TWISTED FAIRYTALES

“I FELT LIKE A PRINCESS!”

• starting with the first ANTP Adrienne Curry

• The Bachelor- prospective princesses sit on their aimless, tiny behinds, fend off fellow ladies in waiting, and hope to be whisked away by a network-approved knight in shining Armani.

• ROMANCE=FINANCE

Joe Millionaire

• Introduced as he gallops towards the admiring girls on a stallion

• Looked like Gaston• The girls squealing

“Ohmigawd! It’s a castle!”

The Formula

• Naïve beauty who longs to get married

• Offer her a gorgeous guy who says he shares that wish

• Send her to a series of bridal gown fittings, let her pick a ring and write some vows

• Throw in a bunch of liquor and voila!

• True Love—reality style!

The BachelorSeason 10

• Tessa expresses doubts about remaining on the show—not sure if she’s crazy about Andy

• How dare she? Princesses aren’t supposed to save themselves!

• Prince Andy is tasked with luring the errant cutie back to his court.

• How would he do it? Humour? Intelligence?

• “The fairytale date”

• $2 million diamond necklace, earrings and bracelet to wear for the night, they sped off in a $600,000 Saleen S7 Twin Turbo, Nicole Miller gown

• Tessa: “ This whole date I’ve wanted someone to pinch me. I think it’s every girl’s dream to, like, be brought over diamonds, and brought to a dress store and pick out anything you want. I’m just excited!”

• Hear that guys? If you want a woman to fall in love with you, don’t worry about baring your soul ir risking your heart. Just get out your credit card and prepare to score!

Why do we watch them?• There isn’t one clean simple answer• Psychological images of the fairytale

provoke a strong emotional response in us and compel us to keep watching.

• mockery is a sport for some viewers• Fantasy escapism• Superiority we feel• Shows are carefully crafted to push all

our buttons and the pretty-pretty princess nonsense gets us to accept these old-fashioned notions as ideal

• Dates back to childhood (Disney, anyone?)

What’s the Cost?

• Limiting view of masculinity• Stoic providers of pleasure and financial comfort• Male viewers learn that they shouldn’t expect or desire

women as partners in love and life but only as beautiful, compliant subjects in need of social, sexual, and interpersonal direction.

• For women—it’s impossible to live completely outside our culture

• Buried deep inside many adult, single, heterosexual women’s minds is that conformist voice humming, “Someday my prince will come…”

• SOCIAL CONDITIONING

Humiliation

• Scores of women are desperate enough to fight and weep over strangers just to avoid the shame of being a single female

• Send women a message: This is where independence leads ladies—to failure and misery

• Season opener: one single dude is told how handsome and manly and perfect he is by 25 over-dressed, overeager chicks (do they have a sense of self beyond their willingness to please some guy?

• One mortifying stunt after another…

• The shot the producers wait for—the crying woman…

• Granted no privacy or ability to seek solace from friends

Happily Ever After?

• Advertisers understand: it’s much easier to shill cosmetics and clothing—not to mention Match.com and fitness memberships to insecure women scared of being alone than it is to self-confident people who believe they are beautiful and capable of being happy just as they are…

• Are we thinking critically about the dangerous messaged these shows are sending?

• They teach us that women have no self-respect• Because we think this is a representation of “real-life”,

we believe that women in general do not deserve more respect than is shown to the ones on the TV.

• You have to kiss a lot of frogs to find your prince….

• In TV’s version, happliy ever after happens when men have all the power and women do all the grovelling

• In fairy tales, once she is whisked off, the princess is guaranteed a life of happiness, adoration and wealth…

Now…

Fairy-Tales Aren’t Real…

• Is your Prince Charming some shallow, egotistical, lying dimwit who stuck his tongue down twenty-five other women’s throats until he reluctantly settled for you?

• If you hope to be the prince, do you yearn to leave a trail of broken hearts behind you as you work your way through a throng of insecure hotties?

• Real love involves a foundation of respect, honesty, and trust, concepts wholly missing from the pale imitations sold to us by the folks who script “unscripted” entertainment.

Editing

Frankenbiting

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Un1lE0Or2Q&feature=related

We can’t forget this is NOT reality. The fairy tale isn’t real, the stories aren’t real, and the love isn’t real.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDuHp_GvmJ0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVmODE5RPvY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hLFr8gOb5c (9:20)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5pIAkIEsfU (4:10 cameraman on left)

• And if you ARE a strong woman…

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBoAXZtW_j0

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uaEyL7LAnk&feature=related

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_hXCnmhI6E&feature=related