"I am not saying that 'Real Housewives' killed Russell Armstrong, or that its intrusions had some bearing on whatever happened between him and Taylor behind closed doors. But there is no universe in which appearing on a show like this could have helped them. There’s no universe in which one can defend 'Real Housewives' for the way it has dealt with this tragedy. And there’s no universe in which one can simply brush off the series as a guilty pleasure — not after watching the cast members, the producers and the network continue to exploit this catastrophe week in and week out. And anyone who watches a series like this for pleasure and discusses it as frivolous entertainment — as if it were a cooking or travel show or even a 'Jackass'-style stunt compendium, or worse still, as if the 'characters' weren’t actual people who agreed to let themselves be exploited and distorted by television — is 'guilty,' indeed."
-- Salon's Matt Zoller Seitz in a scathing piece on the completely-without-merit cultural abomination that is The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and its decision to play the suicide of one of its cast-members for cheap drama
I've said before that, besides maybe E! or MTV, Bravo offers the most repugnant and shameful programming on network television -- making it the most repugnant and shameful network on television. I realize it's de riguer for anyone with even a shred of respectability and intelligence that he or she values to decry reality TV dog-shit like The Real Housewives, but I can't stress enough how all the indignation in the world from decent people won't stop the proliferation of this kind of sickening awfulness. And that's why I think it's time for some good, old-fashioned 2x4s to the faces of these vapid, horrid women and the vulturine producers who both prey on and elevate them. Consider it the nuclear option from Aliens: It's the only way to be sure.
