Some time has passed since Rihanna and Chris Brown's violent altercation. The passage of time has not quelled the public hunger for even the most trivial details of their private lives. Violence and sex entice even the most dispassionate into a frenzy of ravenous voyeurism.
The omnipresence and ease of the Internet grants publishing powers to almost anyone who could wish for them. This has given rise to entirely new kind of entertainment reporter, the amateur paparazzi. Celebrity tracking is no longer strictly for insiders, elites, and tabloids. An ordinary citizen can run and fill a celebrity tracking blog with as little as a cellphone camera and a Twitter account. However, the availability of information doesn't necessarily translate to the consumption of that information. So why is the minutiae of Chris Brown and Rihanna suddenly so compelling? Because it looks like a television show. On Lifetime.
This "story" and a movie on Lifetime have considerable textual similarities. A Lifetime movie often presents us with celebrities (in the guise of a character) confronted with the consequences of a combination of physical, psychological, and sexual abuses. Many of us have learned that this is simply idle amusement to be consumed with little thought or questioning. Chris Brown and Rihanna play the parts of victimized woman and abusive man. The public then does as it's been trained and suspends disbelief and accepts the social interaction of domestic violence as a spectacle of entertainment. Violence against women is an acceptable and extremely common go-to plot device. People who could not be bothered to care who these two were before the incident are now riveted, waiting to find out what happens next. We don't look away because this looks like something at which we're meant to stare. Hypnotized.
This post is not an indictment of Lifetime. Violence against women is the plot dynamo of any number of episodes of popular television shows with a conceptual conceit of realism. Choose any episode of the many permutations of CSI or Law and Order. These shows not only offer references, but are often centered squarely on the subject.
But this is life. There will be no decisively joyous or tragic outcome. The credits aren't going to roll and snap us from our Pavlovian paralysis. So every detail takes on a sharp new significance. Why is Rihanna shopping for a house without Mr. Brown? It must be symbolic of her desire to end the relationship. It must have significance or it wouldn't be in the story. But news is not narrative. When it is interpreted as such there can be dangerous consequences. Imagine if the totality of public knowledge of sex came from popular television shows. I'll let the tragic consequences of that sit with you.
Do we need to develop, as a society, a toolkit for understanding television as a medium? Is the answer to the cries of quivering parents, not the control of the medium, but simply a more complete understanding of it? A multitude of tools and literature exist to educate oneself or children on nearly every facet of sexual behavior. That is an interesting inequity. Society has gone to great lengths to provide educational materials which provide practical and useful knowledge regarding sex and sexuality. But it has not done so in regard to violence. There are no violence education classes. Within which, domestic violence or "family" violence could be appropriately addressed. Scare tactics and misinformation neither curb interest nor alleviate the dangers of sex. Why would it work for violence? Why are we content to teach ourselves about violence through television?
Is poor storytelling the real danger of television?
And that's where a mention of Chris Brown and Rihanna led me today.
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