But Seriously...?
by Clay Risen

If you happened to be surfing the airwaves on Thursday, Feb. 21, say around 8 p.m., you might have come across a group of large men stuffing their faces with food. Mayonnaise, beef tongue, sticks of butter; what didn't go in their mouths ran down their shirts, all to the apparent joy of a studio audience. It was Fox's "The Glutton Bowl," a two-hour smorgasbord of competitive eating. Clearly entertainment at it's best — there's nothing more thrilling than watching everyday Americans break all conventions of manners, health and personal safety at the same time. And yet — and yet — and yet you might have been bothered by one, tiny, nagging thought: This is the new era of seriousness?

Remember seriousness? Sometime during the afternoon of Sept. 11, the American mind was supposedly wiped clean of all affection for "Survivor," "Survivor II," Britney Spears and the rest of the flotsam and jetsam of America's bubble-gum consumer culture. We were, all of a sudden, serious. Our new obsessions, so we were told, were Islam, Afghan history and bioweapons. Overnight, every pot-addled college student, every housewife, every crane operator became an armchair talking head. Sure, we said, we Americans like our crap, and we like it thick and juicy and well tanned, but when the call of duty is blasted across the screens of our two-way pager/cellphone/PDAs, we respond. And for a while, it worked — subscriptions to Foreign Affairs went up. CNN and Fox News viewership skyrocketed. For a while, America was a dangerous place to be a reality-TV producer.

But little more than six months later, here we are. Back to square one. Back to "The Glutton Bowl." And "Celebrity Boxing." "Survivor 3." Liza Minnelli's wedding, 'Lil Bowwow and J to tha Lo.

Of course, chances are, you weren't surfing the airwaves that February night. If you're like a large number of Americans, you already knew "The Glutton Bowl" was going to be on, had read the previews and marked your calendars with bated bowels. During the week of Feb. 17 to 23, "The Glutton Bowl" achieved a 927 rating on the Yahoo! Buzz list. This No. 2 spot (behind Kristanna Loken, the star of Terminator 3) was almost double the buzz around the gruesome murder of journalist Daniel Pearl by Pakistani terrorists, which garnered only a 485 rating. And they say Americans are shallow.

But then who were we kidding? Did anyone actually believe that one fatal morning was all it would take to smack that silly smirk off our collective face? In the early part of the Twentieth Century it took a devastating war, famine, cholera and inescapable depression to bring about the era of German "new sobriety."

Our cultural pablum is also our soma, the greatest product of a ridiculously advanced society. Its insanity keeps us sane. It protects us from the big bad world out there. It's the ultimate extension of the American dream: We don't just have access to every possible convenience; we also have airwaves powerful enough to convince ourselves that everyone else has the same. Reality TV distracts us from reality. We don't just like the "Glutton Bowl"; we need the "Glutton Bowl," to keep us distracted, to keep us from having to think about Daniel Pearl.

Sept. 11 was never a test of the American people. There was never a question that we would strike back, rain steel and C-4 down on those responsible. Rather, it was a test of our safety shield, our defenses against the reality beyond our borders. And yes, for a brief period, those defenses were down, we were exposed, forced to take on a serious tone for a serious time. But, thankfully, only for a time.

E-mail Clay Risen at risenc@yahoo.com.