To think that contestants should be banned from telling us their sob stories on game shows?

[mumofoneAloneandwell]

Now i am secretly rooting for the other person to beat you 😬

Bring back contestants who want the money for a boob job!

You realise OP the producers make them do it to make it more interesting for the audience, not that people want to go and share their lives for the lolz.

We all know it’s the producers!

I guess it’s just gone too far now and people are starting to turn off - they’ll keep going as long as there is a critical mass though

for me I was so upset when RAW did it because that was the one reality YV program I watched because you didn’t have the constant navel gazing. Ah well

My nan in law is 103 and I guarantee you that every last relative will be 'shocked' like they think she's immortal or something...

Completely agree op and let us not forget the soundtrack that accompanies sob story...makes me want to be a bit sick!

Race Across the World have fully signed up to all contestants having some kind personal struggle or trauma that they are working through, its getting beyond tedious. Its not enough that the people want to participate to win a wedge of money or see some exotic locations, there has to be some tears as the emotional journey of recovery plays out before our eyes. Seems so mawkish and contrived.

The thing is it’s part of a wider belief that the most important thing is everyone’s feelings and you see it on supposedly factual programmes like the news too.
There was an item recently where a couple had been scammed out of their life savings buying a house that was either non existent or not finished or something, and the journalists were getting the man to describe in detail how he felt about it all and how it affected his mental health and so on.
I just thought, scamming is wrong, it would be equally wrong whether he felt his life had been ruined by it or whether he had been philosophical and going, ‘it’s shitty but nobody died, there are people worse off than me.’ Shouldn’t the story be ‘how did it happen, how can you avoid it happening to you, what is being done to stop scammers’, rather than ‘look how sad this scammed man is! Scamming makes people sad!’ as if we need to know how sad he is to understand it is a Bad Thing.

Yes - whenever people win on a game show, buy an apartment in the sun, get their dog trained… the first presenter question is “How do you feel?” If you’re not spilling your emotions you’re unworthy.

Well if you’re not going to shed tears over it is there even any point in training your dog?
😂

Local news is particularly bad for this. I live in London and you would think there would be enough going on in the capital on a daily basis to populate a whole half hour news slot, but no, we have an emotionally incontinent several minute long interview with someone who has raised some money for charity or kitchen table sad face interview with someone who has been affected by an expensive vet bill (cue footage of some shit arsed bark machine pug playing fetch in the garden).

😆

Despair Shop! “This item is so precious to you, you let it moulder away in a shed for 20 years”

Surely there's a middle ground, though? It must be possible to enjoy your winnings in a sensible way - such as having a nice mortgage-free family home (not a country mansion) - without it ruining you?!

That's one point that people make perpetually about the lottery: if you give one person £20m, it could well end in years for them; but if instead you were able to give 40 people half a million each, it would be enough to make their lives way more comfortable, but not enough to send them off the rails.

Oh my god I've found my people!
I know its the producers doing it, bloody hate it. It must get them the ratings though, but how? How do they link that exact bit of the programme to making more money? Be so interesting to know.

Yes to all the dead nans and grandads who were in the war! Im even worse though, sometimes you'll get a story of 'my dad worked all the hours under the sun for us as kids so the time we got with him so was special' and then you find out that their mum also worked as a nurse or a teacher or something and i think... did he actually need to work those hours or was he dodging doing any parenting and then putting on his Disney dad face for 4 hours every couple of months to kick a ball round and taking all the glory, while there's a woman on her knees from raising three kids? Im way too cynical!!

I suppose the original Weakest Link - with Anne Robinson - was the antithesis of the modern sob-story-led TV.

She would seize on any perceived weakness and use it against them to tear them to pieces.

Surely there's a middle ground: where they're all nice and respectful to the contestants, whilst understanding that viewers just want to watch them getting on with singing/dancing/answering questions/playing the game, and aren't really that bothered about the intricacies of their lives?

Incidentally, I wonder how things work in US television? Are they like us, or do they swing the opposite way in building up a strong hero who has everything going their way - and thus one who is considered worthy of starring and/or winning the big prize?

I remember watching a documentary years ago looking at how various lottery winners had faired several years down the line. It was depressing really, mostly utter stupidity by some young 20 something’s winning a million quid or so, quitting their jobs, going on fancy holidays with their mates, buying insanely expensive cars before being skint and living with their parents three years later having pissed it all away. They honestly thought they could retire at that age and live like a rock star.

