Reader Rachel asks
Today I’m consumed with the question: even though it’s so staged, corny and shameless that it causes me actual physical pain, why do I keep watching The Bachelor?
The Avid Bruxist answers
If I had TV*, I would watch it because doesn’t a size-2 girl with straight, white teeth and shiny hair—a person with no cellulite whatsoever—get rejected each episode? Good stuff.
*I don’t have TV. I mean, I have a TV set and DVD player that my friend Angie lent me when she moved temporarily to Spain, and I NetFlix the hell out of some shows, but I don’t get, y’know, channels. Somebody told me recently that I could just connect my computer to my TV set and, voila, programs! Here’s why I’m NOT going to do that: I grew up without TV. I came from parents who thought TV rotted the mind. And my folks were right, of course, but the complete prohibition of it creates TV JUNKIES. Exhibit A: there was a time in my childhood when the gods sent HBO(?!) to our 13-inch, black and white TV, and my siblings and I absolutely gorged ourselves on “Fletch” and “The Legend of Billie Jean” when my parents weren’t around. We must have watched each of those movies 25 times. (I can go note-for-note with Pat Benatar on ‘Invincible’.) To this day, I have no governor on my TV consumption. If I were to have unlimited programming, I’d probably be watching a rerun of Maury when Mr. Povich and his gang showed up to film the episode “It’s Official…I’ve Grown into My Couch”.