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	<title>IdeasCategory: TV &#124; Ideas &#124; TIME.com</title>
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		<title>IdeasCategory: TV &#124; Ideas &#124; TIME.com</title>
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		<title>Bill Cosby&#8217;s &#8216;Tough Love&#8217; Is Counterproductive</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2013/06/12/bill-cosbys-tough-love-is-counter-productive/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2013/06/12/bill-cosbys-tough-love-is-counter-productive/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 12 Jun 2013 09:45:13 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Marc W. Polite</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[American Cities]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Children]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Crime]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[apathy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Bill Cosby]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[personal responsibility]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=33321</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[&#8220;Personal responsibility&#8221; is a theme frequently drawn upon by people addressing the social problems of the day, including problems that black communities face. Public figures issuing calls to action often challenge the role of the individual, although whether it works in better reaching the individuals who need to hear these messages is debatable. The bigger problem is that a message that exclusively focuses on personal responsibility without an accompanying clarion call for society itself to improve gives us only half of the answer. No one exemplifies this problem more than Bill Cosby, who recently dictated an editorial to the New York Post in which he said, &#8220;There is this situation where people tend to think that we are all victims. Victim meaning somebody else is doing this to us. That’s not true.&#8221; The former star of The Cosby Show is known for making controversial statements directed to the black community. In 2004, at an address at an NAACP gala celebrating the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, Cosby said “the lower-economic and middle-economic people are not holding up their end in this deal,” i.e., not following through on all of the hard-earned opportunities available in our time. While his statement upset many, it actually led to a constructive dialogue on black class differences and Professor Michael Eric Dyson wrote an entire book to unpack the issues that Cosby raised. But this time around, Cosby lays all the blame at the feet of black Americans who, he says, suffer from &#8220;a plague called apathy.&#8221; He goes on to suggest that parents need to make better choices for their children, including not buying them sugary drinks. Otherwise, they pass the bad habits and health risks down. &#8220;It becomes a term of apathy because people say my father had it, my aunt had it. People then ask you, &#8216;What your mother die of?&#8217; &#8216;Diabetes.&#8217; &#8216;Grandmother?&#8217; &#8216;Diabetes.&#8217; These things don’t have to happen if you make the correct choice.&#8221; Cosby is completely justified in tackling the issue of Type 2 diabetes in children. But what about addressing the<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=33321&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/wprtr2kwh5.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Bill Cosby in 2011.</media:title>
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		<title>Confessions of a Black Woman Who Loves HBO&#8217;s Girls</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2013/02/21/confessions-of-a-black-woman-who-loves-hbos-girls/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2013/02/21/confessions-of-a-black-woman-who-loves-hbos-girls/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 21 Feb 2013 13:00:48 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Christina Greer</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Girls]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Lena Dunham]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[race]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[race on television]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=28553</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I am not ashamed to admit it: I am a black woman who loves the show Girls, HBO’s dramedy about the uncomfortable and sometimes ugly journey of a group of young women learning how to be adults. Since its first episode, critics have scolded Girls for whitewashing New York City, showing only characters of privilege and few of color. But that shouldn’t be a reason to dismiss the show. No one really “teaches” women how to transition into adulthood; it just happens. I spent my post-college years in New York City and can relate to some (though luckily not all) of the misadventures of Hannah and her friends. I had a diverse group of girlfriends — black and non-black, women with PhDs and GEDs, friends that represented the entire socio-economic spectrum. If I am honest with myself, my discoveries in New York City in those early years often involved selfishness, minor betrayals and friendships lost. Another dose of honesty: it was privilege that allowed me to spend some of my early twenties experimenting with adulthood, reveling and slowly coming to understand that unsure time. (MORE: Viewpoint: The Problem with Lena Dunham&#8217;s Girls) It’s true that Girls has zero non-white characters — Donald Glover’s two-episode cameo as the black Republican in season two notwithstanding. But this is hardly new in the world of entertainment. Friends, Seinfeld, Entourage, The Sopranos, and just about every Woody Allen movie are monochromatic. And it’s not always unrealistic. There were several times I ventured to a new neighborhood or local hangout only to discover that there were absolutely no people of color to be found. There really are enclaves of New York City that are overwhelmingly white.  Girls has been quite honest about the loneliness and uncertainty of being a twenty-something in a big city. Adding an African American or Asian American character wouldn&#8217;t change that, but there is a long list of shows that have clumsily attempted to side step a glaring lack of diversity with a sassy or wise friend of color. What makes Girls relatable is that it speaks to the universal experience of women struggling<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=28553&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/girls1.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">HBO&#039;s &#34;Girls&#34;</media:title>
		</media:content>

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		<title>Viewpoint: The Problem with Lena Dunham&#8217;s Girls</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2013/02/08/viewpoint-the-problem-with-lena-dunhams-girls/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2013/02/08/viewpoint-the-problem-with-lena-dunhams-girls/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 08 Feb 2013 13:00:31 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bill Persky</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Girls]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Golden Globes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Lena Dunham]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Marlo Thomas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[That Girl]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=28188</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Lena Dunham is clearly a bright and talented young woman. At only 26, she is the creator, director and star of her own series, HBO’s Girls, about a quartet of twentysomething females of varying backgrounds, attributes and problems, sharing what is presented as a contemporary female experience. Just before she won two Golden Globes, Parade magazine put Ms. Dunham on the cover, referring to her as “That Girl.” With all due respect, actress Marlo Thomas was, is and always will be the original — and only — “That Girl.” (MORE: Lena Dunham Developing Another Series for HBO) If I seem defensive, it’s because I am: I was the co-creator of That Girl, a series that featured television’s first