The Perils of PBB Phenomenon

This morning I received an email entitled The Perils of PBB Phenomenon. I haven’t read it completely but I guess it’s something worth sharing since I have high respect for its author.

The Perils of the PBB Phenomenon

The crowd gives a deafening cheer and a rousing standing ovation as six pairs of young men and women come out from the back part of a platform illuminated by a thousand glittering lights, clad in matching biker outfits of mauve, cerulean and gold—all bright colors that signify youth and vitality—each one ready to claim all the glory in the world from the center of the stage, as it were. Undulating awkwardly to the beat of a popular melody which has become the cultural catchphrase of an entire generation, the twelve wear smiles worthy of toothpaste endorsements as they bask in the adulation of people who unwittingly feed their egos. Riding in brand-new, gleaming motorcycles, the twelve part the motley sea of curious onlookers, supporters and followers as they travel to the place they will call home for the next forty-two days, in hopes of forging new friendships, finding true love, and (if they’re lucky) winning one million pesos.
Such was the scene in the opening of ABS-CBN’s latest installment of the (debatably) popular TV franchise, Pinoy Big Brother. Now sporting “Teen Edition” as its oh-so-creative kicker, the show intends to pit twelve (wonder of wonders) teenage boys and girls in dangerously close quarters for a prize package worth at least one million pesos, sans all the fringe benefits of appearing on such a show (read: endorsements, TV hosting gigs, modeling stints, having your own love team, you name it). And while I have never been a big fan of the series ever since it was adapted to suit the Filipino palate, I can say in my own humble opinion as an average member of the viewing public that I have had enough, and that this particular incarnation of the show flat-out stinks.
First of all, let me concede that it is hard to be objective while watching a reality TV series as Pinoy Big Brother. The temptation of seeing images of our own repressed, savage psyche subjected to cleverly concocted and well-executed dilemmas captured on camera is just so terrible that it’s become fascinating. I know we sometimes catch ourselves doing a reflexive uptake as we see ourselves in the entangled lives of Zanjo, Bianca, Sam and Rustom, and we sometimes even feel self-righteous over these characters in some kind of bizarre, vindictive Schadenfraude. That being said, however, I feel that shows like PBB perpetuate the voyeuristic tendencies of the Filipino culture; an acculturation that has somehow justified (and indeed, validated!) our “need” to fork over each other’s dirty laundry. In short, it breeds a culture of chismis, an act that the average Filipino has gotten around to accepting so long as it’s not being done to him. Political Science professors would tell you that politics exists anywhere there is human interaction, but Kuya’s household, being a “carefully controlled” environment where majority of external stimuli is eradicated, seems more like a cruel, if accurate, Pavlovian experiment. The reality factor of PBB is different from the reality factor of say, the Amazing Race, because while both provide contrived situations that “test” each contestant, the manner by which the Amazing Race elicits our empathy and attention is on how each pair overcomes such contrivances. PBB does just the opposite, capturing our attention by tastelessly focusing on how people get stuck in their respective ruts and spiraling down towards depression or self-destruction, as was the case with certain PBB contestants. If the Amazing Race is a display of humans’ triumph against adversity, PBB glories in the wallowing of people in the said adversities. Some people may argue that PBB eventually seeks the same ideal as displaying man’s glory in the face of adversity since it offers a prize at the end, but such a justification overlooks the fact that the means to get to the prize is by playing up the wrenching human (more often “romantic”) problems while inside the house to elicit viewer sympathy, and consequently, gather enough votes to muscle your way to the prize money.
Unfortunately, PBB: Teen Edition is no different from the previous installments of the show in this aspect. The concept is actually identical to the first two shows, with the only difference being that the players this time around are teenagers. I find trouble with this particular incarnation of the show on two counts.
