the talking cure

And I wake up and I ask myself what state I'm in
And I say well I'm lucky, cause I am like East Berlin
I had this wall and what I knew of the free world
Was that I could see their fireworks
And I could hear their radio
And I thought that if we met, I would only start confessing
And they'd know that I was scared
They'd would know that I was guessing
But the wall came down and there they stood before me
With their stumbling and their mumbling
And their calling out just like me…

~Dar Williams, “What Do You Hear in These Sounds?” from the album End of the Summer (1997)

I was watching TLC’s What Not To Wear (2003-present) the other day and marveling at how its two hosts, Stacey and Clinton, fancy themselves both fashion experts (which they are) and amateur therapists (which they aspire to—curing people’s neuroses and poor self-image through the healing power of fashion). In this particular case, they were making over a woman in her early twenties from Austin, Texas who insisted on wearing extremely short skirts and provocative clothing that was exceedingly unflattering, though she didn’t realize it. She also often accessorized with a fake raccoon’s tail pinned to the back of her jeans or skirt, in order to “stand out” and “make a statement” about “who she is.” Basically, she was using her clothing to get (the “wrong” kind of) attention from men and Stacey and Clinton told her as much, eventually coaxing out of the girl a genuinely sad tale of a past relationship with a very controlling man who all but forbade her from leaving the house. And, hence, she surmised, this was why she felt the need to flaunt herself in public, using her over-the-top outward appearance to mask her very deep-seated insecurities. In the first half of the episode, she continually fretted over Stacey and Clinton not only taking away her clothes, but thereby also taking away her sense of self and self-worth. Talk about pulling at our heartstrings. But by the time the episode was over, Stacey and Clinton (along with hairdresser, Nick, and make-up artist, Carmindy) had transformed this walking ball of contradictions—a woman whose friends claimed regularly “dressed like a hooker,” but who was simultaneously kind of mousy, immature and insecure—into an adorable, self-confident Cinderella-at-the-ball (without the midnight bell toll). While Stacey and Clinton often caution that fashion can’t cure deeper emotional issues, the show promises that it can prove a tantalizing stop-gap salve to ease away perceived flaws.

This is all well and good, and although I’m not sure I entirely buy the fashion-positive moral of the What Not To Wear storyline, I’m content to leave it be for now. I’m more interested in the trend to want to help people on television and through television, a discussion I started in my post on Oprah’s The Big Give and which I’ll continue here on a broader scale. I think we’re all agreed that television usually entertains, that it often serves as an escape from the humdrum blahs of everyday life, and that it perhaps even educates at times. But can television help us become better people? Can it provide a place for us to process our traumas and recover from the woes of the daily grind?

When I asked, perhaps a bit coyly, in last week’s preview, whether television is therapy, I wasn’t talking about the obvious attempts to make television shows somehow therapeutic or curative—shows like What Not To Wear or The Biggest Loser (NBC, 2004-present) or TLC’s new frighteningly televangelist-like self-help show that I can’t bring myself to watch, I Can Make You Thin—although the growing number of makeover shows is certainly part of the television-as-therapy trend. Nor was I referring to the few narrative shows that feature psychologists/psychiatrists, like Showtime’s Huff (2004-2006) or the brilliant new HBO show In Treatment, which I adore in an obsessive way that probably isn’t healthy.

No, when I talk about television as therapy, I mean television as a whole—a landscape of pixels and sound waves, narratives and advertising, hypnotic glow, endless flow and ubiquitous cultural resonance. For better or for worse, television is a mirror of our society, or parts of our society. And while this reflection may be always distorted, I believe it proves crucial in our formation of cultural and social identity. In his essay on the mirror stage, French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan posits that infants first learn to recognize themselves as separate from their mothers by looking in the mirror and seeing a perfect, complete, discrete child-being (the child herself) with whom they identify (later he argues that this isn’t necessarily a childhood identification, but more of an on-going internalized split in every individual’s subjectivity--but that’s really beside the point). Essentially, there is always a disconnect between who we feel we are (incomplete, confused, ungainly) and who we see ourselves to be (complete, composed, balanced).

