True Life: I’m Grossed Out

So I was flipping through the channels one evening, and I came across a show that I can only describe as flat out disturbing (and perhaps disgusting). I’m sure you’ve all heard of it: MTV’s True Life. Now you have to understand that at this point in my night procrastination was rearing its ugly head; anything to occupy my time (rather than studying of course) was tempting. So naturally, this gem of program caught my eye and I started watching. The topic was True Life: I’m a Sugar Baby. I can honestly say that I started watching TV because of procrastination, but once I realized what this show was about, I was watching out of complete awe and disbelief. Not just in awe of the idea that people live like this, but also in awe of the fact that we’re watching it on television (I’M watching it on television). I became immediately angry and sad at the state of a world in which people sit at home and watch this kind of shit, but I guess that’s a topic for a different kind of blog.

What I also thought about, which is pertinent to the conversation, is how this whole “Sugar Baby” thing can be analyzed with a feminist lens. According to the featured Sugar Babies on True Life, living the lifestyle doesn’t mean sexual favors. Instead, being a Sugar Baby means taking advantage of older, richer men (usually) who love to spoil younger women. There was one male Sugar Baby on the show who was looking for an older woman to mooch off of essentially. Anyway, I’ll focus on the lady Sugar Babies for now. For them this is a serious lifestyle that literally and figuratively pays off. One of the women had been hustling herself long enough (and well enough, I guess) to be living in a great apartment, driving a nice car, and paying for all her mother’s expenses, and this girl didn’t even have a job.

As much as I want to blame MTV for airing such a ridiculous show, I haven’t seen enough of True Life say that the show itself is bullshit. This was the first time I’d seen it, so I don’t want to jump to any conclusions. What I will say is this: first of all there seems to be an inaccuracy with the title of the show and its content. Call me crazy, but I don’t think that hustling older men for money is in any way true to life. Also, it seems like MTV’s audience is mostly young teens, so I’d say that for them, watching a show about whoring yourself out for money probably isn’t a the greatest for their sense of self. Plus, the lady “Babies” in the show were stereotypically hot, and they were obviously using their looks to get paid. At the end of the show, both of the lady Sugar Babies end up leaving the lifestyle and becoming somewhat independent, which I guess is good? I think what really bothered me about the show was not just it’s message about women’s value, but that basically the episode was about taking advantage of others. The Sugar Daddies were obviously using these women for eye candy, and the women were using the men for their money.

So what do you all think? Am I over-analyzing here? Or is this something worth being distraught over?