Download as pdf or txt
Download as pdf or txt
You are on page 1of 17

REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 1

Reality TV: The Hunger for Truth

Luis Fernando Velasco #76078

Wheaton College Graduate School


REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 2

Introduction

"Welcome to the desert of real". Those were the Morpheus' words to Neo when he was introduced to the

reality of life, in the Watchovisky's movie, "The Matrix" (1997). Maybe our reality doesn't seem like the virtual

world presented in the movie but no one can avoid the profound philosophical questions that were raised by the

movie.

Perhaps "The Truman's Show" (1998), where Truman suspects that all his life is not real, could be a better

illustration of our own context of life. That's because there's no one single human being that has not already asked

himself about these questions. Is this world real? How do I know that? Would it be really possible to get to know

the truth? What is the meaning of life? Are there any ways to find profound answers for that?

This paper will discuss these ontological questions as a means to interpret and understand the current

cultural trend called RealityTV and Reality Shows, as well the Virtual Reality.

In the first part, The Reality, some data and the history of the phenomenon will be understood.

In the second part, Behing Reality, is going to be discussed some causes that brings some light upon this

cultural trend. Mainly, it is the hunger for truth and reality in the postmodern milieu.

For the third part, Beyond Reality, some consequences of living in the hyper reality will be seen.

The Spiritual Reality, the fouth part, will discuss deeper reasons behind the search of the human soul, and

present a final answer for the questions raised from what Gilles Lipovetsky called, "The Age of Emptness" and

"Society of Deception" (Mattos, 2008).

As final words, The Communal Reality would be stated as the way to "see, touch and taste" the answers

for these questions that follow the humanity since the beginning.
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 3

The Reality

Later, when you arrive home, you will probably 'zap' through the TV channels looking for something to

watch. Which are your options? After going through the news, check the sports agenda, and watch part of a movie,

you will probably end up in some channel watching Idol, or So You Think or You Can Dance, Survivor, Amazing

Race, America's Next Top Model, American Idol, Big Brother, Dancing with the Stars, Face off, Hell's Kitchen,

Kitchen Nightmares, Project Runway, the Bachelor or some other of the more than 320 "Reality TV" shows that

are currently being shown on television channels around the world (Winston, 2010).

In some of these shows you will recognize your own life story. In some of these you will certainly review

your own history of suffering and overcoming. In some of these you will be able to laugh at your own failures and

cry excited at your own victory. Through RealityTV your image will be shown to millions of people and everyone

will know who you are. For a few minutes, everyone will know that you exist, that your family exists. Everyone

will know that you are real. This is the strength of RealityTV that grows exponentially and satisfies the "hunger

for reality" of millions of people around the globe.

With RealityTV, television showed another of its side, that superpowered eye that scans what happens in

the private space of homes and carries what it finds there to the media space. Television now not only operates as

a broadcaster of programming, but also as receiver, it captures the daily life of the public and give it back through

its program schedule. The prime time is now to translate everyday life as spectacle and expose to the public the

lives of anonymous. That anonymous person playing in the mud or singing on a stage represents millions of

viewers who, in some ways, are watching themselves. However, now these anonymous are becoming celebrities

as they reach the Olympus of media exposure to become a character in itself (Rocha, 2009).

Back in the Days

RealityTV and Reality Shows have its origins in radio programs and talent show of the 40s and 50s in the

U.S., as well as television series in documentary style. There are a great variety of shapes that define Reality

Shows, but in general, all carry the same structure: unscripted dramas, total renovation of people, homes or cars;
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 4

attacks on celebrities; seeking boyfriends and competitions of every kind imaginable (and unimaginable).

Essentially, by not having scripts, Reality Shows do not need to hire actors and writers and use low-cost locations.

Usually there is also a presenter who narrates the story and sets the stage for the drama that will take place.

"American Family," presented in 1973, where the problems of the Loud family were exposed without

shyness. Eight years later, "Survivor" would change the scenery of TV networks, establishing a pattern that would

take over the TV today (Metz, 2007). "Survivor" meets a group of 16 to 20 people on a remote island who,

deprived of food and supplies, must overcome the challenges presented. The public vote by eliminating one person

each week until there is only one winner, it takes one million dollars. Several other Reality Shows will follow the

same model as Big Brother, The Mole, The Amazing Race and The Bachelor.