single, working woman — who did not need a husband to find happiness. I&#8217;d like to think that over the course of its five-year run, That Girl managed to lift the aspirations of an entire generation of young women in the late 1960s. While I applaud Miss Dunham&#8217;s accomplishments, I am saddened by the message of a show that lets its characters wallow in low self-esteem, high self-pity and perpetual victimhood. When That Girl failed, she figured out why and started over — instead of diving into a quart of Haagen-Dazs. When That Girl doubted herself, she got to the root of the problem with her smarts — not by sleeping with the pizza delivery guy. I don’t question that Ms. Dunham is being honest and writing in a way that feels true to life, but it is an uninspiring experience to hold up as an example to young women who are trying to find their way in today’s complex and unsupportive world. Instead of wanting more, as did That Girl (in a time that was equally challenging) the Girls seem satisfied with accepting less — of themselves and others. In a recent episode,  Lena Dunham&#8217;s character Hannah is asked to write about going &#8220;outside her comfort zone&#8221; and proceeds to snort coke, expose herself publicly, and let down her friends. Where&#8217;s the human dignity? (MORE: The War on Women<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=28188&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/girls.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Girls</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">timecontributor</media:title>
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		<title>Viewpoint: Lance Armstrong Will Be Back</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2013/01/21/viewpoint-lance-armstrong-will-be-back/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2013/01/21/viewpoint-lance-armstrong-will-be-back/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:00:41 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>John Eustice</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sports]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[doping]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Emma O'Reilly]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Lance Armstrong]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Oprah]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[USADA]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=27598</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Anyone expecting a tearful Lance Armstrong to gaze into the camera and beg forgiveness for a lifetime of deceit, after having given up all of the names and details of the how and why of his successes, was certain to have been disappointed by the Oprah interviews. It was classic Lance: stubbornly proud, controlling and calculating. But given who he is, a man who has spent a lifetime constructing an impenetrable protective shell around him, it represented a massive effort on his part and was a pretty good first step towards rehabilitating his public and personal lives both now lying in tatters. (MORE: How Lance Armstrong Came Clean to Oprah) Lance lost. He lost the game that USADA finally won after a protracted and bloody battle, and, as Lance said in the interview, being deeply afraid of losing has always been his driving force. This loss represents a complete change, something he has never experienced in a lifetime of winning almost every fight both big and small. He now has to come to terms with what losing, and losing big, means, and accept the fear that has landed on his doorstep. That is not going to happen overnight and certainly not in one session with Oprah. (MORE: Lance Armstrong&#8217;s Confession and the Psychology of Elite Athletes) The interview provided a fascinating insight into the mind of a professional athlete, one who had achieved the ultimate goal of turning himself into a brand. Lance’s parsing of the definition of cheating was a look into the secret life of a pro and how they can rationalize using every possible legal and illegal advantage to perform at the levels the public and sponsors expect and demand. As he swung back and forth from saying  “I” and “we”, was it the man or the brand speaking? &#8220;To be honest, Oprah, we sued so many people I don&#8217;t even [know]. I&#8217;m sure we did.” &#8220;Emma O&#8217;Reilly [Armstrong's former employee who he called an "alcoholic prostitute" after she blew the whistle on his doping] is one<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=27598&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/id-lance-armstrong-0120.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">image: Lance Armstrong for a training session during the second of the two rest days of the 2010 Tour de France cycling race in Pau, France, July 21, 2010.</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">timecontributor</media:title>
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		<title>Would More Women In The Senate Mean Less Gridlock?</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2013/01/04/would-more-women-in-the-senate-mean-less-gridlock/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2013/01/04/would-more-women-in-the-senate-mean-less-gridlock/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 04 Jan 2013 16:08:35 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Judith Warner</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Congress]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Law]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ABC News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Barbara Mikulski]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Diane Sawyer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Dianne Feinstein]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Elizabeth Warren]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[fiscal cliff]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Patty Murray]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[women senators]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=27162</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[They’re definitely “not a sorority,” as Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) insisted. And yet the 20 women lawmakers who sat down for a group interview with ABC’s Diane Sawyer that aired on January 3 did seem to form a chummy, sisterly club as they celebrated the milestone of one-fifth female representation in the U.S. Senate. There was lots of “you-go-girl” nodding, as senator after senator extolled the virtues of female cooperation, collaboration, and can-do workmanship. (“Workwomanship?” It’s a word, perhaps, whose time has come.) They agreed that, had women been running the show, there would have been no “fiscal cliff” drama. “We don’t believe in the culture of delay,” said Barbara Mikulski, (D-MD.) Sidestepping partisanship (by neatly avoiding mention of which party does or does not support women’s reproductive rights), they jointly expressed frustration with their male colleagues’ obsession with abortion.  “Can’t you just leave that alone?” asked an exasperated Patty Murray (D-WA, and pro-choice.) (MORE: Viewpoint: &#8220;Pro-life&#8221; and &#8220;feminism&#8221; aren&#8217;t mutually exclusive) The only smidgeon of a sign of barely possible disagreement came when the newly-elected Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) interrupted a comment from Susan Collins (R-ME) on how politicians should focus on the economy, health care, education and foreign policy and not reproductive issues to interject that in fact access to birth control was still very much an issue – a perhaps too self-assertive gesture that left the colleagues seated around her momentarily unsmiling. But never mind.  Now is not the time to wonder if women reached a level of political participation commensurate to their representation in the voting population (which would give them a majority, not mere parity in government), and if their numbers were more or less evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, they wouldn’t find themselves in as much gridlock, with as much conflict and partisan grandstanding as their majority-male colleagues. (&#8220;More Women in Senate Likely to Result in Higher Taxes, Bigger Govt, Less Freedom,&#8221; was the headline of a statement from the conservative Independent Women&#8217;s Forum published in the Weekly Standard just hours before Sawyer’s interview.)<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=27162&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Politics</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/politics/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/ht_diane_sawyer_senators_2_nt_121211_wg.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">image: Female Senators sit down for an interview with ABC&#039;s Diane Sawyer.</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">timecontributor</media:title>
