Have You Seen This Garbage?

I am so positively grossed out by this.

According to the sourcelink, a rich dude in Florida decided that his 22-year old son Alex needed to become famous, and that his lavish lifestyle needed to be observed by the unwashed masses, so he hired a producer to produce a professional pilot that he could shop to TV networks in the hopes that his kid would become a reality TV star.

And naturally, because MTV has a huge boner for spoiled, entitled, nauseatingly rich young people, they picked up the show.  It started this past Monday, and it’s called Siesta Key.

Here’s what Gary Kompothecras, Alex’s father, had to say about his brainchild:

‘I go, “You guys are really having a hell of a lifestyle.  I said this would be a good reality show. Plus they’re good kids, so that was the main thing, they weren’t bad kids. I said this would be a good story because when I was growing up, you had Father Knows Best, you had My Three Sons, you had people with values and I didn’t see that in the TV of late.’

Except now, the watch party for the show has been canceled due to death threats, because apparently, Alex is tied at least tangentially to a viral video depicting a shark dragged to its death.

Aaaaand then there’s this.  Apparently, Alex has posted some questionable content on his Instagram page, which has prompted cries of racism and anti-miscegenation (I know, I had to look it up too – it means being against interracial relationships.)  Now, there’s a whole hashtag campaign to boycott the show (#boycottsiestakeymtv).

So the idea that this show is about “good kids with values,” as Gary Kompothecras suggests, miiiight be a little generous.

But the worst part about all of this is that a REALITY SHOW is the goal Gary Kompothecras has for his son.   A reality show featuring eight 20-somethings being impossibly rich and leading lives of ridiculous privilege (the real kind, not the social just warrior kind.)

Here’s how the first sourcelink describes the show (emphasis mine):

Alex is unsurprisingly the center of the action, with two beautiful women, Juliette Porter, 19, and Madisson Hausburg, 23, vying for his attention
The cast is rounded out by Madisson’s strong-willed younger sister Paige, the boisterous Chloe Trautman, 21, and the flirtatious Brandon Gomes, 22, – a Cape Verdean who is the only non-white cast member and was added after the pilot, he told the Herald-Tribune, because ‘they were looking to diversify the cast and expand.’

So that’s neat.  Instead of the reality show being about reality, they basically threw money at the nearest available minority.  Perfect.

The show has already debuted on some screens across the country, and amazingly, Actual TV Show Critics took the time to watch and critique it.  For real.

Here’s a few excerpts from their reviews:

New York Times:  Gary’s son Alex has “charms that barely register on camera, unless you count the size of his (parents’) house.”

Time Magazine:  It lacks “nuance or wit, reliant on the single-entendre.”

I am baffled that the NYT and Time would even review such a trainwreck, but I suppose it’s to their credit that they didn’t think much of it.  I mean, it’s a show about rich kids doing rich kid things and pretending to have black friends.  That’s literally the show.

And the fact that MTV picked it up, and that these kids are, as a result, going to become famous for having rich parents, is absolutely nauseating.

That’s the culture we live in, y’all.  Bad behavior constantly rewarded.  Thanks a lot, Kardashians.

If you can stomach it, here’s the trailer.

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