Main focus of this work, the biggest superstar of all Reality with historical rates of audience around the

globe, is Big Brother. The program is composed of participants that do not compete just for money; they also want

a place under the sun. It is also a competition for visibility. And this is the biggest attraction for the viewer: being

able to monitor, snoop around and follow the lives of others relentlessly. The name was chosen by John de Mol

and Joop van den Ende to name the TV program they created in the Netherlands in 1999. They were inspired by

the book "1984" by George Orwell, who coined the term "Big Brother" to name the state's control over society.

This "Big Brother" would be an electronic eye of the state to spy on everyone and everything.

Reality Shows like Big Brother reach high levels of success because they have two basic characteristics:

they facilitate the path to fame (even if temporary) for those who would never have it otherwise, and satisfy

human curiosity about what goes on in the lives of others. Along with that, Reality Shows show up as a great

advertising investment, considering the low production costs, and the fact that there is no need to hire writers and

million dollar stars.


REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 5

Behind Reality

Modernity and Postmodernity

Modernity had a promise: human evolution, the overcoming of myths and the release from dogmas would

happen through Reason. Man at last would be released from the divine and, through knowledge, would be able to

control nature, the world, and the future. Basically, in the rationalism of Descartes, the empiricism of Bacon, the

evolutionism of Darwin and the centrality of Kant's Rational is resided the promises of a glorious future. The

phrase "Scientia potentia est" ("knowledge is power"), although of unknown origin but often attributed to Francis

Bacon, illustrates the optimistic spirit of modernity that was based on rationality capable of defining reality and

truth objectively. The Scientific Method would finally be able to bring enlightenment, which would free us from

oblivion, thus identifying the means that lead to the evolution of humanity and progress.

However, the euphoria of the nineteenth century did not give birth to the promised progress. In summary,

scientific developments brought as its best result the two worst wars in human history, and numerous other

problems of contemporary society. Nietzsche, Freud, Marx, Einstein, Heisenberg became the new prophets to a

new reality. And more specifically Lyotard, Derrida and Foucauld are those who present us a new world of

profound and irreversible changes where epistemology receives a new approach that definitely would change

human perception of self, society and the future.

Welcome to postmodernity. Where knowledge is subjective; causes and effects are reciprocal, and the

notion of progress is complex. Ideologies have failed, progress enslaves, science destroys and the dominant forces

of consumption alienate society.

Today, humanity lives in a state of insecurity and widespread fear. Technology is exclusive and

unemployment is rising. And all this happens at a rampant speed. Economic, political and cultural changes build

up a complex global routine that generate and intensify the feeling of incompleteness and emptiness within the

human soul. While the uncertainties, the multiple truths and frailty of values create anguish and fear.
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 6

Hunger for Reality

The angst in which contemporary living is subject to is the effect (and also the cause) of the same human

evolution that brought it to this point of development. The human being is, in his nature, hungry for knowledge,

but the foundations of modernity do not satisfy the human need for knowledge, understanding, discernment, and

control. The only thing that is left is the cold reality of a failed and disenchanted human ideology. The hunger for

truth, frustrated by our inability of knowing all things, is the main drama of postmodernity. Hungry for reality, we

consume more information than any other era in History. However, the abusive excess of information enslaves us

to our inability of processing, living, and experimenting all the information we have. We end up as avid, hungry

consumers of reality, which take us toward nothingness, an existential emptiness.

Inside every human being there is something that drives one to continually know, understand, unveil, and

explain. There is a "hunger for reality." "What is real?" "What is objectively real?" This is the essence of that

which disturbs and defines man since the beginning of time: the search for the final meaning of an essential reality

without having the means of satisfying such a search.