First, I find it particularly disturbing that the portrayal of the youth in the show is highly one-dimensional and stylized. The show claims to gather together contestants from all walks of life, when in reality the difference among the contestants is largely geographical—and even that doesn’t count for much because some of the contestants live within one hour of each other. You may claim to have individuals of “unique and explosive personalities”, but in truth, PBB is a show about the bourgeois by the bourgeois. PBB glosses over the other 95% of the teenage population who do not fit into the show’s neat little categorizations as “the Teenage Mother from Laguna” or “the AmBoy from GenSan” or (gasp!) “the Atenean Scholar from Quezon City.” Why don’t we have “the Out of School Youth from Tondo” or “the Juvenile Delinquent from Subic” or “the Child Laborer from Payatas”? While I have nothing against people from the middle- to the upper-class, it is a crime for PBB: Teen Edition to consciously skim over these kinds of people in favor of those who are exponentially beautiful or glamorous. At least PBB: Celebrity Edition gave a fighting chance to the physically challenged and the virtual unknowns—the Teen Edition doesn’t seem to be so inclusive. Maybe it is not so much the fault of the contestants as it is the network’s, which as a primarily profit-oriented company needs to turn a blind eye to the less appealing but admittedly more real fringes of society in order to justify its capitalist roots, where the marginalized people are reduced to voting fanatically for the person that they want to win. Also to blame is the screwed-up portrayal by media of what is acceptable or not. In an age where myths and fallacies of beauty and fame and wealth are so prevalent, we become nothing but passive receptors of manufactured principles. It becomes doubly aggravating to watch the show and its contestants perpetuate its own feeble version of reality in such precocious and cutesy tasks as looking for a Miniature Schnauzer named “Disney” in a pile of exotic canines amid screams of “It’s gonna make kagat na!” or “Paano ko siya iki-carry?” And what’s next? Do we also expect the teens to flirt, fall in love, engage in catfights (“I don’t like Back Fighters na tao…”), and the like? Even worse, do we expect to derive amusement from such instances?
Second and picking off from the first point, the show undoubtedly plays with the volatility of teenage emotions. While it is true (and some WILL claim this) that a lot of our teenagers today are mature and independent for their age, still a great number of them have yet to fully form a well-developed sense of self and being. Many teenagers still have difficulty reining in their feelings, thoughts and emotions in a manner that will withstand the strong pressure of a society that dictates what they should and should not do or be. This is not to say that the youth are gullible—far from it—but my fear is that with the way media plays up the ideals of our age, their convictions may not develop in a positive way, or at least not in a way that will be beneficial in the long run. As some internet forums have noted, these teenagers will not do anything except magpa-cute, amid a context of sustained societal pressure in terms of how they should look, how they should act, and what they should do. These teenagers will begin to realize (if they haven’t already) that in order to win, one must play it cool or go with what the public wants. The consequence of not doing so would, of course, mean only one thing: eviction. If we continually foster this culture of voyeuristic familiarity and contrived socialization, what kind of future are we building for ourselves and for the next generation? The concept is made more terrifying when we realize that it is not just our own dirty laundry that we are airing out in public, but our children’s. In a way, we have prostituted the youth when we find a perverse sense of entertainment in watching how they operate in a Trumanesque setting, especially if we expect the same things to happen as did in the previous PBB shows.
As a teacher of teenagers, I take particular offense at the gross oversimplification of the adolescent life depicted in PBB: Teen Edition. If I have learned anything as a teacher, it is to believe unconditionally in the great potential of each student, and to actively refuse to box them under convenient but imprecise labels. Society should know better than to try to have an assimilated understanding of adolescents, much more impose its own pre-conceived yet faulty notions of what reality should be. We continually whine about our frustrated efforts of searching for the leaders of tomorrow, but who should we blame for a culture of mediocrity, elitism and immaturity but ourselves? If it is true that we can’t teach old dogs new tricks, then let our generation perish in our self-induced spiraling towards self-destruction. But for the love of God, spare the youth from this madness. Instead, if we want to see how savage human nature can be, I’m all for putting politicians—Administration, Opposition, their puppets, and everything else in between—inside Kuya’s house. That should prove to be an interesting sleaze fest if I ever see
one. Just don’t make the winner the next President.