[Z]

I thought this might be of interest; do the members of this forum agree with editing reality TV programs to make certain participants look better or to increase their popularity?

On the one hand, it's totally biased and unfair to the other contestants, because the shows end up self selecting their winners, and they only really put the program on TV to get some money out of voting, or so it seems.

On the other hand, if the shows didn't do it, then surely it would remove all the entertainment from the program? For example, if they didn't show us the good and bad auditions, would we be interested in them at all?



I think it's, for the most part, a good thing in the early stages of a program, for example the X Factor, they overexpose the contestants that are going to end up getting to the judges homes, although not all of them necessarily will be the final contestants. I think once you've reached the 'final' stage of the program (e.g. top 12 for the X Factor) you can't really big anyone up, because at that point it becomes an unfair disadvantage, but prior to the live shows it's fair enough. I disagree with positive editing when it comes into play on Big Brother, because BB does it when one of their favourite housemates is up for eviction; they want to make their favourite look good or the opponent look bad, and quite often they'll essentially ignore some housemates, for example, look at how little coverage Sara and Lisa got towards the end of Big Brother last year.

[Stu]

I dont think anybody would ethicaly agree with it, but it is an unescapable part of Reality TV shows. Especially a show that has to be put together not from performances, but from 24 hours of live tape. Someone is going to look edited somehow...

[Tom]

Personally it doesn't bother me unless I'm supporting one of the smaller characters like Ruth in X Factor, until at least week 5 or 6 didn't really seem like a contender and by then everyone was already backing someone to win.

If it makes the show more entertaining then I'm all for it, I think some take it too seriously though.

But what really annoys me is if you genuinely like someone who has had a good edit and you like them and its nothing to do with the edit, then people will say "oh you only liked them because they were shown in this way" and if they win then it becomes predictable and worst winner ever.

If I'm going to be completely honest, people need to get over it and accept reality TV for what it is, light entertainment. OK I know sometimes it can get quite intense as a viewer but if you look back in a few months (like say look at X Factor, Hells Kitchen etc now) then its actually cheesy as hell when you take it out of context of the time.