From the most innocent child to the most skeptical philosopher, we are all on the same journey of

authenticating oneself through what is seen, felt, and perceived. In this sense, intensified by technology, the virtual

universe becomes a mediator between identity creation and reality. The medium, therefore, becomes a mirror

reflecting an image of humanity itself who in turn, believes more in the seen image rather than the object

projecting it. The television and computer screen become more real than reality itself because the reflected image

is what ends up defining the identity of the beholder.

The boredom of a meaningless life is the great impulse that drives this search. In Peter Weir's The Truman

Show (1998), Truman Burbank is an insurance salesperson played by Jim Carey. Through a series of events,

Truman begins to notice that his relationships with friends and even his wife seem too superficial. However, what

is actually happening is that Truman is the star of a television show and his life is being displayed live 24/7 to the

world, and all of the people in his life are indeed actors in the show. As he discovers that his life is part of a grand
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 7

entertainment show, in which he has been an involuntary protagonist for more than 30 years, he begins to break

free from the script. Truman decides to escape in an extraordinary manner and finally arrives at the edge of his

known world; he brings an end to the world's most viewed Reality Show and life as he knew it.

The Truman Show is like the show of life because in some level, we are all in search for reality and truth.

There is a generalized sense that there is something more, and we live in search for a meaning in existence. A

doubt is always at hand concerning the possibility of something else that can be known, understood or experienced.

We want to move beyond the shiny, silk screen, because we want to know what happens in the world of those who

love, who consume, who appear, and therefore, exist. We want to go there, in that place where the cars are better,

the women are perfect, and the children are obedient. And finally, even if just for a day, we desire to escape from

the cold, harsh reality that the physical world imposes upon us.

I appear, therefore I Am

On the one side we have a need to know and understand, while on the other, a longing to be seen, heard, and

understood. I appear, therefore I am. If marketing is the soul of a business, appearance is the essence of existence.

Be it a fake profile on Facebook, random worthless phrases on Twitter, or just being ridiculous on television--it

does not matter--appearing is most important; because to be seen is equals to exist.

On the other hand, the market needs the celebrity product; futile celebrity who inspire no respect or any

other reaction besides envy. There is no value, no meaning. "The reality show is a type of electronic circus that

exhibits anonymous celebrities without any great talents or abilities, in order to satiate the social anxiety caused by

these immediate celebrities," says Beatriz Jaguaribe (Jaguaribe, 2003)

We watch on the TV screen the narrative of personal dramas, tears and neurosis, that tend to increase the

participants chances of being accepted by the viewers, and reaching the great dream of every anonymous, to be

famous. Consequently, this social global context where only a few are included, the community is weakened

because the trustworthy authorities, leaders, guides, teachers, and mentors who set healthy examples have become

scarce.
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 8

Today we only got celebrities that became the "food for gossip" for communities that concentrate and and

dilute themselves in a same transient and momentary speed. Next week the cycle of celebrities' futility reestart

again, bringing new gossips for new communities. That is reason because the industrie of celebrity is protected

against all kinds of economic depressions, comments Bauman (Bauman, 2010).

Beyond Reality

I consume, therefore I Am

Accelerated by the constant and quick connection with the media in general, the stress of options and

information pressures men to the frantic consumption of the instant and disposable, and deposes his own identity

as an active human being in the world. By the planned obsolescence, the human being became merely a numerical

target, a consumption target to be reached. And by that he turns out as just a passive consumer of futile products

and values in the showcase of "Reality Shows": the newest product consumed in a Worldwide scale: under the

fantasy of truth and reality, other lives equally empty and with no sense are consumed. One way for men to

become "real" is by beeing a consumer. The more men consume, the more "real" they will become.

According to Baudrillard (2001), Big Brother turns out to be a mirror and a disaster of a society that is

trapped by the insignificance of its own platitude. And by that, there's nothing to think, there's only to consume. A

Reality TV and the Reality Shows end up being self portraits of the world we live. The subject's death, the

fugacity of the expiriences and the cult to image that are consumed without criticism or reflection.

This would be the last frontier to know: the conclusion that there's nothing to know. The futility and vanity of

reality ends up in the emptiness and vicious cicle of consuming information and entertainment.