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		<title>Kids at Tragedies: Turn Off the Cameras</title>
		<link>http://entertainment.time.com/2012/12/14/kids-at-tragedies-turn-off-the-cameras/</link>
		<comments>http://entertainment.time.com/2012/12/14/kids-at-tragedies-turn-off-the-cameras/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 14 Dec 2012 22:05:34 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>James Poniewozik</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=26526</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=26526&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">timecontributor</media:title>
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		<title>Viewpoint: Adults Read Too Much Into &#8220;Sesame Street&#8221;</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/11/27/viewpoint-adults-read-too-much-into-sesame-street/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/11/27/viewpoint-adults-read-too-much-into-sesame-street/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 27 Nov 2012 10:45:08 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Erika Christakis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Family]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Abby Cadabby]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Elmo]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Katy Perry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kevin Clash]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[sesame street]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sesame Workshop]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=25697</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Many adults who have been tracking the story about Elmo-creator Kevin Clash&#8217;s departure from Sesame Street might be surprised to learn that they&#8217;re part of the show&#8217;s target audience. As the Sesame Workshop explained last year, in response to parental outcry over an apparently risqué Katy Perry segment recorded with Elmo (but not aired), “Sesame Street has always been written on two levels…We use parodies and celebrity segments to interest adults in the show because we know that a child learns best when co-viewing with a parent or caregiver.” It’s hard to argue against parent-child bonding, even in TV-watching. And it’s understandable that parents feel protective of the show and want to track every real or imagined controversy. The nostalgia factor is high, for one thing, with more than 77 million American adults having watched the series as children. Sesame Street’s unique content – a blend of pre-academic skills, social advocacy, and multicultural harmony – also reinforces parents’ sense that they are raising good kids and doing their best for them. (MORE: Katy Perry Weirds Out Sesame Street) But parental concern about the puppeteer&#8217;s sex life obscures a different set of issues. First, it’s problematic when adults over-identify with children’s entertainment. When the launch of a new character is a major news event (as when ABC News selected Abby Cadabby as Person of the Week) and puppet characters have their own publicity machines, it’s easy to forget about the real target audience: preschoolers, most of whom are watching the show not on two levels, as the Workshop suggests, but on one level, and often alone. Anxious speculation about the Elmo brand’s post-scandal prospects reflects an adult’s perspective on the puppet character, not a young child’s, as one Wall Street Journal blogger sheepishly admitted when she confessed to confiscating an Elmo toy from the diaper bag to avoid intrusive thoughts while playing with her son. But parents who are suddenly finding it awkward to make good on Santa’s Christmas promise of an Elmo doll are really missing the point. The simple truth is that most three year-olds<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=25697&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Pop Culture</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/pop-culture/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/sesamestreet.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Image: Sesame Street</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">timecontributor</media:title>
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		<title>Fall TV: Strong Female Characters Can Negate Violence</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/09/17/fall-tv-strong-female-characters-can-negate-violence/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/09/17/fall-tv-strong-female-characters-can-negate-violence/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 17 Sep 2012 11:45:44 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Christopher J. Ferguson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[female characters]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Law and Order]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Revolution]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Buffy Effect]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Underworld]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=22082</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[If you watched any of the Olympics, you no doubt saw ads for a new TV series called Revolution, which premieres tonight on NBC. (The pilot episode is also available online.) The show follows the adventures of a young woman named Charlie (played by Tracy Spiridakos) trying to survive in a postmodern future in which electricity has ceased to function and civilization is run by ruthless warlords. Part Hunger Games, part Lord of the Rings, the show particularly intrigues me because the lead character is a strong female. This represents more than another step toward equality. (As TV and film director Joss Whedon famously said in a 2009 speech, &#8220;Why do [I] always write these strong women characters? Because you&#8217;re still asking me that question.&#8221;) Recent research I&#8217;ve conducted suggests that strong female characters actually mitigate the negative impact of edgy material in fictional media for both male and female viewers. There’s been much debate about whether shows with sex and violence, particularly in combination, can lead to negative attitudes toward women. Unfortunately, the bulk of the research has focused on pornography, not mainstream media. An older study from 1988 found that exposure to &#8220;slasher&#8221; films mixing sex and violence might result in reduced empathy to victims of rape among viewers. But a recent study by Moon Lee and colleagues published in Mass Communication and Society suggests that watching sexual violence in crime dramas had little negative impact on male viewers and may have even reduced gender stereotypes. The one thing that these studies failed to tease out was whether it was the sexual and violent content that played a role, or the way in which women were portrayed. I decided to try to get to the bottom of this question. (MORE: Jeff Alexander: Where Are All the (Good) Female Superhero Movies?) What I found was that it wasn’t the combination of sex and violence — which is what we tend to focus on — that impacted male viewers&#8217; negative attitudes toward women or women viewers&#8217; anxiety, but rather whether women characters were presented as strong or submissive. Or put another<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=22082&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Arts &amp; Entertainment</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/nup_149335_1939.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Revolution</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">erinleighskarda</media:title>
