Back in the early days of reality TV, Survivor was the only such show I watched with any regularlity. I didn’t care for the bitchiness and constant infighting, but the games were fun and it fed my desert island fantasy.
Early on, I recognized a truth about Survivor: it’s fundamentally racist. In those early seasons, you never (or, at least, almost never) saw a non-Caucasian face in the final four. Plus, of course, there’s a massive swimming gap between African-Americans and other ethnic groups, and plenty of the challenges happened in, on and under water.
Apparently only two of the 12 winners have been minorities. That’s actually not all that far off the mark, considering 23% of Americans do not identify themselves as ‘white’. One more winner and you’d be representing the US’s ethnic mix accurately.
I’m glad to see that Mark Burnett, the show’s cocksure Aussie creator, is embracing this injustice:
Fueled by critics who slammed its lack of diversity, CBS’s Survivor has unveiled a new twist for its upcoming season: Contestants will be divided by ethnicity. When it premieres Sept. 14, Survivor: Cook Islands will feature 20 castaways divided into four tribes: black, white, Asian and Latino.
I got this from Meg, who submits that what the world doesn’t need “is one more race clash.” I disagree. I’m a big advocate of Paul Graham’s ideas on taboos. A central premise is that ideas which once were utter taboos (‘the Earth is round’, ‘women should vote’, and so forth) are now commonplace. If we never examine our current taboos with openmindedness, how are we going to separate the legitimately wrong ideas from those who’s time has not yet arrived?
The taboo here is that ‘dividing people by ethnicity is always a bad thing’. I don’t necessarily disagree with that, but that doesn’t mean we should never talk about it. And silly TV game shows give us a safe, accessable way to do so.
DarrenBarefoot.com 
Finally, something new and outrageous. They have to keep pushing the enveloppe to make things entertaining again.
Thanks for the link, but I don’t really think they’re trying for intelligent dialogue or taboo exploration there, Darren. I think they’re trying for shock value.
Ask someone living in South Africa how “entertaining” and “fun” and “safe” their race debate might be. Or people in a hundred other countries. I’m sure they’d love the chance to resolve their “issues” on a tropical island with camera crews and high security nearby, rather than in obscurity and poverty and violence.
Losing an immunity challenge is probably far preferable to losing a relative. But they won’t get that chance, will they?
Even if it pops up in the New Yorker with a winking article after the fact or blazes around the MSM media with a shocked look attached or gets bandied about by a million bloggers, it doesn’t change the fact that Mark Burnett isn’t in it for our cultural wellbeing or to forward debate.
He’s doing it for inherently self-serving reasons, which, now that I think of it, is actually the basis for the creation of most racial clashes, anyway. And I’m still naive or idealistic enough to ascribe importance to motive.
This issue is very UNfunny and very UNentertaining for millions of people all over the globe. And while attacking taboos is excellent and admirable and wise, that’s not what’s happening here. Keeping the taboo alive long enough to support ratings is.
I maintain that the world doesn’t need another race clash, in “safe” surroundings, or not.
Meg: I absolutely agree, and I guess I thought it went without saying, that Burnett is in it for the controversy and attention. I also don’t think he’s trying to start a thoughtful dialogue on race relations. That may just be an unlikely result.
I agree that this issue is unfunny and unentertaining for millions of people, but so’s poverty, and I didn’t hear anybody complaining about ‘The Simple Life’. At least, not about its portrayal of impoverished people.
So’s war, yet there are plenty war and violent films and TV shows. And don’t let’s talk about crime shows.
Conflict, whether it be spawned of racism, religious differences and so forth, is fundamental to our storytelling. We see race clashes every night, in cop shows, in sitcoms and in the nightly news. Would you advocate removing all of that from the airwaves as well?
I don’t think we should make a practice of rejecting shows based on the fact that they may offend people. If we did, there would be nothing left in our theatres or on our televisions.
Regardless, I was wondering about something you wrote near the end: what taboo is Barnett keeping alive?
