Poverty in Media

Yes! My thoughts exactly. In helping people, they should look at the grand scheme of things, rather than helping isolated cases. The Ultra Stampede was a terrible time in game show history, and just goes to show how far people can go just for an opportunity for money - and the game developers capitalized on it. And now the same show faces another challenge, accusations of cheating on the way they conduct their show. If this is true, then I would really think that their show was just, well, for show - without the intention of helping people. Instead, duping the very people they portray to help.

I don't really know if we'll get to see some results on their investigation about it, I believe they have some influences in the government that allows them to continue their irregularities. It's obvious that they do this for the SHOW, they could offer help "off the cam" but they instead used the opportunity to topple the other program that they have dreamt for a long time to remove off the air. But I guess that'll happen only in their dremas, it's credibility and responsibility that is important in running a show and not just the money..

This is actually one bad ideology in America, where they portray poverty as no one's fault but the person. It brings a social problem to the level of personal trouble, not considering the many structural constraints that impedes individual social mobility. Unequal education, racial and gender discrimination, unemployment, and many other contingent factors like economic inflation. Though there are indeed many things that may be a fault of the individual, we must not be too quick in reducing it to his level without consideration of his social environment. It's blaming the victim. To further stress my point, why not look on the otherside of the equation towards the rich people? You'll find out that most of them didn't get rich because they exerted too much effort. It is also a matter of inheritance. And the fact that rich kids already have it all going for them - good education, leadership lessons, and other means of acquiring further social and economic capital in the future. It's a vicious cycle, and the ideology you hold only legitimizes the equality. That given, I thank you for replying. :-)

In some way, I agree with Marxist ideology, and to relegate it to a mere narrative without basis is a fallacy committed by those who are not very familiar to it. Meritocracy is also a grand ideology, propagated by capitalism to the point that individuals of such societies are made to think that it is the only way to go. But statistically, are we speaking of a great trend where those that work hard are ultimately rewarded? Those people mentioned are statistical exceptions, take the percentage of the rich and see that only a handful of them didn't grow rich because of hereditary succession. As for the original reply, I agree with your point. We should look at the greater social condition rather than focusing merely on individual agents. This is reminscent of C.W. Mills' sociological imagination, where personal troubles must always be linked with societal concerns. Biography is also in some way a factor of history, and vice versa. To look at the problem in the individual level is to ignore the social issue that the individual himself is a part of.

Soap operas are bad too if they show that the poor will someday, by some twist of fate, become rich. It's false ideology and it is oftentimes internalized by people to the point that they will have false hopes. But yeah, in a way we know that that they are not real, we just have to be careful on their subtle influence. I also agree that we don't really know their motivation. Granted, some personalities really want to help, but looking at the bigger picture, are they really helping in the long run? Thanks for replying!