No, not that one, the REAL Orange County

As I was casually flipping around the TV today, I came across MTV's latest televisual crackfest, Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County. I'm pretty sure that title is a joke, but who knows what the real Orange County is like? While I was born and raised on Long Island and now go to college in Manhattan, I've been to California many times, and I like it a lot. I'll spare you the usual East Coast posturing of how Los Angeles sucks, because to be honest, Los Angeles is nice. However, I can see why many people outside of LA hate it. I remember seeing an interview with NY Times columnist David Brooks, who had written a book on America, describe how the rest of the world views the United States. He said, "The world looks at America in the way that America looks at Beverly Hills." It later became clear that America is seen as vain, stupid, materialistic and entirely self-obsessed. All these traits are commonly used to describe Los Angeles, and while I usually defend La-La Land, that was before I saw our friends in Laguna Beach.

I've never been so repulsed and attracted to a show. The characters are so empty, sometimes I can see the stage lights shining right out the back of them, but they've drawn me in with their pathetically one-dimensional storylines. The plot of the show is as such: Lauren (hot girl) likes Stephen (hot guy) who likes Kristin (younger hot girl), but also has feelings for his friend Lauren (aforementioned hot girl.) Kristin is shallow and manipulative, while Stephen and Lauren are saintly and pure. Case Closed. Sounds boring right? You're so stupidly wrong, my dismissive reader. You made the same mistake I made, meaning you ignored rule #1 in television: people will stop whatever they are doing to watch attractive people, especially if those attractive people are young and usually in bikinis. I was so stupid to forget that in my passionate and pseudo-intellectual snobbery, I like hot people on my TV screen, it even makes me feel hot by proxy. The kids on this show, as a magnificent bonus, are also prone to Dawson's Creek-esque exchanges, like so:

Lo's Mom: Lo, it's not a fashion show
Lo: Every day's a fashion show, Mom.

You can't write that stuff. Or can you? Since debuting last summer, the show has confused people with its claims that it is all real, while managing complicated two camera shots, always being around when important and unexpected events occur, being completely linear and having guys with appearing and disappearing facial hair. I, for one, don't care if the show is a little bit staged or completely false. It's a potent mix of attractive people with minor but overly dramatically portrayed problems. Plus, I think those kids are legit--I checked them on thefacebook.