"Watching 'Bad' Television: Ironic Consumption, Camp, and Guilty Pleasures"

Poetics 47 (2014) 41–59

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Poetics

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/poetic

Watching ‘‘bad’’ television: Ironic consumption,
camp, and guilty pleasures
Charles Allan McCoy a,*, Roscoe C. Scarborough b

a SUNY Plattsburgh, USAb University of Virginia, USA

A R T I C L E I N F O

Article history:

Available online 8 November 2014

Keywords:

Popular culture

Symbolic boundaries

Consumption

Media studies

Sociology of culture

A B S T R A C T

This research examines how people watch ‘‘bad’’ television–

television programs that the viewers themselves label as ‘‘trash,’’

‘‘stupid,’’ and ‘‘awful.’’ Such viewers experience a normative

contradiction; while they have created or embraced a symbolic

boundary between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television, they find them-

selves transgressing that boundary by consuming and, in some

cases, enjoying the shows that they condemn. By conducting 40 in-

depth interviews, this research identifies the strategies used by

television viewers to deal with this normative contradiction.

Beyond ‘‘traditional viewing,’’ we show how viewers employ

‘‘ironic consumption,’’ a ‘‘camp sensibility,’’ and frame their viewing

as a ‘‘guilty pleasure’’ to consume ‘‘bad’’ television.

� 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

How do people watch television that they themselves label as ‘‘trash,’’ ‘‘terrible,’’ ‘‘awful,’’ or‘‘dreadful’’? In other words, how do people consume television shows that they make negative estheticand moral judgments about? How are persons able to watch shows that they react to by saying: ‘‘Thisis horrible. I can’t believe I am watching this [Jersey Shore],’’ or, ‘‘I know it’s not good for me. It’s like

* Corresponding author at: Department of Sociology, SUNY Plattsburgh, 101 Broad Street, Plattsburgh, NY 12901, USA.

Tel.: +1 518 564 3326.

E-mail address: [email protected] (C.A. McCoy).

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C.A. McCoy, R.C. Scarborough / Poetics 47 (2014) 41–5942

junk food! It’s terrible, terrible; it’s frivolity [The Hills]’’? Persons who consume ‘‘bad’’ television1

believe these shows as esthetically inferior, at times even morally objectionable, and yet for somereason they find themselves in front of their television sets, and now computer screens, perhaps in astate of shocked fascination or ridiculing contempt, unable to turn away. Day-time talk shows, made-for-TV movies, contemporary reality TV, soap-operas and other fare are watched even though (and attimes, expressly because) they are seen to be so ‘‘bad.’’ How are persons able to both condemn andconsume television in this manner?

In research on media consumption, the practice of consuming the products of popular culture thatviewers themselves label as ‘‘bad’’ typically falls under the label of ‘‘ironic consumption.’’ While theconcept of irony and ironic consumption has been used extensively in English studies, cultural studies,and the social sciences (e.g., Booth, 1974; Fish, 1983; Sontag, 1999[1964]; Ang, 1985; Gitlin, 1989;Klein, 2000; Thompson, 2000), there is a surprising lack of research on the actual people who consumeculture ironically. Most scholars have been content to study the objects of popular culture and thenmake conjectures about how they are consumed ironically. We think it is better to focus on howviewers consume cultural products that they label as ‘‘bad.’’ We therefore performed forty semi-structured interviews to understand how television viewers, specifically highly educated viewers withconsiderable levels of cultural capital, consume ‘‘bad’’ television.

Contributing to the ongoing Bourdieusian debates, we follow the lead of Holt (1997, 1998). We seeHolt as both working with and developing Bourdieu’s research program by claiming that consumersfind distinction not only through the consumption of specific forms of culture, but also find distinctionin how these products are consumed. Advancing this Holtian framework, we claim that ‘‘bad’’television is consumed in such a way that retains the viewers’ symbolic boundaries between ‘‘good’’and ‘‘bad’’ television. Such viewers maintain these boundaries, and the cultured status that goes withthem, not through abstaining from cultural objects that are considered lowbrow, but instead bywatching them ironically, with a camp sensibility, or as a guilty pleasure.