Saturated by information and stimulus, the consumer now needs what Big Brother offers: the platitude, the

futile, the relief of information and the emptiness of truth. At the same time that tries to run away from life's

cruelty and the boredom of existance, men are overstimulated by the experience of something they no longer

believe but that exists.


REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 9

In the end they don't "exist", they're not "real", in order to have a meaningful and constructive purpose in

the world. They only 'experiment', feel, see and want to be seen. In the absence of destiny, men are given to be

only an experiment of themselves. When Television and media become less capable of noticing unbearable events

of the world, they discover on a daily basis, the existencial platitude as the event of more media that alienates men

while hipnotized, watch their own mediocrity. "The individual becomes mediocre to be seen and contemplated as

mediocre, having that be his own protecion against the need of existing and against the obligation of beeing

someone in a world increasingly difficult to exist" (Jaguaribe, 2003).

The search for objective truth in modern times did not find a satisfactory answer to this ontological question

that bothers humanity since ever. Illusions, dreams, passions, drugs, the literature, and finally the virtual 'reality'

and the Reality Shows, become the frontier where men seek answers to their eternal search. But what he finds is

his own emptiness where the realities converge with each other and now we no longer know what we are seeing as

well as reflections from nothing. What happens when the world is free from appearances? Heidegger answers:

"He falls in banality" (Baudrillard, 2005).

Hyper Reality

Finally, the technologic revolution of the computer's 'touch-screen' and the 3D TV screens become

increasingly narrow, the border between the real and virtual inducing people to "a type of immersion,

a type of umbilical conection and such a tangible interaction to the point of the humanity believing the reality

behind the screen is more real than the real images, as prophesied MacLuhan in his book "Understanding Media"

((Macluhan, 1996), in 1964. According to MacLuhan, "the medium is the message" because the media create an

environment that shape the types of society and the experimented forms of life. The medium shapes, defines and

controls the forms and even the essence of relationships and human activities.

The fifty-year-old MacLuran's prediction became reality. There are no doubts about it. But perhaps

McLuhan could not predict that the medium would become Reality itself. He could not foresee the birth of Hyper

Reality.
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 10

Hyper reality is an adequate description of the perception of reality in the postmodern context. It would be

a means to characterize the interactions of the mind with reality. Especially when consciousness loses its ability to

distinguish between reality and fantasy and begins to relate to it as if fantasy was better than reality. The nature of

hyper reality is an 'improvement' of reality. That is, objects, signs, images are displayed better than reality itself.

Accordingly, it is not the 'real' world that defines the image, but the image that defines the social order in the

world.

The utopia of a perfect world, profile and personal image edition, pornographic fetish growth and even

interventional Reality Shows are all a concrete representation of hyper reality manifestation. Shows like Extreme

Makeover, I want a famous face (MTV), Queer eye for the straight guy, 10 Years Younger, to name a few, are

programs displaying surgical intervention where participants gain new noses, new breasts, new bellies, new

reduced stomachs, new faces and new smiles bringing a true pedagogy and technology of how to be accepted and

look beautiful, safe, confident and successful. Deluded by Hyper reality of beauty, these mechanisms allow people

with insecurity problems, low self-esteem and self shame to expose themselves for the cameras with ease,

confessing trauma, anguish and even displaying, for millions of viewers, the body parts they reject. All with the

goal of making my own image in the hyper real image that the media sold me.

Hyper Reality would be a rejection of the real in exchange for the enchantment of the "post-human",

which also characterizes contemporary society. The humanization of technologies places us before the post-

biological because "in the valuation of the object, humans become more objectified and objects more human", as

noted by Jaguaribe (Jaguaribe, 2003).

This disenchantment of reality and the world empties organic affective relations in exchange for the

satisfaction of all desires not satisfied, generating more frustration and dysfunction with reality. It's the liquid

modernity so well defined by Polish sociologist Zygmunt Bauman that leads to liquid love, liquid life and liquid

fear, where everything flows and nothing remains (Bauman, 2010). This postmodern ephemerality reinforces the

dominance of desire through an image that promises the hyperreal perfect without the shortcomings of the real but

imperfect.
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 11

Spiritual Reality

Perhaps the least likely place to find the reality and substance of existence is exactly in the intangible spiritual

reality. Perhaps man's fascination with image is precisely a reflection of his deeper search: the ultimate reality of

things, of reality, that can not be found in the physical world but maybe in the metaphysical one.

