whooping car alarms served as our morning wake-up call.

Lately, however, the memories of tough neighbourhoods gone by have come flooding back with a vengeance.

Our neighbour (who in all other respects is a fine, upstanding human being) maintains a very large and magnificent cherry tree on his property whose branches stretch amiably over the fence and into our yard. For most of the year, the tree is very pleasant to look at and provides welcome shade from the sun in the warmer months.

But at about this time every summer, it also attracts a seemingly endless parade of "undesirables" to the neighbourhood.

Like the avian version of Marlon Brando and his unkempt cohorts in the The Wild One, flocks of menacing-looking crows take up temporary residence in our block to feast on the luscious, bright red fruit as it ripens. Their threatening, gang-like presence dominates the street.

Our tiny songbird companions are left to cower nervously in the shadows and hope that the bullies will soon tire of their sport and move on (much like the residents of the towns that Brando and his ilk terrorized in that 1953 motorcycle movie classic).

But for weeks on end, their raucous cawing and unruly behaviour are the scourge of the neighbourhood. Knowing that no other species of bird will trifle with them (apart from the occasional eagle or ill-advised seagull), they spend their days lounging around and generally making a mess of the place. If the bird world had an equivalent of the beer-swilling, pot-bellied loser who steadfastly remains parked on the couch in his underwear, the crow in yonder cherry tree would be it.

Don’t get me wrong. Ravens and crows have a cherished place in West Coast native mythology and Western literature (to wit, Edgar Allan Poe). I suppose that the species also forms an ecologically important component of the local bird population.

But for the love of Pete, they can also be insufferable, annoying boors when they want to be.

At no time is this unsavoury side of their nature most evident than mid-July, when the juicy, vibrantly coloured cherries are just past their peak. I suspect that the summer sun begins to ferment the juice in the latter days of the season and turn it into a mildly intoxicating brew, because the crows begin to get even more surly than usual – even amongst themselves.

Remember that guy in the beer parlour who would toss back way too many glasses of cheap draft beer in the rush to get drunk before closing time? (Again, remnants of my misspent youth). He'd then greet every figure that would come within blurry eyeshot with a gruffly mumbled, "Wadya lookin' at, punk?"

You get the picture. It's no wonder the robins and sparrows have been lying low these days.

But this morning, for the first time in what seems like an eternity, there was an eerie silence outside our window when we woke up. Then, almost imperceptibly, the tentative calls of one small bird broke the silence. A minute later, he was joined by another – and then another.

Soon the air was filled with the sound of birdsong, with nary a caw to be heard. Brando and his band of thugs had apparently moved on – and none too soon. I was beginning to long for the sound of whooping car alarms just to drown out their incessant cries.

Oh, well. There’s always next year.