6 ms·

The show “Alive” makes me think of colosseums sometimes. It is a reality show about surviving in the wild, except that they drop you in at the start of the fall

The show “Alive” makes me think of colosseums sometimes. It is a reality show about surviving in the wild, except that they drop you in at the start of the fall where there is no food and the end of every season is a starvation and suffering fest. The most recent season there are mostly poor people, one formerly homeless, who are all so desperate for the money that they take medical or wildlife-related risks on a regular basis. In one season, a poor dad is hiding frost bitten toes so a he can try to win money for his kid etc. In several seasons somebody has requested emergency extraction because of cold or animals or other things and it took 6–12 hours to get help - imagine if it was really urgent. I used to really enjoy the show but reality tv is pushing the envelope here a bit too much. They aren’t slaves and are doing this by choice, but like I said, some are desperately poor

extr 6y ago
I just finished watching season 6 of Alone and at first found it to be an interesting watch, but as I saw more episodes (and the contestants had been out there longer), I saw more and more of what you're talking about here. And after I finished the show and looked it up online, I was surprised to see just how much of the narrative I had just watched was completely fabricated and morally repugnant. For those who aren't familiar, the premise is 10 people are shipped to a remote destination with the basics (sleeping bag, axe, cord, etc...) and whoever lasts the longest gets $500K ($0 if you lose, I presume). They are also given camera equipment and are responsible for filming themselves. They don't see anyone else while they're out there except a medical team for occasional check-ups. Season 6 took place in northern Canada in near arctic conditions, starting in late fall and continuing through winter. (Spoilers) * The skill gap between best/worst contestants is portrayed as minimal. In reality, some contestants came in with years of lived experience thriving in the exact environment of the show (like the victor, who had spent years living in Siberia with people native to the region), or are literally paid professionals (like the army survival instructor, who tapped out because he was so successfully surviving he was bored, and didn't need the money), while others come from difficult backgrounds and have picked up wilderness skills only as a hobby or by necessity. When you find out just how large the skill gap was, and how some of these contestants basically never had a chance, it feels completely exploitive and effectively rigged. * Contestants give "camera confessions" in classic reality TV style, but these take a very dark turn as the show progresses. Going from "Excited to overcome the mental challenge of isolation", to starving, choking through tears "If I can hang on just a few more days I might be able to win the prize money for my family and give them the life I never had" in just a few episodes. If people are out there doing this for pride or because they enjoy the experience, so be it, but it's another thing entirely to dangle a large monetary prize in front of them. It just feels really sick to be watching people who are incredibly vulnerable and literally dying open up about their traumas and making it very clear they are only sticking it out for the cash. Begging to be allowed to stay when they are clearly underweight and at risk for cardiac issues. * The final episode makes it seem like the 2 remaining contestants are both just hanging by a thread, a literal starvation contest, which would be sad enough. But if you do some research afterward, you find out that while the 2nd place contestant had lost a dangerous amount of weight and was eating rabbit entrails, the winner had 100s of lbs of food stored (including moose and plenty of fish) and had not lost any weight. Hell, the last (gigantic) fish he caught they apparently brought back and used to feed the production camp. * All this said, the winner of Season 6, Jordan Jonas, is a very interesting (and apparently humble, good natured) guy, and I have enjoyed reading his commentary on the show on reddit and his blog. The show portrays him as lucky in some respects, probably to make him seem more like the other contestants, but he was in fact using a great deal of very specific techniques and knowledge, like how to build an structurally sound/ideal shelter, track/bait/hunt large game, ice fish, or build structures to keep stored food away from other predators. He himself admits the show obviously created a false narrative around his chances to win.
- jonny_eh 6y ago
  If the prizes went to charity it could remove the "sad" factor.
  - extr 6y ago
    But most of the people with these skills are not independently wealthy, and would be hard pressed to give up wages for a few months just to participate. I think the ideal situation would just be to use a tiered prize structure. Where the longer you last the more money you get, but not so much that you're incentivized to stay after it becomes hopeless/dangerous. A 500K 1st prize could easily be split into 150/100/75/50/50/25/25/25 for places 1-8. That way you're always competing for about 25K more, but you're not desperate to hang out or get sent home with nothing.
    - hutzlibu 6y ago
      Yes, but that reduces drama/colosseum fights. I think the original colosseum fights were mostly not fair either, but the audience just wants blood.
      - WalterBright 6y ago
        > I think the original Colosseum fights were mostly not fair either I would expect the opposite. Nobody wants to see a pro baseball team crush a high school team, they want to see an evenly matched slugfest. The notion of a "fair fight" is deeply ingrained in people.
        hutzlibu 6y ago
        Yeah, but the mob also likes winners. After a "fair" fight. Like in the reality survival show. It seems like a good fight, but when you have trained professionals vs. desperate people - you can have a spectactular fight, just not a fair one.
        6y ago
Ericson2314 6y ago
If wage-slaves is a phrase, I suppose we can say wage-gladiators.
etrautmann 6y ago
Do you mean the show “Alone”? I have conflicted feelings about it if we’re discussing the same show. On one hand, many of the contestants are survival experts who relish the challenge, and get regular medical checkups etc. OTOH, they routinely discuss their financial motivations. It feels different from the (morally reprehensible) bum fights of the early internet but I could see the argument for rough equivalence.
- hertzrat 6y ago
  Pardon me, alone is probably the correct name. I can’t remember for sure
- philistine 6y ago
  The early internet had bum fights !?
  - rasz 6y ago
    Early? Current internet has bum fights, killings, maimings, decapitations, prostitutes pissing on produce in grocery stores or masturbating with beer bottles from the shelf, people in India committing suicide by high voltage line (no ide a why, but very popular there), moped drivers falling into oncoming truck and getting popped like an ant, etc etc. Its all available now in greatest number to date, some of it you can even pay someone to make you tailor made snuff movie. theync is a real life 8mm (1999) times 100 every single day.
  - ObsoleteNerd 6y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumfights https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumfights Despicable group of humans who went on to do such quality things as stealing body parts of dead babies to try smuggle them into the US.
  - hertzrat 6y ago
    A friend somehow got one of the DVDs once, except it was the sequel: Ex-con fights. He made us watch it one night and it was really uncomfortable. Every fight ends with an epileptic seizure after somebody's head got kicked too many times. Its making me really uncomfortable to just think about it, its really horrible stuff
xwdv 6y ago
These shows are highly produced and lightly scripted, chances are the reality is nothing like what you get on TV.
- coldtea 6y ago
  Not everything is totally fake (within limits). The best of those shows don't even have a crew on the island - there are statically positioned cameras and the players operate others themselves.

