Programming despair: post-9/11 American television show mirroring a too-familiar dark reality

Abstract

This work is an analysis of the phenomenon of wildly popular television shows airing since the 9/11 attacks, many of which appear to critique United States foreign and domestic policies and the morally and economically deprived environments those policies have created, all of which have led to correlative, disturbing psychological changes in US citizens. Television is a textual site, and, especially since 9/11, an indicator of national mood, temperament and consumption trends. "TV" is an increasingly important vehicle through which to examine how producers engage with consumers, as they sometimes "mirror," sometimes create, and occasionally criticize systemic ideologies and beliefs. Since 9/11 the qualitative content of shows has changed drastically, which poses new challenges for consuming viewers. Many of these shows reify the old critics' warnings, but some obliterate them with these new writers' critical examinations of cultural, economic and political problems we increasingly face. I look at what some show producers are telling us now that they've achieved that supposed "American Dream," that is, working toward and achieving some economic independence. They show a maturity in their earnest messages that the old dichotomies of "good guys and bad guys," are no longer believable. These shows in varying degrees to the discomfort and to the pleasure of a more discriminating and disenfranchised US public show this. I propose an approach to discern which shows are enlightening in many ways and those which only serve to obediently "take up consumers' time with meaningless entertainment" as pre-9/11 scholars had bemoaned. Not all TV shows are created arguably equal anymore, at least in regards to the agendas of the producers; some humanistic writers and producers have daringly scrutinized many institutional social governors and throttles inherent in the machinery of control over the public. Yet, no matter how enlightening some of these new visual vehicles are, some are not, and simply drain time. And with "bingewatching" also come new health problems. It is up to the individual reader/viewer to recognize the difference and to choose what benefits one's self, from how to choose their "leisure" time to becoming more active in eliminating the sources of their anxiety, alienation and dis-ease. This work hopefully offers a new way of looking at the changes we've encountered, especially those presented televisually the past twenty + years. Just as the creators of some of these new shows have heeded the old scholars' criticisms, so too is a need for new scholarship on television so that both can co-evolve, in the hopes that there grows enough consensus in how to pinpoint and then resolve the financial problems we've inherited.