Made in the U.S.A.

Lest it be assumed, based on my last three posts, that my pontifications are limited to 1980s pop culture and do not span into the present, I have chosen to devote today's entry to my favourite current television show, MTV's Made. For the uninitiated, Made is a "reality" tv show with the ostensible goal of helping average American teens realize their dreams, while of course having fun and coming to an easily-encapsulated-in-fifty-words-or-less sense of self-knowledge along the way. Here is a sampling of a few choice episodes:

• the sensitive jock who wants to become a ballet dancer
• the shy tomboy who wants the female lead in the school play
• the band geek who wants to be crowned a pageant queen
• the skinny nerd (male) who wants to join the wrestling team
• the skinny nerd (female) who wants to be a cheerleader
• etc., etc. (for more examples, visit MTV's hopelessly unnavigable website).
  

In each episode, the protagonist is a wholesome, down-to-earth, more or less emotionally stable kid. Of course, these kids have a few problems, but that's why they're on Made--so that MTV can whip up a 28-day, action-oriented solution to their teen angst that, if successful, will help them to disavow the realities of adolescence and adopt a perky, all-American, can-do attitude the likes of which we haven't seen in TV teens since The Brady Bunch went off the air.

So how does this mythical journey unfold, you ask? Here's a brief synopsis of the narrative arc that characterizes most episodes of Made, accompanied by my notation of the various blatant fallacies embedded within it:

1. We meet the teen/hero. Teen does not fit in at school, as evidenced by the fact that they do not belong to the "popular" crowd [blatant fallacy #1: entry to the popular crowd = instant happiness]. We get a glimpse of the "in" crowd, which is contrasted with the teen's friends. We are asked to empathize with this teen's feeling that his or her high school experience is in some way deficient. This feeling is frequently compounded by there being a big brother or sister in the picture who is perfect in every way and rubs this in with our teen/hero at every opportunity [I must confess, the bitchy blonde big sisters are my favourite, but that's probably because I never had one].
2. The teen/hero identifies a goal that they have . They believe that if they could somehow meet this goal, they will be able to have a beautiful, fulfilling high school experience [blatant fallacy #2: there is no such thing as a beautiful, fulfilling high school experience].
3. The teen/hero meets their Made coach. This individual is an expert in the field associated with the teen's dream and has been assigned to basically kick his or her ass repeatedly over the course of one month in order to ensure that dream gets realized (kind of like Mr. Miyagi, but sadly minus the Buddhist enlightenment factor).
4. The teen/hero's road to success is a rocky one. Along the way, they usually build up enough confidence from the progress they're making towards their goal to think that it's a good idea to ask out somebody who's way out of their league [blatant fallacy #3, and damn, is it a pervasive one: it is never a good idea to ask out somebody who's way out of your league]. This pretty much always crashes and burns [which sort of acknowledges the reality of blatant fallacy #3]. Further conflict ensues when the old, uncool friends start getting pissed that the teen/hero not only wants to ditch them, but has solicited the help of a national TV show to do so. Family conflict may flare up as well, particularly in situations where the parents were slackers/nerds in high school and feel threatened by their progeny's quest to better themselves.
   
5. The teen/hero finally (like in the last 5 minutes of the show), takes a test that will determine whether or not they have met their goal. And here's where it gets super-interesting, in my opinion, for a mainstream American tv show: the teens usually FAIL! OK, they don't totally fail. The band geek won Miss Congeniality, the skinny nerd (female) made the junior varsity cheerleading team, the shy tomboy got a speaking part in the play. But they aren't blazing success stories either--especially in a country where world-class figure skaters, Democratic presidential candidates and that Bo Bice guy from last season of American Idol are berated for coming in second in their respective arenas of competition. [NB: Now, with Canadians it's a different story. We're willing to designate friggin' national holidays for people who come in fourth.] At any rate, Made tries its darndest to gloss over the fact that its protagonists come up short in their quests to attain their goals [which brings me to blatant fallacy #4: it's not about winning or losing, it's about how you play the game. Yeah, right. Jerry Bruckheimer ain't never making your biopic if you believe that kind of claptrap].

As with any kind of journey (except for "Journey," who will be the subject of a later entry), lessons are learned along the way. Here's a few that I gleaned for myself from repeated viewings of Made:

1. Popular girls are nice.
2. Popular guys are nice.
3. Pageants, especially the mettle-testing swimwear competition, can be the answer to one's self-esteem problems.
4. Forcing oneself to conform to dominant notions of gender identity that feel completely and utterly foreign to one's self isn't as bad as feminist theorists make it out to be. Especially if there's a chance it'll impress a boy.
   
5. High school can be fun--you just have to have the right attitude and a willingness to repress certain personality traits.

Perhaps what I like best about Made is how it makes a highly persuasive case that this is how the American high school experience should be: everyone can participate, everyone can get along, everyone is entitled to social climb as high as is decently possible, everyone can have a great yearbook photo, everyone can be a team player, everyone can love high school from the bottom of their hearts if only those hearts are open to the possibilities of personal betterment. What's that? You disagree? Sounds like somebody needs an attitude adjustment! You'd better sit yourself down and watch a few more episodes of Made.