When Survivor went to Australia, I made a report to the Great Barrier Reef Authority about the removal of coral during the show. People Mag wanted to interview me, but, when the Reef people told them I was in Canada, they decided to interview an American who made the report after I did. So that just goes to show what sorts of bias are involved.
I don’t know that it goes without saying after you laud his “truthiness.”
I WOULD complain about the portrayal of poverty and cultural differences on the Simple Life. But mostly I complain about the existence of Paris, period.
I think you’re missing my point: he’s not saying racial divisions are wrong. He’s not saying racial conflicts are wrong. He’s not exploring those dynamics as they exist in society. He’s setting up a false situation for shock value that may very well create more ignorance than it defeats.
And I’m also not asking for it to be removed from the airwaves. I’m saying I object to it, which is pretty much what I can say about anything I like without asking that it be censored. This is my freedom, just as it’s his freedom to offend me or anyone else.
You spoke at the end of your piece about how we should engage in debate and discussion about taboos — I’m making the assumption that the end goal of said discussion would be to eradicate taboos that should not exist and confirm those that should remain taboos because they are undoubtedly harmful in some way that most sane humans can recognize.
I really don’t think he’s doing anything that intelligent. He’s just using a taboo to piss people off, and celebrating it to some degree in the meantime.
I didn’t express that well before though. Or maybe even now.
I don’t know — hard to believe I was ever a bloodless debate champ when I get so hot and bothered about stuff like this now.
Ah, Defamer says most of them are from LA, and a lot of them are actors. Ah well.
What I meant, which I may not have explained clearly enough, is that by making a controversial decision, Burnett may accidentally provoke debate and discussion about taboos.
I expect that plenty of taboos have been deconstructed or eliminated without intent. Or at least that process was started without intent.
I guess the reason I dig the move is because it’s so provocative, something that TV rarely is. Do I think it’s going to make anybody more or less racist? Probably not–it’s going to be too innocuous in its execution for that.
As for Burnett himself, he’s clealy a publicity hound, but I respect his roots. Years before Survivor, he ran a fantastic endurance race called Eco-Challenge, and that made for fantastic television. Far better, I might add, than Survivor itself.
Also, can you clarify your use of ‘truthiness’? I’m familiar with the term, but I’m not sure how I’m not sure what Burnett’s truthiness is, or how I’m lauding it?
I LOVED ECO-CHALLENGE! One of my favourite shows ever. That’s part of why this is disappointing.
But I do agree with all your points. Thanks for opening up the discussion. My reaction was a kneejerk one, I admit.
And “truthiness” came from “admits truth” in your headline. I’m mocking Burnett’s grasp of “truth”, not yours. Although the demographic evidence is indeed the truth, I don’t think that it particularly concerns Burnett — it’s just a means to announce his next end.
I was priveleged to be in Sydney in 2000, working the Olympics at the time Survivor was wrapping up there.
Bill Bryson was doing guest columns for the Morning Herald (such a paper Vancouver should dream of having!). He wrote a very good column about the fact that for possibly fifty thousand years the Aborigines not only survived, but thrived in the conditions of possibly the most hostile inhabited area on Earth.
But he’d noticed the world only turned up to watch a bunch of starchy white “C”-grade actors squabble over a bag of rice.
Burnett’s desperately trying to inject new life into what is hopefully a concept rattling off to the Hollywood cemetary.
But as long as we’re being racist, I wanna see these guys go up against an Inuit team in Nunavut–there’s a real test of survival!
FYI, Mark Burnett is not Australian, he’s “a British-born, naturalized citizen of the United States”.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Burnett
The trouble with “talking about the taboos” is that sometimes the discussion gets framed by people like this.
I suppose that’s why it disturbs me. If the “white” team wins–what fodder will the neo-nazis draw from that? Next, will it be Jews, Christians, Muslims and Buddhists?
If Burnett was interested in testing a hypothesis, he should have created an “alloys are stronger” team to compete against his uniracial groups.
What about the Middle Eastern tribe? The Aboriginal Tribe or the East Indian Tribe?