MTV Strikes Again in the Friendzone

It seems as though SallyAnn Salsano hasn’t just been sitting around fist pumping and counting her monies. The woman who brought the world (much to its chagrin) Jersey Shore is back with another series called Friendzone.

The premise is pretty straight forward: One of two kids, who is the self-avowed best friend of the other, tells the latter that she/he has deeper feelings and tries to take it to the next level. Under the pretext of being wingman, the boy or girl asks the crush to help him/her prepare for a blind date- not knowing that he/she is the intended “date”. Just before the wingman walks away, the lovelorn friend reveals his/her true feelings, and thankfully MTV is there to capture the joy or heartbreak that follows. Nothing says that I love you and this is 100% genuine like having a camera in your faces when you tell your beloved and thirty million other people your deepest truest feelings and desires at the same time for the first time.

The first episode that I watched last night featured two sets of best friends, both a male and female pairing. In the first segment, it was the female who had fallen for her male best friend and wanted to tell him. The second pairing is a couple of friends in which the boy has fallen for his beautiful female friend. One was a success and the other a failure. Guess which one was which?

As a female, though markedly older than the kids featured, I can understand how it’s harder for girls to bridge the friend zone gap- especially when you’re in your late teens and early twenties. You want the spark, the excitement, the drama, the passion- and when that doesn’t happen initially, it’s hard to have the maturity required to appreciate your friend as a paramour. And that is unfortunate because those are the beautiful men that we should be flocking to, not the dirty-legged (slutty), obnoxious, yet hot or sexy cads we tend to gravitate toward. Oh, the humanity!

I can honestly say that I have only had one male best friend in my life. I have had many, many good male friends, but when I think of someone who I hung out with all the time- going to lunch, partying, staying up late having deep ass drunken conversations- there has only been one. And he was gay, so a potential romantic interlude was never even a part of the equation, so I cannot fathom the fear and trepidation that goes with telling someone so close to you in one way that you are feeling for him/her in a completely different way. In spite of my earlier sarcasm about the cameras, I have nothing but admiration for the fact that these kids had the courage to tell their BFFs at all. The risk of losing a friend for me would strongly outweigh gaining a boyfriend or girlfriend- maybe that’s why I immediately shut any possibilities from the jump. I’m not proud, I’m just being honest. They might be craving stardom, fame, money or anything else that can be gained by being on television, but the risk of a shattered heart that everyone can see and experience with them, makes them stronger in that sense than I will ever be.

I would love to hear from people who were old enough to go out drinking, but chose to stay home and watch Ross and Rachel in prime time television: Did you ever crush a best friend? If so, did you ever tell the person, and if you did, how did it work out? Was your friendship jacked up, did you hook up, or did you get drunk, get over it, and crack up?

For those interested, check your local listings for the time and days to see Friendzone on MTV.

Russian (Raggedy Anya) Dolls: What I Learned from Trashy Television

Lifetime is still playing broke ass cousin to Bravo and MTV's reality shows, and in case you need proof, check out Russian Dolls, the Плохо, poor man’s version of Jersey Shore. Don’t get it twisted- I got just as sucked in. Something about those marginally attractive, completely arrogant, unbelievable materialistic “friends” just got me all stupid, silly drunk on them and I couldn’t stop watching once I tuned in.

It truly was JS without so many obviously drunken antics, but they got down with hella doses of straight up crazy: Women going on 2 dates and calling dudes their “boyfriends” and wanting them to meet their parents, chicks dating dudes who get tattoos that read, “I won’t kill you, but I will watch you die”, and bitches who scream and lose their minds at beauty parlors when their cheap ass weaves, that Mattel wouldn’t put on a Barbie Loves Beauty Styling Head, don’t fluff and style the way they want. It’s a crazy deeper than Lake Baikal, truer than the cold of Siberia, and more addictive than vodka. These nuts work that Russian stereotype down to their furs and their rampant gossip. Loves it!

But my favorite part was the confessional, when they talked to one of the cast members, Eddie, and his best friend (read: They met at the auditions and got along), Albert. These fools obviously have a good, humorous rapport and Lifetime worked that. At one point, though, through all their eighth- grade observations and ridiculously chauvinistic, bullshit musings, these douche buckets actually say something that bears repeating- which goes to show everyone has value to someone at some point.

I can’t remember what they were talking about, and I refuse to use energy that could be applied to something productive that could truly enhance my life trying to remember what it was, but one of them makes this obvious and simple, yet amazingly profound (to me) statement:

“Russian women demand to be treated well. So, you treat them well.”

Now I know that all of our camp counselors and church advisers have told us girls that we should demand queen treatment since we were knee high to a grass hopper, but I think it’s worth revisiting again. In our culture, although we don’t admit it, we tend to bend to accommodate males. No one wants to be the bitch, or the asshole, and we end up settling for people and things that we absolutely know we shouldn’t. A Russian woman will tell you to “eat her fcuk” faster than you can say “Bolshevik”, flip her fur, add more lip gloss, and keep walking. No apologies, no explanations. I’m not saying that we have to be that hard- but we need to stand our ground better.

Why is there a stripper pole in my house? Why am I biting my tongue when you say something erroneous and silly when I know it’s wrong? Why I am I lowering myself to you when you should be raising yourself up to me? See, Russian bitches know this and even though I have always loved them, I never realized why. Until now. These women, who are so sistah on the inside, douse themselves in parfum "Ain't the One" and call it a day. And I love, love, love them for it.

I think that the Russian Dolls show has already died and been buried in a trashy television unmarked grave (I could be wrong), but if you get the chance to check it, do yourself the pleasure. It’s like tea, vodka, caviar, fur, and disco blue eye shadow all rolled up into one lovely babushka of a wonderfully bad, entertaining show.