"Reality is merely an illusion..." -Albert Einstein

When you watch TV, do you become totally immersed in the characters and lose yourself in the storyline? You may be experiencing a hyper-reality. Jean Baudrillard is a theorist who came up with hyper-reality. He defines it as “The simulation of something which never really existed.” So the question is: Does watching television create our reality, or is it just an outside source of entertainment?

To test this theory, I had to watch a full night of television. And honestly, it’s painful these days. There is only one single show that keeps me almost sitting still for an hour: America’s Next Top Model. I don’t think this makes a false reality for me because I don’t watch it thinking that those girls are representing everyone. If I wasn’t experiencing these situations on the show, I’d be experiencing them in a magazine or someplace else. No false reality here.

Next up was Sopranos. Okay, this one might construct a bit of a hyper-reality. I tend to have a stronger New Jersey accent afterwards and I tend to say I’m going to “whack” people. (DISCLAIMER: I would never actually do such a thing. It’s just a joke.) Even though I do hail from the fabulous Garden State, I’m not regularly exposed to mobsters (although my new neighbor is seriously shady). I do think that if you watch hours upon hours of The Sopranos, you might start to believe the sensationalized life of a mobster is real life. But then again…is it false?

Finally, I rounded out my night with some classic King of Queens. You can’t beat this show. It’s funny and sweet and, I think, quite real. The situations are obviously dramatized for effect, but most of them are very possible. I just realized that this is another show I love that’s based in New Jersey. I am consistently exposed to working class people and NYC commuters in real life. Again, no hyper-reality here!

I believe I can see the difference between reality and hyper-reality. I should point out, though, that a show like The Sopranos does twist some people’s views of certain groups of people (here, Italian Americans in New Jersey). Perhaps other people find themselves in a hyper-reality when watching these shows. I feel that I think about the bigger picture enough to realize the difference.

I could see evidence for and against Meyrowitz’s view that television brings people closer together. With the Sopranos, it brings together those New Jersians who can laugh at the depictions. But it also breaks some apart because they get so angry over the stereotypes.

Lippman might say that these shows create pictures in our heads about these groups of people. I think that being aware of this makes me challenge those pictures.