What’s this show called … You’re Cut Off!?

It’s no longer a novelty to see people being “deprived” on TV. All sorts of reality shows aim to do just that, dropping people into living situations vastly different from the ones they’ve lived in their entire lives. Remember Amish in the City?

So even though I’ve seen the basic idea before, I was curious to check out the VH1 series You’re Cut Off!, because I had a question I wanted answered: Why. Not why does this exist, although that’s not a bad question, but why is anyone doing this, from the participants to their families to the network. I wondered what the ultimate goal of the series was, if there was more to it than the “torturing” of leachy rich people. Plus, it was a much appreciated suggestion from tracey8051. Thanks!

The episode I caught followed some big drama from last week. From what I could gather, Jenn had a meltdown, or freak-out, or whatever you want to call it, and she was removed from the house at the beginning of the hour by Laura the counselor. I assumed it was a big deal until I looked into it and discovered that there’s already multiple precedents for people failing out of this program.

Yeah, that was another puzzler; I didn’t think I should be expecting a competitive show, with people getting sent home every week, but I certainly didn’t consider that the point of the show was to get every girl to graduation at the end. I guess this is one of those “helping” shows. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t still challenges, winners, and losers.

The girls on the show really seem largely delusional, I have to say. Did they believe that they were getting dressed up nicely for what they thought was a shopping spree? And the only thing I took away from their regaling us with how expensive their clothes were was that all of them got taken for suckers. There’s nothing wrong with spending that kind of money, but in return what you buy should look like it actually cost that much money.

Which played right into the budget/bank challenge, where everyone consistently guessed wrong what was cheap and what was expensive. That made it clear that these people have no idea what they’re talking about; they’re more about judging things by their covers (“You’re telling me that belt made from things you just picked out of the garbage costs $5,000? I must have it!”) than having an appreciation for the finer things in life.

Which makes sense when you consider the fact that they’re living off mommy and daddy’s successes. I knock the “celebrities” on The Celebrity Apprentice, but whatever they do or don’t have, they’ve earned it (or not) on their own. They might be delusional to think that they matter to the rest of us, but they think it because of how they estimate their personal contributions to the world, not the credit card that their parents left for them. These girls were just sad.

I guess the Swap Meet scene was kind of funny, but by that point I couldn’t even take guilty pleasure in the participants’ stupidity. There’s just nothing redeeming about the entire thing. And maybe their parents should be going through a process like this as well, learning how to say “No” to the progeny that they’ve already destroyed. And the kids didn’t all fail the task, they’ve all failed life.

The best thing their parents can do for them isn’t putting them on TV. They need to give their kids enough money to survive for six months, shove them out the door, and never look back. Only when they’re forced to sink or swim on their own will these people learn to become contributing members of society.

Clacked by Aryeh S.
on Feb 07, 2011 @ 17:45 EST5EDT