cgod, this isn't really directed at you, just prompted by you. I'm under a lot of stress now and I need to let off some steam, so here we go.

So? That doesn't mean anything. Do you think the majority of the people that sign those waivers, the people that appear on COPS, understand what the waivers actually mean, let alone the repercussions of what they're signing? An overwhelmingly large number of those people are any combination of impoverished, poorly educated, suffering from substance abuse and mental health issues, and find themselves under extremely stressful situations day in and day out. It's part of the reason they make bad decisions, signing a waiver for a shit TV series like COPS just adds to it.

Waivers for a shit series like COPS. Pay day loan companies. Rent to own retail stores. On and on. They take advantage of people who are prone to making bad decisions, unable to often think things through, and don't know that what they're doing is getting them into trouble until it's too late.

Let's keep going with COPS though and how shitty of a TV show it is. They are taking people and filming them on some of the absolute worse days of their lives and pushing it as entertainment so that networks and advertisers can make money of them. Making money on the misery of others, in any way, shape, or form, is bullshit.

TV series like COPS horribly skews the public perspective on the impoverished and the crimes they commit. Come on, when's the last time you saw COPS go arrest someone for embezzlement? Nah. It's all drunks, wife beaters, drug addicts, and petty thieves. Horrible crimes. Yes. Awful crimes. Yes. Crimes committed overwhelmingly by the underclass, a layer of society that has it hardest above all. It paints these people in a very bad light, tainting our perception of them as a whole. The majority of those people are good hearted, law abiding citizens just trying to get by in the world. Every now and again, some of those people make bad decisions.

Let's keep going though, cause I'm not done with COPS. No fucking siree. So these people, these people on very bad days, make some fucked up decisions. That's all we get to see. We don't get to see the whole story. We don't see what lead them to where they are and we don't see what happens to them after. How many of those people, after those days, decide to do something better with their lives? Sober up? Go back to school? Become volunteers to at risk youth or people with addiction problems? How many of those people, 99% of the time, are loving spouses and parents, hard working men and women, and are all around good hearted people? Shows like COPS, whether these people are first time offenders or repeat offenders, record just a tiny sliver of their lives and puts it out for the world to judge them, condemn them. Shit, having a record of any kind makes it hard enough to find jobs and affects relationships. That sucks. COPS takes it one step further though and puts all of that shit on national television and calls it entertainment. These people are getting fucked while the producers of COPS get emmys.

I don't care what waiver that man signed. I don't care what it said. In fact, I don't even care if he had legal representation at the time when he signed it. His life is being exploited for fucking television. There's no excuse for that. Just because it might be legal, it doesn't mean it's alright.