extr 6y ago

I just finished watching season 6 of Alone and at first found it to be an interesting watch, but as I saw more episodes (and the contestants had been out there longer), I saw more and more of what you're talking about here. And after I finished the show and looked it up online, I was surprised to see just how much of the narrative I had just watched was completely fabricated and morally repugnant. For those who aren't familiar, the premise is 10 people are shipped to a remote destination with the basics (sleeping bag, axe, cord, etc...) and whoever lasts the longest gets $500K ($0 if you lose, I presume). They are also given camera equipment and are responsible for filming themselves. They don't see anyone else while they're out there except a medical team for occasional check-ups. Season 6 took place in northern Canada in near arctic conditions, starting in late fall and continuing through winter. (Spoilers) * The skill gap between best/worst contestants is portrayed as minimal. In reality, some contestants came in with years of lived experience thriving in the exact environment of the show (like the victor, who had spent years living in Siberia with people native to the region), or are literally paid professionals (like the army survival instructor, who tapped out because he was so successfully surviving he was bored, and didn't need the money), while others come from difficult backgrounds and have picked up wilderness skills only as a hobby or by necessity. When you find out just how large the skill gap was, and how some of these contestants basically never had a chance, it feels completely exploitive and effectively rigged. * Contestants give "camera confessions" in classic reality TV style, but these take a very dark turn as the show progresses. Going from "Excited to overcome the mental challenge of isolation", to starving, choking through tears "If I can hang on just a few more days I might be able to win the prize money for my family and give them the life I never had" in just a few episodes. If people are out there doing this for pride or because they enjoy the experience, so be it, but it's another thing entirely to dangle a large monetary prize in front of them. It just feels really sick to be watching people who are incredibly vulnerable and literally dying open up about their traumas and making it very clear they are only sticking it out for the cash. Begging to be allowed to stay when they are clearly underweight and at risk for cardiac issues. * The final episode makes it seem like the 2 remaining contestants are both just hanging by a thread, a literal starvation contest, which would be sad enough. But if you do some research afterward, you find out that while the 2nd place contestant had lost a dangerous amount of weight and was eating rabbit entrails, the winner had 100s of lbs of food stored (including moose and plenty of fish) and had not lost any weight. Hell, the last (gigantic) fish he caught they apparently brought back and used to feed the production camp. * All this said, the winner of Season 6, Jordan Jonas, is a very interesting (and apparently humble, good natured) guy, and I have enjoyed reading his commentary on the show on reddit and his blog. The show portrays him as lucky in some respects, probably to make him seem more like the other contestants, but he was in fact using a great deal of very specific techniques and knowledge, like how to build an structurally sound/ideal shelter, track/bait/hunt large game, ice fish, or build structures to keep stored food away from other predators. He himself admits the show obviously created a false narrative around his chances to win.

