Life Aid?

Considering the fact that the human species has been around for quite some years one would think we would have gotten some training and gathered some experience in how to live life. But somehow we seem to have been better at making life more complicated, than at coping with it.

Ok, we have found a lot of solutions for many problems, but we are also very good at finding new problems. Somehow I now have the feeling we can no longer live our lives ourselves, we need help to do that. Now I am not talking about the need for doctors, psychotherapists, lawyers, technicians or all other people we whose help we sometime might need. I am just fascinated about all TV-shows that aim at helping people live their lives. We have seen so many docu-soaps trying to make stars or top-models out of hopeful wannabes, we have seen loads of extreme makeovers of people and their homes, we have seen tons of different dating shows and we have seen people fight and get married on TV, and we have had the Super-nanny teaching people how to raise their kids. Nothing of this is new. However, lately I have noticed a kind of TV programme that for me seems to take this one step further. It is no longer any competition and it is not focusing on how you look or how your home look but it is trying to tell you how you are supposed to live you life!

I Swedish TV we now have one show running that is closely following a family with small children, while they are visiting other families with children to see how they cope with everyday life. There is another show where professional economists are helping families who are trapped in debts. They try to explain the basics of economy and tell the families how they must change their way of living to be able to pay their debts. Another show is called the Single Coaches. There a group of probably self-elected “experts” teach people how to behave to get out of their miserable single life. They are taught not only how to dress and style themselves, they are also taught how to flirt, how to move, how to talk, how to act on a date etc etc..

I am not saying anything of this is wrong, but when the hell did life get that difficult that we need someone else to live it for us?? And are we really the first ones who want to meet someone to live with, to have a nice home, to cope with debit and credit, and are we the first ones to have children?? I don’t think so. And when the hell did we get that bored we need to watch other people live their life on TV??