Modernity dismissed the supernatural, the intangible, judging everything by close scrutiny of autonomous

human reason. But the tangible reality, visible to the naked eye, is that rationality has not reached the target it has

set itself. Surely found the answer did not satisfy the questions, because the end of the saga was an absolute

nothingness revealed by the prophets of postmodernity.

In this context the hyper-reality materialized by the technological revolution and heated by the

consumption of goods, products and sensations become commonplace for the global dysfunction of the unfulfilled

human quest.

Back in the Beginning

Seeking knowledge is one of the most essential characteristics of man, and follows him since the

beginning. Already in the narrative of Genesis we find man discussing the possibilities of knowing. And the

misguided promise given to humanity was the certainty that, as God, we could know all things, good and evil, and

become like God. "For God knows that When You eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God,

knowing good and evil." (Gn.3.5). From the beginning, man did not want little things, just have his eyes open and

become nothing less than God, then having access to complete knowledge of all things, good and evil.

Some mistakenly claim that God had forbidden eating of the tree of knowledge in order to continue

ignorance and obscurantism. However, a closer reading would not support this idea. The eating of the tree was the

symbol of the pursuit of knowledge independent of the Creator. The issue was not to know or not know, but the

reasons that led to knowledge. Clearly, the suspicion that God had withheld something necessary and taking the

fruit would be the possibility of acquiring this knowledge only becomes a god, or as God. The problem therefore

was not ignorance but the distrust of human independence. The result was the futile knowledge of Nothing that

brought man not what he sought, but condemned to an eternal and futile search of himself and something that will

satisfy his spiritual thirst of truth and reality.


REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 12

The "Realness" of Reality

If the ontological questions of mankind have not been satisfactorily resolved by the human experience, the

Creator of reality decides to incarnate himself in order to be the answers. It is the moment when YHWH becomes

a person; the Being who has existence in itself decides to dwell among men. As the Gospel of John says: "In the

beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.

Through him all things were made, without him nothing was made that has been made. The Word Became flesh

and made his dwelling among us, full of grace and truth." (Jo.1:1-3, 14 NIV)

Unlike merely intellectual reflections of the philosophers and equally empty rituals of the religious

systems, both unable to answer the questions of the human soul; Jesus himself becomes the incarnate answer,

visible and palpable to all people. The transcendent and immanent and intangible becomes tangible. According to

the testimony of John:

"From the very first day, we were there, taking it all in--we heard it with our own ears, saw it with our

own eyes, verified it with our own hands. The Word of Life appeared right before our eyes; we saw it

happen! And now we're telling you in most sober prose that what we witnessed was, incredibly, this: The

infinite Life of God himself took shape before us. We saw it, we heard it, and now we're telling you so you

can experience it along with us, this experience of communion with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ".

(1 John 1.1-3 MSG)

Against the posthuman disenchantment, the incarnation of Jesus is a tangible sign of the importance of the

body and the physical reality, and even miracles, besides reflecting the value of the healthy human body also

manifest the power of God over matter. The greatest of miracles though - the resurrection - became the main

message that a God committed to restoring not only the human body but also of all things (1 Co.15.20; 2Co.5.18).

If in the physical sense Jesus identified himself as the creator of everything and his incarnation confirms

the objectivity of reality, he was also very clear about the meaning of truth. In a way that humanity no longer got

lost in its futile pursuit of truth, Jesus identifies himself as the embodiment, the incarnation of Truth itself. Truth is
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 13

no longer a set of endless and intangibles speculations of vain philosophies - and theologies. Truth becomes a

Person, not subjective contents for intellectual constructs of the human ego. Philosophies, elaborations, theories

and theorems could not satisfy the question made by Pilate: "What is truth?" (John.18.38), because the answer to

this question requires more than one answer, it demands Substance. Numerous philosophical systems and religions

remain looking for answers to that same question Pilate had made to Jesus, all willing to remain blind in the

darkness of their own conclusions.