In this research we not only describe how viewers maintain their symbolic categorization of‘‘trashy’’ television even as they consume it, but we also extend the theoretical framework of ‘‘ironicconsumption.’’ In this existing framework, ironic consumers simply watch ‘‘trashy’’ television showsto make fun of and feel superior to them and their ‘‘traditional’’ viewers. We show how there is, in fact,a variety of ways that viewers consume ‘‘bad’’ television, each viewing style possessing its owncharacter and purpose. We describe how these different styles allow viewers to consume ‘‘bad’’cultural objects without letting go of their symbolic boundaries between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television.Even though these viewers consume cultural objects they consider to be ‘‘bad,’’ they are notcontaminated by them.

We do not focus on what causes people to watch bad television; we take it as a given that peoplewill watch a variety of shows for a variety of reasons and that some viewers may come to characterizesome of the shows they watch as ‘‘trashy,’’ ‘‘stupid,’’ or with some other pejorative label. Weemphasize instead how people who consume ‘‘bad’’ television find themselves in a state of normative

contradiction; they condemn the television shows they watch, yet find themselves still consumingthese shows. These consumers of ‘‘bad’’ television accept a symbolic boundary between acceptableand unacceptable television, but also transgress that boundary by consuming television that theythemselves label in negative terms. We show how viewers deal with this contradiction in diverseways.

In response to their transgression of their symbolic boundaries, viewers employ different modes ofconsuming ‘‘bad’’ television, or what we call viewing styles.2 Much like how Friedman (2012) uses‘‘styles of comedic appreciation’’ to understand class-based reception of comedy in Britain, our‘‘viewing styles’’ offer insight into how consumers maintain distinction while consuming ‘‘bad’’culture. The main styles of viewing ‘‘bad’’ television that we observe in our interviewees are ironic

1 It should be clear that for the rest of the paper when we talk about ‘‘bad’’ television we are referring to the esthetic and moral

judgments of the viewers themselves and not any sort of objective evaluation of these shows.2 As we theorize it, a viewing style is not a description of particular type of viewer, but rather the manner in which a viewer

consumes the cultural object. A single viewer is able to react to ‘‘bad’’ TV using different viewing styles and transition seamlessly

between them.

C.A. McCoy, R.C. Scarborough / Poetics 47 (2014) 41–59 43

consumption, a camp sensibility, and a guilty pleasure style of viewing. We explore these analyticallydistinct viewing styles and show how each style experiences the contradiction of consuming whilecondemning in a different way.

2. Literature review

2.1. Distinction in cultural consumption

Bourdieu (1984) argues that social classes display different patterns of taste and consumption;each social class shares a habitus, or a common system of dispositions. He proposes that there exists ahomology between the economic and cultural fields in which class competition and conflict arealways present. This struggle takes place both at the individual level, in face-to-face interactions, andin the field of cultural production (Bourdieu, 1985, 1993). Dominant classes use their superior‘‘cultural capital’’ to maintain their position of dominance. Members of the dominant class seek todemonstrate and confirm their superiority by legitimizing their own cultural tastes (e.g., opera,poetry, art), while maintaining esthetic distance from other cultural forms.

In other words, those who consume ‘‘elite culture’’ create ‘‘symbolic boundaries’’ (Lamont andMolnar, 2002; Lamont and Fournier, 1992) between themselves and those who consume lowbrowculture. ‘‘Symbolic boundaries’’ are the practice of conceptually dividing persons, objects, and culturalactivities into different categories (Lamont and Molnar, 2002); it is through the creation of suchboundaries that, ‘‘people acquire status and monopolize resources’’ (Lamont and Molnar, 2002, p. 168).Alasuutari (1996, 1992) examines the symbolic boundaries that exist for television. He observes theexistence of a ‘‘moral hierarchy’’ of television programs and finds there to be a generally uniformcategorization of ‘‘program types’’ (i.e. genres) that classifies television shows based on their esthetic andmoral value. Current affairs shows reside at the top of the moral hierarchy, while ‘‘inferior’’ soap-operasdwell at the bottom. Similar to the Bourdieusian model, Alasuutari finds that programs at the top ofhierarchy are connected to the viewing habits of more highly educated (especially male) viewers.

The concept of cultural capital and the homology between the field of economic classes and thefield cultural consumption helps Bourdieu explain the social reproduction of inequality. Aftereconomic capital is converted, from one generation to the next, into cultural capital, it aids inoccupational procurement. This occupational advantage then allows cultural capital to be convertedback into economic capital (Bennet and Silva, 2011).