Deal Or No Deal has to be the very worst for this. So much twaddle about 'meaningful' numbers and 'following your heart' - along with all of the deceased grans looking down and bringing them luck.

It's all random what's in each box, love! If it weren't, the makers would get into serious trouble! The only skill bit that you can influence is playing the averages and probability and deciding when to deal.

The US version of DOND is insane. So many contestants will defy all sense and turn down very good offers, because they KNOW that they have the $1m in their case, for some heartstring-pulling reason or other - and not because they've smuggled in a pair of X-ray specs! So often they'll scream at how pathetically insulting 'only' $285,000 is - again especially because they KNOW what's in their case - and then end up going home with $5!

I think the biggest problem if you try and continue your life but more financially comfortable is that your friends/neighbours can resent you or people start hassling you for money. I don’t think it matters if you won half a million or twenty million

financial literacy in this country is terrible and they need to be much better at giving advice to winners - particularly when they are very young!!

It depends how you won it, though. If it was on TV, then everybody will know; but if it's a lottery or similar - or indeed a radio competition like I was on - you can go under the radar. Possibly not so easily with £20m, but with half a million, certainly.

How many people do you know with houses worth around half a million? Depending on where you are in the country, possibly loads. And do you know how many of them own them outright, owe 95% on the mortgage for them or anywhere in between?!

I think the ones who see a significant win as them hitting the big time, splashing out and living high on the hog like a celebrity forever are the ones who are doomed to failure. Those who appreciate the security that it can bring them, but otherwise don't really go overboard, except for wise, considered purchases (such as an averagely-decent house or something else that will hold its value) - and don't broadcast it far and wide - are the ones who will properly benefit the most from it.

In my old village the youngish man who ran the local bike repair shop won a lot of money and I was absolutely shocked by how people talked, they were saying things like ‘oh, he’ll see us all right’ on the basis that they’d been at school with him.
There was already going to be a trickledown effect because he was going to buy a new van for his business (he was not one of those chuck in your job and go on a cruise types) and he was going to give his old van to someone else, who in turn was going to give their vehicle to someone else.
I think you are absolutely right, he was not going to be allowed to enjoy his winnings in peace.

I know someone who won enough to pay off their mortgage. Didn’t tell anyone but as hey had more disposable income they ate out a bit more, nicer car etc and people picked up on it

humans are envious beings

There was a similar story in the above mentioned documentary about a bloke who won nearly £18 million, at the time I think it was one of largest ever lottery wins and it was sad listening to how he was basically treated like shit in his local village, getting his car keyed, his kids at school getting bullied, randoms down the pub expecting him to buy huge rounds everytime he walked in and just general resentment. He owned a local glazing company and ploughed a fair whack of his winnings into the business turning it from a moderately successful local firm into a very successful regional company employing loads of people. He ended up having to move house just to get away from all the above crap. It seemed people can't stand 'one of their own' doing well for themselves.

It is amazing how many people come out of the woodwork and assume you'll just give them a large amount of money because they once briefly brushed shoulders with you.

Also, just how thick people are at maths. If you've won, say, £1m and so they magically think you can easily afford to slip them £50k and not even miss it - but it doesn't occur to them that there would be hundreds of people on the same 'level' of closeness to you - ex-colleagues, went to school with you, drink at the same pub, regularly buy from your shop or whatever - and if you gave just 20 of them the same amount, you'd not only have nothing left for yourself and your family, but you'd also have scores more of angry people who were convinced that you were still eternally loaded and furious at you, in your now-penniless state, for not shovelling a load in their direction!

I don’t have an Italian nonna - maybe that could be my sob story? Oh woe is me, I never had a nonna’s bolognese recipe and was forced to feed my family substandard bolognese!

😄😄😄 just dont start suggesting putting ham in a carbonara to make it british or Gino will come for you

I also think that the introduction of the confessionals format across reality TV, where they can blabber their feelings and running commentary unchallenged, has deeply influenced how people tell themselves. Not for the better.

What really irked me back in the day was the "Stacey Dooley investigates...", especially because of the name. She never investigated much, she went to places, looked around, talked to ppl, mainly to ask them how they felt, summarised it meekly with a sad face, careful not to take sides, then a long bit about how she feels about all the feelings she has been asking about.

So superficial, so vain really, very careful not to give too much information or having it coming from experts because it would make the show look pedantic, uncool or worse, discriminatory.