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		<title>Breaking Bad and the Downfall of the White &#8216;Anyman&#8217;</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/07/20/breaking-bad-and-the-downfall-of-the-white-anyman/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/07/20/breaking-bad-and-the-downfall-of-the-white-anyman/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 20 Jul 2012 12:00:55 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Touré</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Breaking Bad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Sopranos]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Wire]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Walter White]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[war on drugs]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=19657</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Breaking Bad is on the short list of the greatest dramas in modern TV (alongside The Wire, The Sopranos and Mad Men) not only because it&#8217;s well-written, well-acted and well-directed, but also because it&#8217;s wrapped up in three major themes that speak to where America is today. The show&#8217;s premise — a high school chemistry teacher named Walter White descends into making and selling methamphetamine — comes into view after White discovers he has lung cancer and is unable to pay his exorbitant bills and may die leaving his family broke. This brings us into the long national argument around health care (as well as the criminal underpayment of America&#8217;s teachers). When White moves into the meth trade, the show enters the territory of the War on Drugs as he swims in an ocean of sharks — evil dealers, crazy hitmen, kooky junkies, crooked lawyers and the dogged DEA. (MORE: Breaking Bad: 5 Questions We Want Answered This Season) Third and perhaps most importantly, White — like Don Draper of Mad Men and Tony Soprano of The Sopranos — is a man struggling to retain his grip on power in his world. The meta-story of these shows is a top dog in slow decline. White&#8217;s narrative started in a nice, predictable, vanilla suburbia, but he lost control over his body because of cancer, then over his world because of the dealing, leaving him fighting to stay alive among criminals who are tougher than him and stay out of jail by avoiding authorities who are chasing him. As recently as late last season, White was virtually a slave for a bigger dealer, who he kills because he&#8217;s afraid of being killed. Yes, White has risen high on the underworld ladder, but to do so he&#8217;s moved from protagonist to antagonist: he&#8217;s lost his soul. Cancer pushed him out of his suburban Eden and into a chaotic meth-filled Hades where he struggles with ill characters who are black and brown and white trash. Thus White&#8217;s battle to maintain power and supremacy in an increasingly<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=19657&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/bb_501.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Breaking Bad</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">erinleighskarda</media:title>
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		<title>Why Do We Care More About Diversity on TV Than In Our Schools?</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/05/24/why-do-we-care-more-about-diversity-on-tv-than-in-our-schools/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/05/24/why-do-we-care-more-about-diversity-on-tv-than-in-our-schools/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 24 May 2012 10:45:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Noliwe M. Rooks</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[diversity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Donald Glover]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Girls]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[integration]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Lena Druham]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[schools]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=16258</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[As soon as it premiered last month, HBO’s new series, Girls, was roundly criticized for the lack of racial diversity in the cast. Filmed in Brooklyn, the show chronicles the lives of four white female friends who have recently graduated from college. TV critics immediately questioned how it was possible for the stars to only have white friends and chastised Hollywood for perpetuating the fiction of such extreme levels of racial separation in personal and romantic relationships. In response, the show&#8217;s creator, writer and star, Lena Durham, went on NPR to address the controversy and promised that if the series were renewed for a second season, the racial makeup would change. True to her word, Durham recently tweeted while filming the show&#8217;s second season to share pictures of the newest cast member, black actor Donald Glover from the show Community. While this turn of events is clearly progress, why are we so willing to call for ending racial segregation on television and not in our nation’s classrooms? (MORE: Michelle Alexander: The Myth of Desegregation) Television is actually more racially integrated than many of our urban school districts. According to a report commissioned by the Screen Actors Guild, non-whites were cast in 20–25% of all roles on television between 2002 and 2008, with African Americans garnering between 13–15% of that number. Now consider that in New York City, more than half of the schools are at least 90% black or Latino and that those numbers remain similar in many of the largest cities in the United States. In Chicago, white students only comprise about 10% of the overall student population, in Philadelphia they are only 15%, and in Los Angeles, the second largest school system in the United States, white students are only 9% of the student population. What this means is that in some areas of our nation&#8217;s largest cities, between 85–90% of the student population is racially segregated, with whites attending schools predominately and overwhelmingly with other white students. These are segregation levels we have not seen since the 1950s. Back then, it<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=16258&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>U.S.</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/u-s/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/girls600.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">girls</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">ruthdaviskonigsberg</media:title>
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		<title>When Fans Attack: The Perils of an Internet-Enabled Audience</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/24/when-fans-attack-the-perils-of-an-internet-enabled-audience/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/24/when-fans-attack-the-perils-of-an-internet-enabled-audience/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:00:39 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Jeff Alexander</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Movies]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pop Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Adele]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[fan base]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[fanatics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[fandom]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Star Wars: Episode I 3-D]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Stephen Colbert]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Simpsons]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=10100</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Fame, it is said, is a fickle mistress. But fans can be more like a crazy person who boils your kid&#8217;s rabbit on the stove when you piss her off. Creative endeavors are tricky things, not always governed by the economic rules of supply and demand that hold true in other industries. But in most fields, including entertainment, consumers have come to expect a superior, consistent product from those they&#8217;ve given their business to. And when that doesn&#8217;t happen, whatever the reason, they can get a little ugly. Consider a few recent events in the entertainment world: Feb. 10: Star Wars: Episode I: The Phantom Menace opens in theaters in 3-D, nearly 13 years after