Reality television is a universe in which things are extremely dramatised, ostracised and detached . We are all very aware of reality tv and the glorification of reality televsion, but are we all really aware of the reality surrounding reality television ? I personally love to engage in reality television, whether it’s Keeping up with the Kardashians, Big Brother, Love Island and many more. I found that my main reason for wanting to engage in these forms of media were simply because I enjoyed the aspect of being a voyeur, watching life unravel for ordinary people seemed so much fun. The aspect of knowing that through these broadcasts I am able to vicariously live through a bunch of contestants on an island for love, or on a talk show finding out if they’re the father to the child they’ve been raising for three years.

In hindsight this explanation I just provided seems incredibly mundane if not absurd that I could find entertainment in watching other people. But it’s not as simple as just watching people, it’s the dramatisation aspect centred around real people. Shows like Jeremy Kyle are a prime example of the dualities of reality & drama that come from reality television . Jeremy kyle marketed itself as being a space where many working class people with dilemmas could come onto a platform to have these issues resolved.

Now this description makes you somewhat drawn in when you think about the fact a lot of working class people do not have the money to be able to find resources that could benefit them, much of the demographic Jeremy kyle was centered around came from extremely problematic backgrounds in which they had dysfunctional family dynamics. So assuming they could “sort these problems within the home” is naive to assume, so of course going onto a show like this adds up.

So put yourself into the shoes of someone that doesn’t come from a wealthy background, with a stereotypical nuclear family where everyone knows how to communicate healthily . I’m sure you probably would be tempted to find out if your son was actually your biological son or not, if you had access to do so for free. We saw thousands of people on Jeremy Kyle having their dirty laundry aired out on national television, during the day time might I add just to emphasise the amount of watchful eyes this spectacle was receiving. Women, children and men all on a television show raising their blood pressures, as well as raising the likelihood of them not being able to return home with any dignity, just so we can have some entertainment…. How true was this reality television though ? Because as I write this we now know that there were many hidden factors to the show.

Reality Television shows capture the attention of watchful eyes because as stated previously, there is something so amusing about living through the scandalous lives of people you do not know in real life. You may be a reclusive introvert who hates parties but find yourself gravitating towards the loud party type on a show like Big Brother, simply because you say to yourself ‘I wish I could be more like her’ or on the flipside the introverted calculated person may have your extroverted and vivacious self thinking, ‘ I wish I didn’t have to do too much’. We all have qualities about ourselves we don’t like so we find qualities in others we would rather have. But when it comes to reality television you rarely have a choice of which qualities get expressed.

To the people who have no knowledge of how the tv industry works they’d assume you sign up, audition, get the part and be yourself which means the public automatically flock to you If you’re likeable . What most people fail to understand is that with the dramatisation aspect, comes forcing narratives from the footage obtained to create a version of people or situations that are untrue. Love Island UK officially began in 2005 and ended in 2006 after it aired for two seasons. It was later brought back in 2015 by late ITV presenter Caroline Flack. From season 1 to season 3, we can truly see that this was prime reality television.

Events which unfolded in front our our screens were authentic with no additional gimmicks and this is what the public wanted. The grand displays of cringe emotion, the everflowing tendencies to not be politically correct, smoking on live television, fights, turbulence and chaos. This is the epitome of how Love Island was until it became the ultimate cheat code in how to gain fame and notoriety . We started seeing people come into the villa with strategic gameplans as well as people simply coming in just to be “one hit wonders”. Around this time is when the effects of producers, along with editing started to take a toll on contestants. What they don’t preface is that you genuinely have no control over how the producers market you as well as how the public receives you. Editing is an incredible tool in which you can construct something out of nothing, which creates collateral damage, in this case it was at the expense of Mike Thalasis’s mental health. Mike Thalasis was a contestant on Love Island who suffered tremendously from having a bad edit on the show, so much so that he took his own life. Mike was described to be “Loyal” and “family oriented”, so the fact he was portrayed to be a nasty individual took an impeccable toll on his mental health as this narrative didn’t align with him at all. Imagine simply wanting to shop, meet with friends and family but all you hear is “Muggy Mike”. Jokes typically have to make people laugh and the joke wasn’t humouring Mike, I would go as far to say it probably became tedious. Granted it isn’t viewers fault as they weren’t to know that he was very different to what he was portrayed to be.

As of recent we are witnessing how ‘parasocial’ relationships are enabling people to completely forget that celebrities/influencers are not your friends- they are not an extension of you just because you watched their reality television journey. You cannot possibly assume you know someone because of several one hour epsiodes. We later saw multiple controversial incidents regarding Love Island but more notably the controversy surrounding Caroline Flack, who came under fire after a dispute with herself and her boyfriend. This incident was blasted all over the tabloids as she was potentially facing judicial scrutiny for allegedly asasaulting her boyfriend.

