This whole so-called reality crap is going too far.

It was bad enough when it was a bunch of actor-wannabes out on some island or something, running races or reinventing fire or whatever it was they were doing to prove they were more fit to marry a millionaire or whatever idiocy those things were built on, but this last round of shows is getting...horrible.

Women going through plastic surgery makeovers just to reinforce that old stereotype that you have to fit a narrow range of "beauty" to be a worthwhile person. I notice we're not seeing any guys volunteering to have their double-chins removed for the amusement of millions of slack-jawed viewers.

And it's worse than that. It's all getting mean. Mean-spirited. Focused on the humiliation factor.

Women competing for the "love" of a millionaire only to be told he's just a working-class guy, then the audience holding its breath to see if she stomps off mad.

And now we get a gay-themed dating game, only the fun (Ha. Ha.) is that the guy isn't competing for the affections of other gay men.

Nooo, they have to "spice it up" by including some het guys in the mix. (As if that isn't going to fuel the nightmares of a million straight men secretly convinced that every gay guy in the world is secretly after his ugly butt.)

What's next? "Reality" shows were guys have to choose their woman from a pool that, all unknown to them, contains a few cross-dressers and a transsexual or two?

Why not go all out and find someone's long-long sister or brother and throw them into the dating pool? What's a little potential incest when these kinds of ratings are at stake?

I blame every single one of you who has watched one of these shows and discussed it around the water cooler the next day. You're all part of the problem, okay?

If people weren't so feeble-minded that this kind of crap passed for entertainment in their lives, the airwaves wouldn't be filled with it today and we wouldn't be threatened with more and more bottom-sucking concepts every year.

You know, I was in a reasonably good mood before a Former Friend* sent me this stupid link.

Occasionally it occurs to me to wonder why I spend so much time watching the Food Channel any more, but then I realize that seeing the factory process to put the Ms on M&Ms or watching some master-chef create a five foot tall sugar sculpture or haring about the best places in the country to get seafood is ten times as interesting as mainstream television.

* Just kidding, piglet, you know that. :P