Jesus clearly identifies himself as the Truth itself (Jo.14.6). And in the same Gospel, John describes Jesus

as The Logos:

In the Greek philosophy, the logos remains an impersonal force, a lifeless and abstract philosophical

concept that is a necessary postulate for the cause of order and purpose in the universe. In Hebrew

thought, the Logos is personal. He indeed has the power of unity, coherence, and purpose, but the

distinctive point is that the biblical Logos is a He, not an it. (Sproul, 2013)

The "cosmic" Jesus enters humanity; the eternal enters the temporal, the infinite manifests itself in the

finite, the reason, the foundation and essence of all things - the very Word of God - incarnates in order to be the

definitive answer to the deep questions of humanity.

Despite the fact that postmodern skepticism present epistemological difficulties to acquire such

knowledge, in reality the problem is not - and never was - epistemological, but theological. The issue is spiritual

and a new means of knowledge is needed that goes beyond the merely rational categories. You need an openness

to faith on the part of the individual seeking. As Anselm of Canterbury said, "I do not seek to understand to

believe it, but I think to understand. Effectively I think, because if I did not believe I could not understand."

The scenario of Eden remains the same. In the face of every human being, the question remains: go to the

Tree of Knowledge or go to the Tree of Life? Which path to follow, the arrogant independence or obedient

dependence?
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 14

The Real Life

Knowing that Truth would be a sine qua non condition to live in a balanced and sensible, in the physical

world. As contingent beings, inhaiting a fragmented world, all are subject to all sorts of pain and misfortune. Who

could survive alone in a world marked by indifference, by disability and dysfunction? A very small amount from

consumers will be able to fulfill their dreams of consumption, while an overwhelming number of neighbors from

the planet will not see the dawning of a new day because they will be victims of violence, abuse, disease and

hunger. How to survive the unknown, to the mystery of not knowing? How to live with the reality of the

uncertainties of tomorrow? The answer to this question is a world population bored, dysfunctional and hopeless,

characterized by fear and its consequences: anxiety, phobias, depression, panic, anger and violence.

Jesus, the incarnate Truth, on his last night before being handed over to be killed (John 13-17), reveals the

only way to live fully in this world, will be when the truth is 'materialized', is embodied in him who seeks to know

it . It would need to inhabit who knows it, so the void is filled by the existential foundation of all things, the very

existence, the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the Logos, the Truth

"I will talk to the Father, and he'll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with

you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth. The godless world can't take him in because it doesn't have eyes to

see him, doesn't know what to look for. But you know him already because he has been staying with you,

and will even be in you! "I will not leave you orphaned. I'm coming back. In just a little while the world

will no longer see me, but you're going to see me because I am alive and you're about to come alive. At

that moment you will know absolutely that I'm in my Father, and you're in me, and I'm in you". (John

14.16-20 MSG)

Communal Reality: The End of the Show

If the words of Jesus have any element of truth and reality, they - and only they - could make existence

'real'. Only them would be able to "speak" to the 'Nothing' revealed by Nietzsche and Baudrillard, and make that

'Nothing' sprout Life. Life that is eternal. And if there are people on this earth who met this Truth and are

experiencing this Life, these people would be - and they alone - able to be definitive proof that reality and truth, in
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 15

fact, exist.

Facing a skeptical society, saturated with information and stimuli, abused by the consumer market and

distressed by a meaningless life; easy formulas and philosophical elaborations to solve your dilemmas will prove

completely futile. In general, these were the answers that religion handed to modernity but will not be effective for

the current culture. The world has become more complex and the search for ultimate reality of existence has

become a definite challenge for the Church.

According to Dieter Zander, "God is using the current culture to challenge his church out of the 'comfort

zone' found in modern culture and return to its primitive origins." The challenge is that the Church is once again a

clear and undisputed testimony of God's presence on earth.

There is not much else to elaborate on methods and strategies to achieve this culture beyond the church

going back to being the church. Back to what it was designed to be: the living Body of Christ. There is nothing

else to do. Any evangelistic strategy will achieve little and temporary results.