The way in which the media handled this situation, as well as spectators (fans/haters) was too much for her to bare and she simply couldn’t imagine a life in which she wasn’t able to escape the slander and return to normal ITV duties. Following the death of Caroline there was a movement pushed to the forefront called “Be Kind” , this means to always remember to be kind as many were not kind to Caroline causing her to lose her life. It seems that this movement was done in vain as ITV came under fire once again for the talk show “Jeremy Kyle”.

In hindsight looking back at the Jeremy Kyle show it was always evident that the show was completely unacceptable, and it’s not that I must create an excuse to justify why I enjoyed this show but in able to critique the failings I must also face up to my own enabling behaviour in contributing to the views which continued to uphold this show for as long as it did. The show targeted those who were in many cases unable to afford the resources needed to solve their probems, which should already indicate red flags which trigger throughts of ‘Oh this is kind of exploitative ’ but I was young and obssesed with drama and humour around others misfortunes which I am ever so lucky to not have ever endured or faced personally .

The way in which Jeremy treated his guests was terrible, sneering at them, speaking down to them as if they were toxic degenerates and managing to be condescending at every given moment, which to me now signifies his feelings towards the working class as he berraded along with insluted them on live tv under the guise of “discipline”. This behaviour simply was hypocritical as Jeremy had his own failed marriage, so in which way was he qualified to tell anyone about what is healthy ?

Steve Dymond took his own life 7 days after appearing on the show as he had failed a lie detector test in a bid to prove his fiancée Jane Callaghan suspicions wrong as she had felt he was being unfaithful. As Steve had failed this test the relationship was abolished despite Steve pleading with her. She had felt that he was simply continuing to lie. The controversy mostly derives from the shows contribution in failing to state how accurate these tests were. These tests were less than 70% accurate which means the remaining 30% is a large contributing factor to the fact this show intentionally left guests out in the dark regarding crucial statistics.This tragic cautionary tale should’ve ended here but it didn’t, a producer named Natasha Reddican who had casted Steve felt immense guilt for her role in the death that she also unintellionaly enabled.

As well as these tragedies another major hit show aired on ITV also had many people coming forward with horror stories detailing mistreatment by the tv show in question which was Xfactor, most notably a Pink tribute artist named Zoe Alexander . In a harrowing video shared onto youtube she recounts the overwhelming mental ordeal she experienced, due to the treatment during her audition that led her to experience a mental breakdown.Now without this raw recounter I intially just thought why is she overeacting ? Surely an Xfactor audition is never this serious ? I found it amusing that a pink tribute act would perform a Pink song whilst simultaneously reiterating she wanted to move away from the Pink persona. This is where the power of editing came into play, she was portrayed to be a manic, overeactive, delusional, pink obssesed woman, which is very far from the truth. Zoe was coerced into making the decision to perform mainly Pink songs, which she did without hesistation as her assumed big breakthrough was right around the corner. Little did she know this was part of a big plan orchestrated to align her to a charcter they’d already decided to paint her as.

Producers had also told her to arrive much earlier than other contestants as well as making her wait ages before giving her audition, not to mention she as well as her family had been deprived of food and drink which also abetted to the added pressure and irritability she experienced before her awful audition. The aftermath of the audition led to her being incredibly mentally ill as she had attempted to take her life several times. She suffered with constant reminders from people which ultimately meant her entire livelihood had been turned upside down.

So when we combine the deaths from Love Island & Jeremy Kyle alongside Xfactor we can identify there is a strong misuse of resources when regarding psychiatric evaluations and aftercare. But I truly think some of the responsibility lies on us as the viewers, or in this case myself as stated before I found ammusment in reality television. We need to reinforce the fact that as much as reality televison features real people, majority of things shown are not real. They’re simply orchestrated for entertainment and monetary gain. With the understanding that these shows aren’t real we can at least diminish the effects of how daunting it can be for contestants on shows to reintegrate into general society.

Sending a contestant hate mail shouldn’t and cannot be normalised because things really do take a turn for the worse, as we can see in my examples. I do think that there should be certified psychiatrists to evaluate contestants beforehand just to ensure they’re mentally fit to withstand conditions which could trigger, a potential breakdown from the immense amount of pressure placed on subjects . We should also remember that contestants aren’t animals, they shouldn’t have to withstand horrible harsh working conditions where they’re forced into a state of flight or fright. We can see that organic contestants who in their own ways find ways to stir up drama works ie. Big Brother & Love Island, so maybe the format needs to go back to this, we should have less people wanting to be stars and more people applying just because . The added components of potential fame or notoriety mean that it’s incredibly easy for someone not suitable to apply, to ignore the impending fact of potential mental instability.