The Bourdieusian framework has not gone without criticism. Some (Coulangeon and Lemel, 2007)question whether there is still a strict homology between social class and cultural preferences incontemporary France, while others (e.g., Erickson, 1996; Lamont, 1992; Lamont and Lareau, 1988)argue that his theory may not be generalizable beyond the French context. A compelling challenge toBourdieu’s homology argument comes from ‘‘omnivore-univore’’ studies. Countering Bourdieu’sclaims, Richard Peterson and associates (Peterson, 1992, 1997; Peterson and Kern, 1996; Peterson andSimkus, 1992) argue that elites in the United States do not show their sophistication simply by‘‘snobbishly’’ consuming only the objects of elite culture. Rather, elites find distinction from being‘‘cultural omnivores’’ who practice cultural consumption patterns that are wider in range than those inless advantaged positions.

Since being advanced by Peterson, a great deal of empirical research on ‘‘cultural omnivorousness’’has, largely, been supportive of the approach (e.g., Bryson, 1997; Chan, 2010; Chan and Goldthorpe,2007a,b,c; Johnston and Baumann, 2010; Lopez-Sintas and Garcia-Alvarez, 2002, 2004; Lopez-Sintasand Katz-Gerro, 2005; Van Eijck, 2001; Van Eijck and Knulst, 2005; Warde et al., 2007; Warde andGayo-Cal, 2009).

Criticisms notwithstanding, Bourdieu’s theories and concepts have continued to inspire interestacross the world (Santoro, 2008). Bourdieu is touted as ‘‘the world’s most eminent sociologicaltheorist’’ (Silva and Warde, 2010, p. 1). His work has inspired a progressive research program in Europe(e.g., Prieur and Savage, 2011) and the United States (e.g., Freedman and Jurafsky, 2011; Scarborough,2012). Sallaz and Zavisca (2007) find that the number of articles citing Bourdieu in major Americansociology journals increased from 1980 to 2004 and that the majority of these articles (51%) try toadvance Bourdieu’s general research program.


Defending Bourdieu’s research program, Douglas Holt (1995, 1997, 1998) has argued that highlycultured consumers do not derive distinction only from what cultural objects are consumed, but alsoin how they are consumed. Specifically, he argues that consumers with more cultural capital are morelikely to have a formal abstract and idealistic esthetic and are more likely to take a ‘‘criticalinterpretation’’ toward cultural objects (Holt, 1997). In this way, elite cultural consumers do not findcultural distinction by consuming a distinctive set of cultural objects, but by consuming a range ofcultural goods in a distinctive manner.

Recent research from Britain supports Holt’s approach. Critiquing the omnivore thesis,Atkinson (2011) argues that survey research hides the existence of distinct esthetic orientations.For example, Atkinson’s interviewees listen to classical music along with older pop music likeBob Dylan or Pink Floyd, but this pop music is appreciated through a distinct esthetic orientationof nostalgia. Similarly, Friedman (2012) finds that there is a clear division in the comedictastes of high and low cultured British consumers. Not only do these groups like differentcomedians, but they also appreciate ‘‘crossover’’ comedy items with different ‘‘styles of comedic

appreciation.’’ Even upwardly mobile ‘‘mixed cultural consumers,’’ who on the surface appear to beclassic omnivores, use distinct low culture and high culture styles of comedic appreciation toexplain different comedic tastes. Overall, emerging research suggests that distinction may beacquired not just from consuming specific types of culture, but also through the style in which it isconsumed.

2.2. ‘‘Active audiences’’ and symbolic boundaries

Our research falls within the ‘‘active audience’’ approach to media reception. This approachexamines how consumers actively create their own varied meanings from the ‘‘texts’’ of popularculture, influenced by the ‘‘interpretative communities’’ that they inhabit. An interpretativecommunity is a collection of people with a shared social position that make certain unconsciousinterpretations of texts (Radway, 1984). In her research on romance novels, Radway (1984) arguesthat these novels are not necessarily a vehicle for perpetuating traditional gender roles as the act ofreading one can be experienced as a form of liberating escape by female readers. The racial or ethnicinterpretive communities that one inhabits also shape one’s reception of media. Research has shownthat Whites and Native Americans have different reactions to Western films (Shivley, 1992), Blackshave an ambivalent reception of The Cosby Show compared to Whites (Jhally and Lewis, 1992), andAmericans, Israelis, and Japanese viewers have varied responses to the show Dallas (Liebes and Katz,1990). See Press’s (1994) review article for an early assessment of the ‘‘active audience’’ approach tomedia reception.

