WHY DOES VIBE MAGAZINE THINK THESE WOMEN ARE ROLE MODELS?

Spotted @ The Single Father’s Blog…
Vibe magazine interviewed four of reality television’s biggest stars for it’s June/July issue. The cover of the magazine reads “Meet Your New Role Models: Kandy, Tamar, Evelyn & Chrissy”.  If you have never heard of these women, they are featured on some of the most popular television shows on cable right now.  Shows like  The Real Housewives of Atlanta, Basketball Wives, Braxton Family Values, and Love and Hip Hop receive high ratings week after week as folks sit in front of their TV watching the latest and greatest drama and escalated cat fights.

Now I must admit that I am somewhat of a reality TV junky when it comes to certain shows.  I have watched a fair share of each of these shows and at certain times have found myself being amused and slightly addicted.  I watched the first three seasons of the Atlanta Housewives, the first two seasons of Basketball Wives and both seasons of Love and Hip Hop.  Each show provided a different kind of entertainment for me.  It was good to see women of color on TV who seemed to be down to earth and easy to relate to.  What man wouldn’t want to watch every day beautiful women of color on TV every week.

Over the years though my interest in most of these shows has started to decline.  As of late I haven’t catching many episodes of these shows.   Mainly because I have become concerned with the way that some of these reality shows have been depicting women of color.  Or should I say I have become concerned with the way that these women of color have been depicting themselves.  It seems as though almost every reality show that comes on TV with a predominantly female, African American cast has to be filled with violence.  And I’m not just talking about the occasional scuffle between two people who don’t like each other.  I am talking about grown women standing on tables in restaurants, spitting on each other, slapping each other, bullying one another because of hearsay, throwing bottles of wine across restaurants and more.  I guess in a sense I got tired of the foolishness.  It just started to seem like every week I would be shaking my head at the cattiness that took place between these women.