Women’s Entertainment Television or better known as “WeTV” is a channel completely devoted to programming that women would find interesting and enjoyable. The WeTV misson statement or what the TV station represents according to their website is as follows:
“WE tv’s programming gives viewers compelling perspectives on women’s lives that range from provocative to extraordinary, including signature series like “Bridezillas” and critically-acclaimed original documentary series such as “High School Confidential.” WE tv’s public affairs initiative, WE Empowers Women, is dedicated to creating programs that foster and celebrate women’s strength, confidence and diversity. ”
According to the WeTV website the following are their original series airing currently and their correlating descriptions:
Amazing Wedding Cakes: Get ready to enter the world of high-end cake making, from larger-than-life designs to the over-the-top personalities who create them.
Bridezillas: A comedic look at how brides-to-be go from sweet to certifiable while planning their big day.
High School Confidential: 12 girls. 4 years in the making. The critically-acclaimed original documentary series about real life high school.
I Want to Save Your Life: This series follows Charles Stuart Platkin, a nutritionist and public health advocate, on an incredible mission to bring Americans back to a healthy lifestyle.
Little Miss Perfect: It’s a journey into the world of children’s pageants, featuring Michael Galanes, a national pageant director for more than 10 years.
My Fair Wedding: Celebrity party planner David Tutera transforms what could be a disaster wedding into a platinum style affair.
Platinum Weddings: It’s the show that captures the drama and decadence of wedding planning on an extraordinary budget.
Raising Sextuplets: The series follows Jennifer and Brian Masche, parents of sextuplets as each child develops their own personality.
The Locator: In this emotionally powerful series, Troy Dunn reconnects loved ones who have lost touch over the years.
Secret Lives of Women: An unapologetic look at females who conceal behaviors and professions that push the boundaries of “normal” society.
If all of these shows premises were combined into one women, we would start off with a girl who is a beauty pageant winner, who then becomes a high school student with issues, who then became obese in need of being “saved”, who then grows up to be a wedding obsessed mother of sextuplets that lives a scandalous secret life.
Ok I left out any mention of the show The Locator. Perhaps this made-up women also had an estranged father she wanted to reconnect with.
So that analysis is clearly extreme. The point I am trying to make is how do these popular shows truly represent women? While some episodes of a few of these shows bring to light certifiable/exceptional women’s topics that are deserving of the spotlight when separated from the overall WeTV picture, such as episodes titled “Mothers of Murderer’s”, “Eating Disorders”, and “Hostages” from Secret Lives of Women, and episodes from The Locator, Raising Sextuplets and High School Confidential. Yet when you view the overall line up of the programming and look at each show’s individual episodes 90% of these programs and episodes are based around a topic that a) portrays women in a negative or not so great light and b) has some element of sensationalism.
Is this what we should expect from Women’s Entertainment Television or the redeveloped “Enpowering Women” sentiment the station has adopted? Do we need this type of drama to be entertained? What kind of social messages does this station send out to its audience which is (if not all) majority female?
Maybe I’m an unhip 25-year-old female, but I’d rather be given the option to watch something inspirational and positive, then something negative and sensational about the lives of women, especially on a Network devote to women. Yet I couldn’t sit here and say I haven’t seen my share of Bridezilla and other like shows either. That leads me to consider… Am I a walking talking contradiction? Does popular television have an addictive substance embedded within it? Or do we have double standards for the depiction of our fellow women on television? Or rather is television not at all a reflection of society and only valued as entertainment with little moral obligation? Do we even take the media seriously anymore? So many questions, not enough answers.
Below are three video clips from WeTV programming. First is ”Little Miss Perfect”, second “High School Confidential” and last but not least ”Bridezilla”. Through these three clips you can get a small sampling of how females are portrayed on this particular TV station, and just so conviently a developmental persepective from child to teenager to adult.
I generally avoid WE like the plague. The Bridezilla concept is particularly nauseating because there may be multiple audiences for it 1. those who want to laugh at the bride or feel above her, or 2. those who actually envy her. Communications isn’t just messages sent, the reader/viewer/listener also brings his or her own life experience and attitudes into it and may not interpret messages as intended, although in this case the intention is simply, what will get the most ratings.
What’s hard for me to understand, unless most of these shows are actually aiming for the second type of viewer, how they are empowering. What does the concept of Empowerment even mean to WE executives?
I think I might be potentially in another category of viewer all together. I see the blatant ridiculousness that is “WeTV” programming, yet some episodes of Bridezilla and etc. are humorous to me. I wouldn’t say that I feel above the women on the show, I just happen to think their antics are pretty hilarious at times. Other times I watch it just to be “shocked” at how far these women will go. But all the while I realize this is sensational, and harmful towards the big picture of how women are portrayed in the media, and specifically on “WeTV” a station devote to women. It’s like I am caught between being entertained and wanting women to be portrayed in a better light. I think there are quite a few of us out there that fall into this indecision.
Although I have no idea how their shows are suppose to be empowering. I can only guess that “WeTV” executives have an obscure definition of “empowerment” because in my eyes these shows are basically the opposite of empowerment. It makes women look power-less, a lot of these shows portray women going off the deep end, not very flattering at all.
WE and Lifetime generally make me sick. WE seems under the impression that all women are crazy and Lifetime loves to show women as helpless victims. It has always been amazing to me that the two channels that claim to be for women are actually so harmful towards women.
I was curious who the execs at WE are. According to their website:
Executives: Ed Carroll, Chief Operating Officer, Rainbow Entertainment Services Kim Martin, President/General Manager, WE tv Robert Broussard, President, Rainbow Network Sales
So the channel for women is mainly under control by men.
Good point Kristina. Men do seem to be in the powerful roles at “WeTV” I’m sure that has a lot to do with why this station represents women the way they do. I wonder how different the station would be if it was run purely by women. Would they still have sensational types of shows, because they are interested in making a profit, or would they put their business minds to the side and put more care into portraying their female characters in a respectable light? I’d like to think that women exec. would be creative enough to blend both entertainment, humor, and respectable characters. Hopefully that will be the future of “WeTV”.
I definitely agree with you that some of WETV’s programming definitely does not live up to their supposed mission statement. Then again, I think most networks are just the same.
One of the things that I like about WETV is that – while they air some shows I dislike (Little Miss Perfect, for example) the vast majority are interesting to me (The Locator, I Want to Save Your Life, and Secret Lives of Women.) I think these shows really do empower women to find their identities, not be afraid to confess their problems and seek help, and get off their butts and do something.
I am not saying that this network is great by any means – clearly a show like Little Miss Perfect is just appalling – but then, what network is these days.
I enjoyed reading your post and hearing your perspective.