its initial release. Feb. 13: Vogue posts an interview with Adele in which the singer announces her plans to take a four- to five-year hiatus, the day after she wins six Grammy Awards. Feb. 15: The Colbert Report goes dark for two days, with no public explanation given at the time. Feb. 19: The Simpsons airs its 500th episode, an unheard-of achievement for a prime-time comedy. Most of these developments sent the Internet into one form of tizzy or another. The Star Wars rerelease was widely regarded as a cynical move to wring yet more profit out of an unstoppable franchise in its fourth decade, and some of the annoyance was probably due to the fact that it worked. Despite a dark, muddy, and largely flat transfer to 3-D, the worst film in the series was rewarded with a $23 million box office take during its opening weekend. (MORE: Alexander: The Latest TV Trend: Autism) Adele&#8217;s announcement was met with shock, especially coming so soon after she was already forced to take several months off due to throat surgery. Would her fans wait for five years? Adele later revealed (or claimed) that she was only joking, but the initial reaction, in which supportive Internet comments were mixed with some calling her a one-hit wonder and predicting she would become irrelevant in that time, is no<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=10100&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Pop Culture</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/pop-culture/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/a509046340.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">a509046340</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">fromero0648</media:title>
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		<title>The Latest TV Trend: Autism</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/17/the-latest-tv-trend-autism/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/17/the-latest-tv-trend-autism/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 17 Feb 2012 13:00:44 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Jeff Alexander</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Movies]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pop Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Alphas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Aspergers syndrome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[autism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[autism spectrum]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Big Bang theory]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Legend of Bagger Vance]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[magical negro]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rain Man]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Touch]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=9797</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I know plenty about people on the autism spectrum. Communication and social skills present them with considerable challenges. They attach great importance to predictability and routine. They have highly specific tastes and preferences and become intractable when these are not met. They have difficulty understanding and processing human emotion, including their own. All of them are male, and all but one of them are young. And they have the ability to perform superhuman feats of memory and mathematics. I know all this, of course, only from popular culture. So maybe I don’t know as much as I think I do. Given the current prevalence of autism in the real world it’s not surprising to see it reflected in current entertainment. In fact, one might go so far as to say that autism is “hot” right now. Last month, Fox previewed a new series, Touch, about a seemingly uncommunicative boy; the dramatis personae of SyFy’s Alphas include a character who self-identifies as autistic; and the title character of BBC’s popular series Sherlock displays the emotional detachment often associated with those on the spectrum. These characters have another trait in common: they are, effectively, superhuman. Sherlock Holmes of course possesses those famous powers of deduction; Alphas’s Gary can pull and interpret electromagnetic signals directly from the air; and Jake from Touch, while communicating solely in number clues, has a seemingly divine ability to trace and even manipulate the invisible patterns of causality that supposedly connect us all (the show’s utterly fanciful premise is beside the point). (MORE: Judith Warner: The Question We Should be Asking About the New Autism Definition) It’s great that the growing diversity of characters is extending to the neurological, and I’m sure it contributes to greater understanding of some of the issues these individuals face; consider whether Charlie Babbitt’s cruel, ignorant treatment of his brother Raymond in the first half of 1988&#8242;s Rain Man would be considered redeemable by today’s audiences. The danger is that it may also lead to a more widespread perception of those on the<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=9797&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Pop Culture</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/pop-culture/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/atouch_08-loft-group_0387_v3_pw.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
		<media:thumbnail url="http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/atouch_08-loft-group_0387_v3_pw.jpg?w=240" />
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			<media:title type="html">Touch</media:title>
		</media:content>

		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/c8c260db54abb878de096ab252836115?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">fromero0648</media:title>
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		<title>When Chefs Get Fat</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/08/when-chefs-get-fat/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/08/when-chefs-get-fat/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 08 Feb 2012 10:00:37 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Josh Ozersky</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Taste of America]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Fat Chef]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Food Network]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kim on Fat Chef]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Biggest Loser]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=9214</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I found Fat Chef, the Food Network&#8217;s new reality show about, well, fat chefs, surprisingly hard to watch. But I also found that I couldn&#8217;t stop watching it. It was depressing and inspiring at the same time, an emotional speedball. I can&#8217;t say I really approve of it, but I know that I&#8217;m going to keep watching for as long as I can. I think it&#8217;s truthful about how we eat and cook in America in a way I&#8217;m not used to seeing presented so starkly. Much of my attention tends to be focused on the country&#8217;s best and most innovative chefs, who tend to be young, thin and tattooed. But get out into the country, and you find that being overweight is almost a universal hazard in the food-service industry. The chef, plus his or her line cooks, usually works in secret, away from the customers’ view; the kitchen is his or her domain, just as our own kitchens are at home. Now, I don&#8217;t know of anybody outside the military who ever became a chef without loving food and eating; and so the compound of stress, skill and authority tends to make these workplaces fat-gaining chambers. Chefs don&#8217;t really get to eat the food they make, but they nibble, they snack, and they tend to drink heavily and pig out after work, in a nightly form of relaxation and catharsis that is almost guaranteed to make them fatter still. (PHOTOS: Gourmet-Food Trucks) Fat Chef&#8216;s premise, as may be guessed, is to begin with a couple of fat chefs, introduce the audience to them and their plight and then encourage them, with the help of the usual unbearably smug personal trainer, to embark on a ludicrous exercise regimen, combined with the inevitable celery snacks. It&#8217;s perfectly obvious that no one with a real job and a deep-seated love of food could sustain the regimen long term, but we don&#8217;t really care because most likely we will never see them again after their show-concluding victories. But that doesn&#8217;t mean we<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=9214&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Taste of America</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/life-style/taste-of-america/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/achef-jen-lamplough-with-trainer-robert-brace-fat-chef-image-courtesy-of-food-network.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Fat Chef</media:title>
