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The Money Pimps 1/12/2005 5:57:11 AM
The Bible tells us that, “The love of money is the root of all evil.” Judging from programs on the telly today, it is the root of shameless stupidity as well.
I suppose it might have begun in the 1950’s with a drama called “The Millionaire”, wherein a ‘Mr. Anthony’ showed the wretched lives of a few people every week and then chose one ‘worthy’ and dropped a million dollars in their laps. I was only a kid at the time, but it seemed like a good deal to me.
Fast forward forty years to where Maury and Jerry discovered that people will display their stupidity and lack of morality for a lot less money. Not only that but they will get naked and fight for it. I asked my wife why she watched these programs. She said, “They make my life look good.” I’m still trying to figure that one out. Or, maybe I shouldn’t.
Now we have ‘Reality Shows’ where pretty people vie to marry rich bachelors/bachelorettes, displaying our species’ greed’s and petty jealousies like a Shakespeare play. We have ‘Survival Shows’ wherein people will cut each other’s throats (figuratively and literally, I suppose) to win the money. Not our finest hour.
But the one show that proves my contention is on cable, featuring two English cleaning ladies who pick a house to clean. Once upon a time, houses had a room called a ‘parlor’, a room set aside, where children did not enter, a room kept clean and spotless to receive company, like the Preacher on Sunday. The front door led to the parlor and a visitor could not see the rest of the house.
In the cleaning show we see a family assembled, grinning and waving, inviting us (and the English ladies) inside to see how they live. The really disturbing part is hearing the ladies degrade the homeowners as we walk through the house. “Oh, dear, it smells like a stable in here! What’s this? Your nine dogs have peed in the sofa and on the pile of clothes on the laundry room floor. Don’t you ever wash, my dear?” The woman of the house grins at this insult. “Still, I guess you don’t get much help from your inbred family, do you, dear?” Camera pans across the grinning husband and children. In the bathroom, “Look at all the black mold! Did you know that its spores can kill you?” The kitchen, “I’d call this a pig sty but I don’t suppose any self-respecting pig would come in here. Look at the dirty dishes in the sink; do you buy new ones instead of washing these? We’re going to take samples of the crud in your reefer to illustrate the dangerous bacteria you’re breeding.” More grins.
Enter an industrial strength cleaning army to restore the house to like new. At the end, the family waves and smiles again. They got money and a clean house in exchange for their humiliation. Have we no shame?