Reality tv, reality show, hyper reality, virtual reality, everything reveals the disenchantment of today with

the answers that have not found, the hunger for reality. Remaining only frustration, thirst and loneliness of that

search, alienated by frivolous and deadly enslaving pleasures.

If the Church rediscover herself, abandoning the comfortable place found in the culture, repent from

prostitution with power and the consumption market, and go back to being the living Body of Christ, that culture

could - finally - find answers to its deep spiritual questions.

Would there be another way for humanity to experience the tangible presence of the Truth, the Alpha and

Omega, the foundation of all reality except through the incarnate God in the lives of ordinary and real people?

Ordinary people who, like everyone else, face the reality of pain and suffering but refuse the skeptical rebellion of

philosophy, the fleeting alienation of pleasure or the easy getaway of virtual reality. Would there be another way
REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 16

to find peace and restoration to their dramas and traumas but through a community committed to bring heaven to

earth through concrete and real revolutionaries acts of love and kindness?

The answer seems clear, but unfortunately not widely tangible and palpable to the complex reality of

postmodernity. In general, the Church has not found herself in this historic moment and have not faced the

profound issues of this reality. Unfortunately the Church of Jesus has been, in many cases, just another reality

show.

References

Baudrillard. J (2001). Telemorfose e Criação de Poeira. [Telemorphose and the Making of Dust].Retrieve from
Revista FAMECOS. Retrieve from
http://revistaseletronicas.pucrs.br/ojs/index.php/revistafamecos/article/viewFile/3148/2419

(2005). Violence of the Virtual and Integral reality. International Journal of Baudrillard Studies.
Retrieve from http://www.ubishops.ca/baudrillardstudies/vol2_2/baudrillardpf.htm

(1991). Simulacro e Simulação. [Simulacrum and Simulation] Relógio D'Agua. Lisboa

Bauman, Z (1998). O Mal Estar da Pós-Modernidade [Posmodernity and its Discontents]. Rio de Janeiro, RJ.
Zahar

(2010). Amor Líquido. A Fragilidade dos Laços Humanos. [Liquid Love. The Fragility of the Human
Ties]. Retrieve from http://www.istoe.com.br/assuntos/entrevista/detalhePrint.htm
idEntrevista=102755&txPrint=completo

Jaguaribe, B. (2003). O Choque do Real: A Violência e as Estéticas do Realismo Midiático e Literário. [The

Shock of the Real. The Violence and the Aestetics of the Mediatic and Literary Realism]. Retrieve from

http://www.semiosfera.eco.ufrj.br/anteriores/especial2003/conteudo_bjaguaribe.htm

MacLuhan. M (1996). Os Meios de Comunicação como Extensões do Homem. [Understanding Media - The

Extensions of Man]. Cultrix, RJ

Mattos. C (2008). Encantamento Pós-Humano. [Human Enchantment]. Retrive from


REALITY TV: THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 17

http://www.bocc.ubi.pt/pag/mattos-celso-encantamento-pos-humano.pdf

Metz, Winifred F. (2007). How Reality TV Works. Retrieve from http://www.howstuffworks.com/reality- tv.htm

Millan, Marilia P.B. (2006). Reality Shows: Uma Abordagem Psicossocial. [Reality Shows – a Psychosocial

Approach] Psicologia Ciência e Profissão. Doi:10.1590/S141498932006000200003

Rocha, Débora C. (2009). Reality TV e Reality Show: Ficção e Realidade na Televisão. [Reality TV and Reality

Show: Fiction and Reality in the Television]. Revista da Associação Nacional dos Programas de

Pós-Graduação em Comunicação. E-compós, Brasília. Retrieve from

http://www.compos.org.br/seer/index.php/e-compos/article/view/387/380

Sproul, R.C.(2013) Interpreting the Logos - In the Presence of God Retrieve from

http://www.crosswalk.com/devotionals/inpresenceofgod/in-the-presence-of-god-week-of- april-12-

11628730.html

Winston, O (2012). RealityTV by the Numbers. Retrieve from http://elev8.com/584715/oh-my-look-now-reality-tv-

by-the-number-infographic

You might also like