VH1- you need me and I need you. For so long I have searched for a way to circumvent your very existence. However, I was a fool to think I could avoid your presence while at the same time enjoy all the splendor, joy, and benefits that come with basic cable. I finally see now that VH1 was right all along and while many of us have strived to walk the path of creativity, educational excellence( or competence), and artistic achievement we have all been led a stray by our own collective hubris. If you (the reader) would just take a look around you, you would see how our arrogance has led us down a path of utter mediocrity.
We live in an age of great doubt and great struggle; America’s job market has dwindled as millions of Americans have lost their jobs in the last year. Banks are failing while car companies need federally funded bailouts that will do nothing more than prolong their slow and agonizing death. Swine flu and a global recession have young adults acknowledging their vulnerability much sooner in life than they would have fifteen years ago. Drought, despair, and disease: All the makings of an H.G. Wells novel yet certain people have managed to prosper in these tough times. Men and women from all walks of life have pulled themselves up by their boot-straps and found a way to be a success. Some have the best education that money can buy, while other didn’t make it out of high school. I am a 26 year old aspiring (and by “aspiring” I mean PAY ME FOR MY WORK) artist, who graduated from college with strong marks yet the “promised land” that education was supposed to give me, according to my family, doesn’t appear to be on the horizon. Does this leave me bitter? No, just a bit…vexed, yes that’s a good way of saying it; vexed.
But through VH1 I have figured out the method of success in 2010 and I find it equally appalling, and intriguing. Success is not found in the business man, the athlete, or the politician. Perhaps many of us have been going about this all wrong? Perhaps you weren’t meant to get that Masters degree in International business from Duke University so you can work at Chase bank for $75,000 a year starting out, complete with full healthcare coverage. Perhaps you weren’t really meant to follow your dream of being a painter so your artwork could one day be shown off at a galleria in Soho 30 years after your death. Maybe, just maybe the ticket to success in 2009 is to become famous for absolutely no reason whatsoever. Now as long as you’re alive fame can/will equal some sort of monetary value and if I have learned nothing else from reality TV it’s that I don’t need to be smart to be paid. So I’m officially putting it out there: I want to be on a VH1 reality TV show so that I may have the opportunity to eventually have my own show on VH1 in which women vie for my attention but there can only be one winner!
Some of you may think that I am whoring myself out like a prostitute with low-self-esteem in the lower east side of Manhattan. To be blunt, I am choosing the path of least resistance. We all know this reality TV business is dodgy to begin with and it’s not like any of these pseudo couples actually stay together all I’m asking is to be paid an inordinate amount of money for doing nothing meaningful in society, aside from providing some type of sick entertainment. Look at Flava Flav and then try and tell me that VH1’s reality TV shows are not the way. Flava Flav went from touring with U2 (as a part of Public Enemy) in the late 80’s to a full blown and admitted crack addict by the early 90’s. His musical endeavors had stalled and he had fathered 6 (of an eventual 7) kids by three women. Various stints in prison and mounting legal troubles had sapped him of all his financial winnings by the early part of the century and who comes to his rescue? The fine people at VH1; you see this is a company that can make dreams come true. We are talking about a machine that can turn a Chevy into a Cadillac; manure into ice cream, Matt Leinart into Tom Brady, and Flava Flav into…well a richer and more successful Flava Flav.
What VH1 did for Flava Flav was nothing short of 5th dimensional quantum physics. First he’s put on “The Surreal Life” and acts a damn fool. Then he gets paired with Brigitte Nielsen for the show “Strange Love” and acts a damn fool. And finally reaches the pinnacle of reality TV and gets a show centered around him, “Flavor of Love,” AND ACTS A DAMN FOOL!!!!!!!!! What’s even more incredible is that a woman by the name of Tiffany Pollard (aka “New York”) came onto “Flavor of Love” and cemented her spot as one of the craziest women to ever be shown on TV. So crazy in fact that she was given her own show (“I Love New York”) Now Flava Flav and Tiffany Pollard are more famous and wealthier than they have ever been before. One was a lingering star and the other was a virtual unknown before VH1. Now they are both paid and famous…Do you see how easy this sounds? Now I’m not saying artistic integrity be damned and to hell with using your education to better yourself. All I’m saying is that these career choices seems damn near recession proof and while we, the viewers, may have our qualms about what passes for decent TV these days we should be thankful that the standards for getting on TV are so incredibly low right now. So VH1 I’m ready for whatever you got; Charm School, Daisy of Love, Real Chance of Love, Tough Love and New York goes to Work. Just put me somewhere and I promise I will make myself memorable. Then we can start to focus on my show, personally I was thinking of something like “Setoiyo’s Seduction,” “Setoiyo’s Ultimate Challenge,” or “Setoiyo Takes Over the Playboy Mansion.” Each show is to be centered around me, but remember that slime stuff they used on Nickelodeon back in the day? Well I wanna be able to slime whomever I want, whenever I want, and I want you to put me in a big house just because. I want to have a secure job, fame, recognition, and admiration for no reason. I want to be the Monstar that I always knew I could be.
Oh and I want a circus at the beginning of each show complete with those dudes who swallow swords and an unlimited supply of Orange juice that can only be consumed by me and you know those amusement park rides that take you high up in the air and drop you down real fast? Well I was thinking…
Setoiyo
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