		</media:content>

		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/c8c260db54abb878de096ab252836115?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">fromero0648</media:title>
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		<title>Downton Abbey Is a Soap</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/30/downton-abbey-is-a-soap/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/30/downton-abbey-is-a-soap/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:43:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Ruth Davis Konigsberg</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Brideshead]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Downton Abbey]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[General Hospital]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Laura Linney]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mr. Bates]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[period drama]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[soap opera]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=8411</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I watched Downton Abbey for the first time last night — late to the party as always. My mother is a Downton Abbey acolyte who is trying to bring the rest of the family into the fold. I was curious about what had gotten everyone so hooked. My cell phone rang at 8:51 p.m. while I was en route to my mom&#8217;s. &#8220;Are you all right?&#8221; she asked, concern in her voice. &#8220;I&#8217;m just in Key Food picking up some dinner. Do you need anything?&#8221; I asked. &#8220;No, just get here by 9!&#8221; When I walked in the door, Laura Linney popped up on the screen. &#8220;Hi, Laura!&#8221; my mom chirped. Forty-five minutes and one marriage of convenience, one engagement of convenience, one child out of wedlock, one new mother turned war widow who might be lying to cover up a child out of wedlock, one broken engagement due to sexual dysfunction brought on by war wounds, and one case of blackmail later, my mother&#8217;s nose was about 4 in. from the screen trying to guess what twisted juiciness next week&#8217;s installment might bring. &#8220;She&#8217;s going to push him down the stairs and kill him!&#8221; she predicted about Mr. Bates&#8217; jilted wife. (MORE: Downton Abbey Recap: Season 2, Episode 4) Downton Abbey is not a period drama — it&#8217;s a soap opera. It&#8217;s a finely milled bar of English lavender wrapped with tissue and gold cord and nestled in a pretty box, but it has more in common with One Life to Live than Brideshead. Actually, make that General Hospital, since the mansion that gives the show its title has now been repurposed into an infirmary for soldiers coming back from the front. But it&#8217;s a soap that we can all feel good about and often find other excuses for watching. &#8220;The war changes everything! Society gets totally turned upside down!&#8221; says my mother, who has never watched a daytime drama in her life. I explain to her the structural similarities to the soap opera, the frequent doses of highly enjoyable<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=8411&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/aemth_d2_ep4_6_2573_32.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
		<media:thumbnail url="http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/aemth_d2_ep4_6_2573_32.jpg?w=240" />
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			<media:title type="html">Downton Abbey</media:title>
		</media:content>

		<media:content url="http://2.gravatar.com/avatar/2586a9c38733bd9e871b1850d572d888?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">ruthdaviskonigsberg</media:title>
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		<title>Is American Idol Trying to Be the Olympics?</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/27/is-american-idol-trying-to-be-the-olympics/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/27/is-american-idol-trying-to-be-the-olympics/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 27 Jan 2012 12:00:59 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Jeff Alexander</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pop Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[American Idol]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Bob Costas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cultural relevance]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[history]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Ryan Seacrest]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[singing competition]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=8184</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[American Idol has certainly come a long way from its humble beginnings as a summer replacement series in 2002. All things considered, it stepped into its role as a pop culture juggernaut with surprising grace. It&#8217;s now unstoppable and ubiquitous and has been for almost a decade. But now there&#8217;s one other thing it&#8217;s trying to be: venerable. Which it probably shouldn&#8217;t. To understand what I mean by &#8220;venerable&#8221; in the context of network TV, consider another televised competition that consistently demands the country&#8217;s attention: the Olympics. The broadcasts of the event constantly remind us of the Games&#8217; long and dignified history, which, it is implied, we are fortunate to be participating in at this very moment. Similarly, last week&#8217;s season premiere of American Idol kicked off with a montage of some of this season&#8217;s youngest hopefuls, who were only 6 years old when the show debuted. The message is clear: just as the Olympics have always been around for as long as we can remember, our young people are growing up in a world where, to them, there has always been an American Idol. (PHOTOS: American Idol&#8216;s Past Winners) But that&#8217;s not the only way Idol is trying to be more like the Olympics. NBC and its affiliated networks&#8217; coverage of the Games has for years been focused more on the athletes&#8217; personal dramas and backstories than the actual competition. Bob Costas or some other host will introduce a lengthy clip package all about the origins, setbacks, tragedies and victories in some medal contender&#8217;s past, just so we can be that much more invested when we finally see them do what they came to do. Which often takes a fraction of the time we just spent learning about their brave battle against poverty, family trauma, scandal, injury or some especially tragic combination thereof. Watching the early audition rounds of this season of Idol is a similar experience. Before we even get to hear most of the contestants sing, we&#8217;re already forced to &#8220;get to know them.&#8221; American Idol is<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=8184&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/a2012-01-09t030431z_11475188.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">American Idol</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">fromero0648</media:title>
