Vh1: Friend, Foe, Frenemy?

I am firmly convinced that had I not had Vh1 freely fed into my apartment as an undergrad my G.P.A. would have been 0.6 points higher and I wouldn't currently be sitting in a windowless bedroom that smells like paint updating an internet TV blog for an audience of two (you know who you are, my sole RSS feeder). I had unfettered access, though, to that crack of cable, airing endless marathons of count down lists that legitimately had me wondering, "who DOES have the #4 hardest rock body?!" I would sit on that 9 foot couch, a Chipotle burrito sitting on my chest, and actively know what it was like to have television eat my brain.

Three years later Vh1 has taken its calculus of narcotizing crap and out of it actually spun a viable media platform: Celeb-reality. Shows like Flavor of Love, The Surreal Life, and I Love New York have given the network some of the highest ratings in the land of cable and, as Bill Carter in today's New York Times points out, pioneered the path for a bizarre new programming maxim:

Take a pop cultural idol from the past 20 years or so — idol being defined so broadly as to include almost anyone who ever struck the public consciousness even a glancing blow — and place him or her in some reality television context.

Carter's article raises the obvious criticisms levelled against shows like Flavor of Love, which opponents claim reify black stereotypes of minstrels and hoochies. Most interesting, however, is the paradoxical role Vh1 seeks to establish for itself as the gatekeepers of "Acceptable TV," an upcoming show starring Jack Black that "dovetails neatly with the general skepticism that VH1 executives have about the value of the Internet vs. traditional television."

Here we have Vh1, the network that brought us Mini-Me peeing on a Brady Brother, as the final arbiter of taste between what passes for measly user generated content and broadcast worthy entertainment. Maybe that passes for irony, but I'm not exactly sure of the term's definition. If only I'd spent more time in the library as an undergrad than on my couch inhaling burritos taking note of the top 40 most awesomely dirrrty songs of '04.