"You look fabulous!"

Todd Mckenie 

 

I must admit that since beginning this site, I have found myself sitting in front of the television, watching shows that I previously would never have looked twice at. Last week, I entered the world of Dancing With The Stars, and tonight, I went there, again. If only to provide a contrast - yet a telling one, mind you - I can't help but confess to you that I have developed a fondness for this utterly tacky, but somehow endearing show.

The thing is, though, it's a charming, old school sort of tackiness. And yes, perhaps I'm being sentimental - but there's a truth in sentimentality we often overlook. Sentimentality is such a large part of our lives, and to be honest, I really credit the Nine and Seven networks for realising that its social value has increased in recent years. Regression was a large focus of my psychology studies, and the novel I have been finishing through my postgraduate in recent years is largely an exploration of regression, and it's connection to our culture as a matter of both functionality and desire. So I was bound to find the Dancing With The Stars phenomenon interesting, because I think there's something very regressive about it's pleasure. 

 

On this website, as we all know, it tends to be the Ten network that suffers at the hands of my television viewing schedule. And the thing about Ten is that it acts as a perfect symbol of "now". It's target audience are youth, and in line with this, it features very little regression. It's agenda - it's self-declared challenge - is to remain on the cutting edge of programming, as it thunders into the "future" (or at very least, acts as if it does). That's one of the reasons I engage it - because if you want to observe where our world is going, there is much to be found in the projections of mainstream culture, and the ideas and images that shape the people plugged into its pseudo-reality (as much as it reflects and appeases them). And it's a dark world, rather. It's a world where young people happily place themselves in a position where they are torn apart as the country watches them fart, confess, have sex, or even sexually assault each other. It's a world where the power of being the celebrity has consumed the masses, to the point where they are lured towards their own exploitation by greedy corporations who are all in on the advertising and revenue bonanza. It's a world where young dreamers are told to believe in themselves, until they rock up for auditions where they are gutted by scripted, contrived nastiness. It's a nasty little world, Channel Ten, it deserves everything I give it - but it does adequately represent where we are heading, there's no doubt in my mind about that.

Nine, however, has recently moulded a programming agenda that drips in sentimentality (with the abominable exception of the new Survivor, which we will discuss, later). With it's older audience, it quite smartly recognised that everyone is now seduced by regression, in a rather scary world where today 'aint so crash hot, and tomorrow looks potentially grim. Like children who instinctively long to be in their Mother's arms whenever crisis strikes, culture can provide an outlet for an anxious desire to rewind. We naturally run to where we feel the best place is. When that's based around our optimistic sense of what is to come, we charge a thousand miles an hour into the future (such a huge part of 80's culture, and the years of Beyond 2000, etc); but when that feels potentially worse than even today is, some part of us psychologically retreats to what is behind us, when things were "better" - usually helped by both (or either) things actually being better, or the way we tend to selectively create a memory of yesterday that is perhaps a little more fun to remember than it was to live it. Whatever the case, we are drawn to the past, and culture can provide cues (consciously or subconsciously recognised) that stroke this pleasure within us. It's a sense-memory - we are really recreating a "memory" of happiness (that in turn, recreates the feeling), by triggering it with associations - and it sells big, right now.

Last night, we saw the most blatant regressive programming in Nine's new series, What Year Is It? Each week, a year is chosen, and for an hour, we simply stroll down memory lane for the sake of it. And while it never got too heavy, neither did it shy away from the chance to paint some rather vivid and telling portraits, that worked very much off a comparison to the present. 1983 was a time when Midnight Oil were scoring number one records that were purely political, and when the average mainstream turned up to protest the Cold War to mainstream political rock. Now, of course, mass entertainment keeps it's nose pretty much out of politics (and those who do, risk being lynched, Dixie Chicks style) - it's pretty hard to imagine the modern teenager listening to Australian protest rock, on their ipod. But in 1983, Peter Garret (interviewed for the show) was really cool - in fact, even Bob Brown was, who successfully saved a Tasmanian forrest (in an era where everyday people took to the streets, and actually did things). Perhaps, not all the mainstream who lapped this show up were consciously absorbing it as a regressive contrast, but the show was making little pretense of what it was often doing.

And though admittedly, Seven's Dancing With The Stars is not a direct regression in the same way a conscious stroll down memory lane (like What Year Is It?) is, the regression is very much there. Dancing With The Stars has stepped out of a time machine. It in no way resembles Ten's cruel, desperate, over-commercialised vision of the future, and instead throws back to the late 70's variety show, 80's camp, and even the post-war suburban dance culture. And this is now the biggest show on television (more people watched last year's finale than the Terri Irwin interview, and as many people watched this season's premiere); getting stronger as Ten's monster, Big Brother, begins to struggle, and Australian Idol (that doesn't rate anywhere near as high) tries to resurrect itself with it's (pitiful and deceptive) bid to win over the more "credible" audience. And the strange irony of everybody wanting to go back, is that you actually start to change what it is to be "now" (culturally speaking). "Now" becomes "then", which in turn, becomes a kind of "now". That's exactly what happens in Dancing With The Stars - when it is no longer even presented as "retro" (despite how old fashioned it really is), because it assimilates into our perception of "now". And kids watch it, too - we change their "now" with a little bit of "then" (that they don't even realise is a "then", because they only know "now"). Confused?

 

So anyway, I'm all for it - and am a little bit privvy to the "then", myself. I don't want to validate regression to the point of denial - we do have to move forward, and people need to be more pro-active in doing so - but a little bit of a reminder can actually benefit that. It provides a contrast to what we dislike about now, and if used correctly, can ultimately remind us of what we need to push for, and what we feel is missing. It's okay to wish things were a little nicer. It's not okay to do so to the point where we retreat from stepping up with what needs to be done, today. So let's remember that when we choose to indulge such culture, and while we let it dazzle us with a safer, nicer space, let's take the time to relate it to today - so that we return to "now", having benefited from having been to "then".

Dancing With the Stars is the most harmlessly silly two hours you can spend in high-rating commercial television. On Big Brother, a scandal is when two boys hold down a girl and rub their genitals in her face; on Dancing With Stars, Kerry Armstrong lost an earring while doing the jive. On Australian Idol, all the women are told they're too fat, or look like "bushpigs" or "like a girl who would stab you at a train station"; on Dancing With The Stars, everyone is told they look "fabulous", and Amanda Kellar is applauded for having the guts to put her curvy, middle-aged body confidently into a sexy dance and dress. On Tench, homosexuality serves the purpose of revolting - homophobic - gay gags; on Dancing With The Stars, half the men on screen are gay, and nobody hides it or cares. The judges don't fight or pretend to dislike each other, and even the designated "meanie" is actually quite nice, and usually apologises after criticising.