Princess of Power

There's a huge television in the break room that is almost always on. Sometimes I have to work overtimes on Saturdays and the show line up is different than on weekdays. This lucily means that sometimes we get to watch some interesting stuff. The last time I worked a Saturday we watched She-Ra Princess of Power and Ozzie and Harriet. I hadn't seen She-Ra since I was part of their target demographic and so watched with that mix of gleeful nostalgia and uncomfortable dissapointment that it is much cornier, choppier and poorly drawn than I remember. Either way She-Ra made break a little more pallatable than our usuall breaktime entertainment fare.

During weekdays the shows are mostly talk shows riddled with drama about unclear paternity, fidelity or gender. That's tiring enough as it is, but some of the shows get into some darker topics and those are hard to sit through. The darker topics generally involve abuse of some sort. The toughest ones are when the victim is a child and sometimes horrific detail is gone into. I have the hardest time with those. This is partly because of the subject matter, but also partly because we are watching/ignoring it during our brief 10 or 15 minute break. Casual discussions about general life topics (mostly hunting this time of year) are going on at one end of the table, and at the other end of the table people on the t.v. are screaming at each other over something terrible. I'm not saying that I think the guys I work with are callous- I don't think that's what's going on. I think there's a level of desensitization they're at and I think that reguarding this as entertainment is part of the cultural waters they swim in. Not sure if I'm doing a good job at it, but part of what I'm trying to say is that it is not my intention to be snobby while at the same time assert that I am bothered by these shows.

The other thing that is particularly hard about these shows is the occational reactions/comments of the guys. I always feel caught off guard by them when they veer into sexist/racist/bigoted. Today's show featured women who were being abused and controlled by their partners. One of the first comments made by one of the guys was that it was partly her fault because she was staying in the relationship. She detailed the physical and psycological abuse by her boyfriend, including rape and isolation and how it made her feel. She would peridically brake into tears as she spoke and the abrupt starts/stops of her crying prompted a few comments that she must be faking it. Then they started imitating her crying.

When stuff like this gets going, I don't know what to do. I bring in books to read, but sometimes it's hard to ignore the television and the banter. I've begun taking my breaks in the weld cell when these sorts of shows are on.

The thing that is a little tricky for me is trying not to appear as if I don't desire community with the folks I work with. Which is an odd sort of question since being part of the community very possibly means at least tolerating if not participating in the consumption of this media and the banter that accompanies it. But at the same time, it's not as though that's everything that's going on with these people either. They have hobbies and families and such, so it's somewhat frustrating that there are a few things I feel prevent me from feeling more integrated into the group.