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		<title>Will Paula Deen Have the Last Laugh?</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/18/will-paula-deen-have-the-last-laugh/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/18/will-paula-deen-have-the-last-laugh/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 18 Jan 2012 10:00:33 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Josh Ozersky</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health & Science]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pop Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Taste of America]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cookbooks]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cooking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cooking Channel]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[diabetes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Food Network]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Paula Deen]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[unhealthy diet]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=7589</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It&#8217;s probably safe to say that few of her viewers were surprised when down-home cooking doyenne Paula Deen announced that she had Type 2 diabetes. How could they be? Deen&#8217;s recipes were so gruesomely unhealthy, so prodigal in their use of butter and cream and sugar and all the things we are supposed to avoid that her show has, for several years now, had an almost libertine glee to it. Deen damned the torpedos, shrugged off cholesterol and generally embraced her role as the Hunter S. Thompson of the Velveeta set. Now that she has diabetes, her critics are crowing, as she surely knew they would. But Paula Deen may have the last laugh after all. (MORE: Ozersky: Why The Martha Stewart Show Had to Go) The Food Network star, who has earned a prodigious income over the past few years both from her show and a whole portfolio of related projects, admits that she has known of her ailment for nearly three years. And now, she says, she&#8217;s going to start addressing it — as the paid spokesperson for the manufacturer of a diabetes drug. Many observers don&#8217;t know whether to be horrified or high-five the old gal. But that is very much the spirit of her career to date. After all, it&#8217;s Deen&#8217;s very doggedness and her absolute inability to bend to contemporary mores, that has made her what she is. Deen knew that, and her enormous success over the course of her 15-year career was based on her personal elan and a freewheeling indifference to health concerns that, in today&#8217;s climate, seemed in some weird way heroic. She was the Huey Newton of country cooking. The woman just didn&#8217;t care; she was going to deep fry some Twinkies, and that was the end of it. The result, just like our mothers told us, has been predictable. “Paula Deen was going to have some kind of health problem,” says chef Franklin Becker, the author of a well-known cookbook for diabetics. “It might not have been diabetes, but it<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=7589&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Taste of America</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/life-style/taste-of-america/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/pauladeen.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">pauladeen</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">fromero0648</media:title>
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		<title>Our Concern Over &#8216;Indecency&#8217; Is Misguided</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/13/tvs-real-indecency-our-concern-over-nudity-and-swearing-is-misguided/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/13/tvs-real-indecency-our-concern-over-nudity-and-swearing-is-misguided/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 13 Jan 2012 12:00:29 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Erika Christakis and Nicholas A. Christakis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Children]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Law]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[FCC]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Janet Jackson]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[nudity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[NYPD Blue]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[obscenity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[prime time]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[profanity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[screen time]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[violence]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[wardrobe malfunction]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=7233</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[There’s something ironic and misguided about the Supreme Court’s delicate concern for our television-watching sensibilities. The Justices are currently debating whether the FCC can continue to enforce its policies on nudity and profanity on broadcast TV, with an ancient episode of the now-defunct show NYPD Blue which showed a woman&#8217;s naked backside as central evidence. A number of justices long for a fairytale world where “government can insist on a certain modicum of decency,” as Justice Antonin Scalia archly observed. Chief Justice John Roberts, a father of young kids, plaintively noted that “all we are asking for is a few channels” where kids won’t be exposed to profanity and sexual acts. Justice Elena Kagan opined that “it seems to be a good thing to have a safe haven” during prime time. (MORE: Digital Gross-Outs Come to Network TV) A safe haven on television? How quaint. Leaving aside the availability of profanity and sex to anyone with cable or a laptop, the Supreme Court justices — and most Americans — are kidding themselves if they think keeping F-bombs off TV will keep children safe. It’s like taking your car to be detailed when the brake pads are worn out: it deflects attention from what really matters. The painful reality is that the great majority of screen time — prime-time television included — can have detrimental effects on children, and it’s unlikely we can legislate ourselves out of this problem. We need an attitude change more generally about TV and kids. Decades of research have produced a mountain of evidence that violent imagery on television can cause aggression in children, as summarized in a report by the Institute of Medicine. Moreover, the rapid-fire pace of even the most apparently benign cartoons has well-documented damaging effects on early brain development that can set up children for a lifetime of academic, social, and behavioral problems. We know this in the same way that we know it’s a good idea to eat fruits and vegetables and lay off the fatty donuts — which is to say that<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=7233&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Law</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/u-s/law/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/ideas_nypd_blue_supreme_court.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">NYPD Blue</media:title>
		</media:content>

		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/c8c260db54abb878de096ab252836115?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">fromero0648</media:title>
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		<title>Why The Martha Stewart Show Had to Go</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/09/why-the-martha-stewart-show-had-to-go/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2012/01/09/why-the-martha-stewart-show-had-to-go/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 09 Jan 2012 12:45:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Josh Ozersky</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Life & Style]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Taste of America]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cancelled]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Hallmark Channel]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Martha Stewart]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rachael Ray]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Martha Stewart Show]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=6864</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[This week brought the news that the Hallmark Channel is pulling the plug on The Martha Stewart Show, bringing an end to its seven-year run. (Stewart&#8217;s previous show, Martha Stewart Living, was canceled when the lifestyle doyenne was sent to the big house for insider trading.) I rarely watched Martha, an hour-long live show in which Stewart, gamely trying to connect with a living audience, never really seemed in her element. But that raises the question of what her element really is. Stewart is one of the very few people in the world whose name stands for a whole