Let’s put aside for a moment that this is a grossly oversimplified version of Lacan’s mirror stage (for the real deal, check out the first two volumes of The Seminar of Jacques Lacan (Book I and Book II), and his collection of essays, Ecrits), and introduce yet another exceedingly abridged psychoanalytic construct to the mix, that of the Freudian “talking cure.” While the phrase “talking cure” was not coined by Sigmund Freud, but rather by a patient of his lesser-known colleague, Dr. Josef Breuer, this phrase has come to epitomize psychiatric techniques, Freudian and beyond. Loosely: by allowing the patient to talk through her problems, perhaps circuitously or by continually revisiting the same ideas from different angles or by letting the patient dictate the path of the conversation, the psychoanalyst can help the patient overcome neuroses/traumas/etc. While talking, the patient is not only able to process what she is going through, but she also unknowingly reveals certain symptoms, connections and patterns that frame her mental state, allowing the therapist to glean the oft-hidden root of her problem(s) even when she cannot.

Thus, the concept of television-as-therapy can be approached in two, not necessarily mutually exclusive ways—television as mirror stage (making apparent how we reflect on our own identities) and television as talking cure (in which we converse, figuratively, with our favorite shows and unintentionally reveal our own neuroses in how we respond to them). In the case of the former, I’d like to refer back to my epigraph by singer-songwriter Dar Williams, which might actually make sense now in context. Television has the potential to reveal to us (especially, it pains me to say, reality TV) that everyone else is at least as befuddled by life as we are. But what about television as a talking cure—not in the framework of the individual show but in regards to the medium as a whole?

Actually, I’m asking the question backwards or, perhaps, the wrong question entirely, because it’s not a matter of whether or not television affords us the opportunity to watch ourselves watching, to reveal to us the inner workings of our mental lives—our wants, desires, needs. Of course, television has the potential to do this (just as the books we read, music we listen to, and art we like probably speak volumes about who we are). The questions isn’t whether or not television can serve as a technological manifestation of the talking cure, but rather…who’s listening even if it does?

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(NEXT WEEK: “It’s Not TV.” This may be HBO’s slogan, but the initiative to make television that isn’t quite television has taken on a life of its own.)

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a helping hand

Watching The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2003-present) last week forced me to consider the degree to which philanthropy, the receipt of free stuff, and talent contests have become part of the fabric of the American Dream as presented by television. From the now almost eighty-year-old Miss America Pageant (remember, it’s a scholarship fund not a beauty pageant) to The Apprentice (2004-present), proving we are better than someone else and then being rewarded for our competitive spirit and superiority—with money, cars, celebrity, careers, and maybe even a chance to make a difference in the world (feature optional)—is an American tradition.

This was all brought to mind for me because of two things. The first was the “Highway to Ellen Road Trip,” a prize awarded to four women from Nevada who received a “brand new GMC Acadia” in which they traveled across the country from Ellen’s hometown of New Orleans to The Ellen DeGeneres Show set in Los Angeles, stopping over at various national landmarks along the way. There was much screaming and eye-popping excitement from the bevy of friends when Ellen called to congratulate them in mid-February and, a mere week later, there was equally much screaming and bouncing and happy flailing when they finally arrived weary and not-so-bushy-tailed (but definitely excited, exceedingly excited) on Ellen’s set. Their response reminded me of the “Favorite Things” episodes of Oprah (1986-present), a pre-Christmas show in which every audience member receives hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars worth of merchandise—items that Oprah considers her favorite things of the season and wants to share with her fans. The “Favorite Things” episodes are always a surprise—not scheduled as such—so many audience members who find themselves unexpectedly involved in one of these amazing giveaways burst into tears or leap around in gleeful hysterics when Oprah announces the news at the beginning of the fateful show.