jonny_eh 6y ago
If the prizes went to charity it could remove the "sad" factor.
- extr 6y ago
  But most of the people with these skills are not independently wealthy, and would be hard pressed to give up wages for a few months just to participate. I think the ideal situation would just be to use a tiered prize structure. Where the longer you last the more money you get, but not so much that you're incentivized to stay after it becomes hopeless/dangerous. A 500K 1st prize could easily be split into 150/100/75/50/50/25/25/25 for places 1-8. That way you're always competing for about 25K more, but you're not desperate to hang out or get sent home with nothing.
  - hutzlibu 6y ago
    Yes, but that reduces drama/colosseum fights. I think the original colosseum fights were mostly not fair either, but the audience just wants blood.
    - WalterBright 6y ago
      > I think the original Colosseum fights were mostly not fair either I would expect the opposite. Nobody wants to see a pro baseball team crush a high school team, they want to see an evenly matched slugfest. The notion of a "fair fight" is deeply ingrained in people.
      - hutzlibu 6y ago
        Yeah, but the mob also likes winners. After a "fair" fight. Like in the reality survival show. It seems like a good fight, but when you have trained professionals vs. desperate people - you can have a spectactular fight, just not a fair one.
        6y ago

Ericson2314 6y ago

If wage-slaves is a phrase, I suppose we can say wage-gladiators.

etrautmann 6y ago

Do you mean the show “Alone”? I have conflicted feelings about it if we’re discussing the same show. On one hand, many of the contestants are survival experts who relish the challenge, and get regular medical checkups etc. OTOH, they routinely discuss their financial motivations. It feels different from the (morally reprehensible) bum fights of the early internet but I could see the argument for rough equivalence.

hertzrat 6y ago
Pardon me, alone is probably the correct name. I can’t remember for sure
philistine 6y ago
The early internet had bum fights !?
- rasz 6y ago
  Early? Current internet has bum fights, killings, maimings, decapitations, prostitutes pissing on produce in grocery stores or masturbating with beer bottles from the shelf, people in India committing suicide by high voltage line (no ide a why, but very popular there), moped drivers falling into oncoming truck and getting popped like an ant, etc etc. Its all available now in greatest number to date, some of it you can even pay someone to make you tailor made snuff movie. theync is a real life 8mm (1999) times 100 every single day.
- ObsoleteNerd 6y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumfights https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumfights Despicable group of humans who went on to do such quality things as stealing body parts of dead babies to try smuggle them into the US.
- hertzrat 6y ago
  A friend somehow got one of the DVDs once, except it was the sequel: Ex-con fights. He made us watch it one night and it was really uncomfortable. Every fight ends with an epileptic seizure after somebody's head got kicked too many times. Its making me really uncomfortable to just think about it, its really horrible stuff

xwdv 6y ago

These shows are highly produced and lightly scripted, chances are the reality is nothing like what you get on TV.

coldtea 6y ago
Not everything is totally fake (within limits). The best of those shows don't even have a crew on the island - there are statically positioned cameras and the players operate others themselves.