way of life; a way of life which, it could be argued, overlapped with the American upper-middle class for a good stretch of the &#8217;90s and early aughts. It&#8217;s entirely possible that Stewart failed because the Hallmark Channel has a tiny audience and that Stewart needs to go back into syndication, where more people can see her making guacamole with Eva Mendes or demonstrating holiday centerpieces. And I suppose the format might be to blame: Stewart is not a people person; she&#8217;s an authority figure. There is also the simple question of age: Stewart is 70 years old, and maybe younger audiences can&#8217;t relate to her. But I suspect the explanation of her waning popularity has something to do with changes in America as a whole. (MORE: Ozersky: Why the Demise of Friendly&#8217;s Is Bad for America) Over the past 10 years, there have really been only two names that truly resonated as representing a way for an American homemaker to live. One was Martha Stewart, and the other was Rachael Ray. It&#8217;s not relevant which one, if either, you like better; I&#8217;m on Team Rachael, personally and professionally, but that doesn&#8217;t even matter. The point is that the two seemed, for a very long, like alternative role models in America. In retrospect, don&#8217;t we have to ask ourselves how this was even possible? Stewart represented a lifestyle that was rarefied, refined and opulent even by the standards of people who<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=6864&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Taste of America</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/life-style/taste-of-america/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/martha-stewart.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
		<media:thumbnail url="http://timeopinions.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/martha-stewart.jpg?w=240" />
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			<media:title type="html">martha stewart</media:title>
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		<media:content url="http://2.gravatar.com/avatar/2586a9c38733bd9e871b1850d572d888?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">ruthdaviskonigsberg</media:title>
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		<title>Why the Winter TV Hiatus Makes No Sense</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2011/12/30/its-time-to-get-new-shows-on-tv-during-the-holidays/</link>
		<comments>http://ideas.time.com/2011/12/30/its-time-to-get-new-shows-on-tv-during-the-holidays/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 30 Dec 2011 10:00:32 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Jeff Alexander</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[holidays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ratings]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[sweeps]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[television hiatus]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://ideas.time.com/?p=6331</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[As someone who regularly writes about television, I always look forward to this time of year to catch up on life. There are no new episodes airing of the shows I cover until mid-January, and there usually haven&#8217;t been any since mid-December, either. While I enjoy the extra family time, I can’t help but wonder, Why is there almost nothing new to see on TV other than New Year&#8217;s Rockin&#8217; Eve for, like, three weeks? (PHOTOS: Neverending Television) There&#8217;s the time-honored reason, of course. That reason is that the broadcast networks prefer to air new episodes of their hit shows when advertisers are paying a lot more attention to the number of viewers, i.e., the &#8220;sweeps&#8221; periods of November, February and May. No network wants to waste a new episode — which, make no mistake, is very expensive to produce — during a week when people are more likely to be catching up with family and doing deferred housekeeping chores than sitting in front of the tube. But time-honored reasons don&#8217;t always hold up as well as they once did. Think about the days when the big three networks had seasons that began in the fall and ended in spring and that was pretty much it (again, mainly due to sweeps). Then upstart network Fox premiered a season of Beverly Hills 90210 in summer of 1991. This head start, while most other shows were still in summer reruns, certainly contributed to the show&#8217;s considerable success. Some networks learned the lesson and some, namely the main ones, didn&#8217;t. Although the broadcast networks largely cling stubbornly to the old-timey September-May calendar, there are dozens of cable networks premiering new shows and seasons outside of that timeframe and seeing them become hits — except, oddly enough, right now. Sure, a lot of the potential viewing audience during the holidays is busy with aforementioned family and home obligations. But there are probably also a lot of people who, thanks to cold weather and short days, would be more than willing to veg out in<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=6331&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">fromero0648</media:title>
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		<title>&#8216;Frosty&#8217; Fatigue: All I Want For Christmas Is Some New TV Specials</title>
		<link>http://ideas.time.com/2011/12/23/frosty-fatigue-all-i-want-for-christmas-is-some-new-tv-specials/</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 23 Dec 2011 12:00:14 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Jeff Alexander</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Arts & Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[A Charlie Brown Christmas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Christmas TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[Last week I wrote about the dearth of new Christmas songs, but there&#8217;s a similar problem with a lack of new Christmas TV. In this case, the conglomeration of the entertainment industry can&#8217;t be to blame — there are way more channels now than there used to be. Instead, networks are actually using the lack of new Christmas TV as a marketing tool. Consider CBS’s Nov. 29 airing of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, a special that’s nearly a half-century old and looks it, with primitive animation and a setting where institutionalized bullying goes unquestioned, even by Santa himself. Despite the millions of videos and DVDs sold to people who can now watch it whenever they want, it captured more than 12.6 million viewers willing to sit through (or zap) the commercials to get a fix of televised holiday tradition. I suspect that tradition is behind a lot of what’s going on here. CBS even advertised the broadcast as such, meaning “come gather the family around the TV, and watch this for the umpteenth time.” Compare that to Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas, based on a popular children’s animated film franchise, which had its televised world premiere Thanksgiving night. Not only did it fall short of Rudolph with 7.1 million viewers, it was thumped in its time slot by a repeat of The Big Bang Theory. Heavily advertised on FOX and featuring the films&#8217; original voice cast, the special wasn’t great, but it probably would have been better had it not had to be crammed into a half-hour time slot. Over at the movie theater, meanwhile, it seems like hardly a holiday season goes by without a new cinematic entry to the Christmas canon. This year’s Arthur Christmas boasts a 92% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and has grossed over $33 million in the U.S.&#8217;, and seems destined to join this century’s The Polar Express, Elf, and The Grinch in an ever-growing oeuvre. (MORE: Alexander: Will Pixar&#8217;s First Female Lead Break the Mold?) It seems counterintuitive that in film, where there’s so much<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=ideas.time.com&#038;blog=27622548&#038;post=5936&#038;subd=timeopinions&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>TV</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://ideas.time.com/category/arts-entertainment/tv/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">ruthdaviskonigsberg</media:title>
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