And, yes, it would be very exciting to unwittingly stumble into a situation wherein you receive an incredible quantity of top-of-the-line, sponsor-donated goods—from Ralph Lauren polo shirts to dishwashers. Who doesn’t like free stuff? What strikes me as curious is the hysteria revolving around such events and the popularity these days of evoking that hysteria and/or emotionality over and over again in every possible reality show context. There’s also the obvious appeal of celebrity—Rachael Ray sells knives because she has fans who worship her technique, gumption and extraordinary perkiness; Oprah has so much clout that her endorsement for Democratic presidential candidate carries serious weight; and the “Highway to Ellen Road Trip” ladies were probably just as thrilled about getting to meet Ellen DeGeneres and be on the show as they were about the free spa treatments, other fancy prizes, and all-expenses paid vacation weekend they spent in LA afterwards. A more in-depth consideration on the cult of celebrity may have to appear in another entry, since there’s something specific lurking in the talk show genre that bears further examination. Is it like therapy for the masses—the talking cure for the televisual nation?

But, for now, onwards. Because what I really want to talk about is Oprah’s The Big Give, the series premiere of which just aired on ABC yesterday and which is sure to spark a new genre of reality television (there are probably executives and producers mulling this over as I write, wondering which celebrities they could woo to host and how they would alter the formula just enough to get away with it). The Big Give is predicated on a philanthropic model of competition rather than the usual cutthroat, I-deserve-this-more-than-you-do model. Each week, contestants are challenged with new ways to “give big”—finding unique and exceptional ways to change the lives of individuals and communities with the resources allotted to them. Then the givers are judged on their creativity, their passion and their actual gifts (be they monetary, personal, spiritual or material) and the least-giviest competitor is sent home. The clincher? The contestants think that they’re just competing for the sake of competing—to show the world “how one person can make a difference” (as Oprah put it) and to have the opportunity to feel good about themselves as magnanimous philanthropists. But, of course, there’s prize money at the end of the tunnel; however, in true Oprah form, the contestants don’t know about the one million dollars they could win if they succeed in becoming the biggest giver (though, really, they must suspect it, given that every reality show worth its snuff has some sort of prize money, “secret” or not).

The contestants include people from all walks of life—from a former army captain and, indeed, a Miss America pageant winner, to a relief worker and a singer who considers herself a “survivor.” Dedicated to “changing the lives of complete strangers in the most dramatic ways,” the big givers and The Big Give itself sure pull at the heartstrings, with most of the givees in the first episode—among them a homeless woman with two teenaged kids and a young mother who’d recently lost her husband in a random shooting—bursting into uncontrollable sobs when their gifts were revealed. The best gifts were about presentation rather than just monetary value. Two givers (the singer and the army captain) managed to raise $40,000 in a mere 15 minutes at a local church for the homeless woman and her family and were able to present her not only with the money, but also a new home and a car and job training. Another team (the relief worker and the contractor/dedicated family man) set up an amazing block party to celebrate the memory of the young widow’s husband, an event which was so heartfelt that it all but trumped the $50,000 they raised for her to help cover her mortgage and the eight years of educational scholarships they secured for her two young girls.

So, there’s something to be said for presentation in philanthropic gestures—which is why the “Highway to Ellen” crew probably wouldn’t have enjoyed their prizes as much if they hadn’t been sandwiched with a visit with Ellen herself. But is philanthropy the new entertainment (and is it even entertaining in the long run)? Where does it fit in with the old version of the American Dream (that’s the land of opportunity, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps version)? Is philanthropy (or, at least, the dispersal of free stuff and money) the inevitable outcome of the talk show genre? Money and prizes instead of mass therapy? And, as a nation, which do we need more?

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(NEXT WEEK: “Playing the Mom Card.” Motherhood and television: protective mothers, restless homemakers, and career/Armageddon versus family.)

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