Revolting.

I have to ask: what is it that gives us as the human race that blood lust? Why do we seek out opportunities to see other people get hurt?

It's nothing new. I'm not blaming the Internet. I'm not blaming crumbling family structure. Ever since the days of the Gladiators (and I ain't talking American here) humans have loved watching people or animals get hurt. It's disgusting. Look how far we've come: gladiators, boxing, bull fights, dog fights, cock fights, and now we've come almost full circle with the recent boom in mixed martial arts fighting. Of course, this whole blog is prompted by the new rising star, Kimbo Slice. This dude is scary. Screw those buffed up dudes on NBC knocking Joe Schmo into a pool or shooting tennis balls at them; Kimbo Slice is the closest we will come to a modern-day gladiator. For those of you who don't know, this scary mofo rose to fame via videos of his bare-knuckle fights coming up on youtube. They're disgusting. They're disturbing. They're bloody. I've seen a few and I can seldom stomach the whole thing. It's just nasty. Just thinking about it makes me a bit nauseous. Yet still, for some reason, CBS decided that now he is legitimately fighting, with gloves and a referee in "the octagon" that it would be a ratings boom to stick this guy on network television in a prime time fight. Well, I think the ratings were successful, as millions of Americans got to watch this guy shoot a right fist directly into his opponent's bulging cauliflower ear, causing it to burst.

I just don't get it. How can we as a global society be so enthralled with pain as entertainment? I really think I'd rather watch reality TV, which at least keeps its pain on a primarily emotional level. Even that is problematic: if someone isn't pummeling the crap out of someone else, there is all the emotional pain that "real life" television tries to capture. Why do you think Maury Povich can run seventeen thousand episodes of paternity results??? Simple: it's either heartwarming or heart wrenching. Same with Jerry Springer, a show that has become a parody of itself. People tune in to hear twisted love stories and peoples' perversions, but stay for the possibility of seeing a good fight or some blurred out nudity. Why do we watch all these elimination-based talent shows? It's not because we want to see the overwhelming abilities of the winner, it's because we want to see someone who has much more talent than us STILL get knocked down and stepped on by a panel of snarky talking heads with little to no talent of their own outside of their talent to criticize.

While I'm talking reality TV, I have to ask: what ever happened to Blind Date? I'll admit it, that show was my one main pop culture weakness. If it was on, I'd watch it. Religiously. But part of the reason I enjoyed it was that it knew it was absurd. It knew it was NEVER serious. You could count on great dates that wound up in the hot tub, and awful dates that ended with people getting drinks thrown in their faces. To be even more honest, it would be my dream job to make a living writing all the little wry comments that popped up during footage of the date. Whoever had that job was hands-down the luckiest person on the planet. Plus, Blind Date was the kind of reality TV that knew it's place: in the gutter known as the 5:00 pm time slot when NO ONE watches. I would be happier if I knew it was still there.