Another line of inquiry in the ‘‘active audience’’ approach to media studies is the criticaldevelopment of the Birmingham school’s typology of a ‘‘dominant,’’ ‘‘negotiated,’’ and‘‘oppositional’’ reading of mass-media texts. Morley (1986) and Fiske (1987) critically utilizethis typology and find that the varied and contradictory social identities of viewers yield diversereceptions to a text. One’s reception does not mechanically flow from one’s social position, butrather a person’s reading has the potential to span a range of reactions, from dominated tooppositional. In Thinking Through Television (2000), Ron Lembo also moves beyond an analysis ofwhat people watch to explore how they use television. He describes different modes of watchingtelevision – ‘‘discrete use,’’ ‘‘undirected use,’’ and ‘‘continuous use’’ – as well the often criticalresponses that viewers experience. Viewers often question the plausibility of shows and critiquepredictable formulas. Importantly, many viewers continue to consume even when they are criticalof the television they watch.

This ‘‘active audience’’ approach to media studies can benefit from the introduction ofthe Bourdieusian concept of ‘‘symbolic boundaries.’’ In our research, we identify how thevaried responses of television viewers to ‘‘bad’’ television are a reaction to the normativecontradiction of consuming a show that falls in to the symbolic category of ‘‘trashy’’ television.This offers insight into how viewers interact with these shows by seeing their viewing stylesas an active response to their experience of transgressing the symbolic boundaries that existin society.


2.3. Consuming ‘‘bad’’ television: ironic consumption, camp sensibility, and shame

A number of researchers connect the practice of consuming ‘‘bad’’ popular culture to a newcontemporary postmodern sensibility (e.g., Collins, 2000; Kellner, 1999; Wilde, 1980; Dettmar, 2004).In No Logo (2000), Klein claims that trend setters in the 1990s youth market attempted to express theirdisdain for contemporary popular culture by reveling in the commercialism of mass produced itemswith an ironic twist. Consumers enjoy television shows like Melrose Place, movies like Showgirls, andplaces like Disney World for their pop culture status and celebrate them for their awfulness. Theproducers of popular culture attempt to capitalize on this new esthetic by purposely creating ‘‘trashbrands’’ that are meant to be enjoyed ironically. In the postmodern age, consumers supposedly do notdenounce the objects of popular culture, but celebrate these ‘‘cultural abominations’’ for theirawfulness (Thompson, 2000). As Gitlin (1989, p. 74) sees it, postmodern consumers want to have their‘‘commodification and eat it too.’’ In other words, they want to still consume the products ofpostmodern culture, yet also display their superiority to the commodified market of popular culture:‘‘The resulting ironic spiral either mocks the game by playing it or plays it by mocking it’’ (Gitlin, 1989,p. 74).

Various researchers have examined how consumers interact with cultural goods that areconsidered to be esthetically and/or morally questionable; Ang (1985), Sontag (1999[1964]), Bourdieu(1984), Johnston and Baumann (2010), and Alasuutari (1992, 1996) use, respectively, the concepts ofirony, camp, and shame to describe how people consume cultural goods they also condemn.

Ang (1985) researches the European reception of the American show Dallas and finds that someviewers employ an ‘‘ironic viewing.’’ These viewers regard Dallas as a ‘‘bad object’’ of popular culture,yet still derive pleasure from watching it. They manage to overcome this contradiction by makingDallas an object of derision and mockery. The ironic viewer does not take the ‘‘text’’ of the program atface-value, but finds pleasure by changing and inverting the meaning of it; the melodrama Dallas isturned into a comedy. Viewers experience ‘‘emotional realism’’ – a ‘‘structure of feeling’’ that appearstrue to life to the viewer. In other words, melodramas like Dallas allow viewers to identify with thesensational world of the soap opera at an emotional level. But if that melodramatic ‘‘structure offeeling’’ begins to feel false, then the show loses its emotional realism and it opens itself up for ridicule;it becomes ‘‘an easy prey for irony’’ (Ang, 1985, p. 99). This type of ironic viewing, along with thecreation of a commentary, allows the viewer to feel superior to the cultural object. Ang writes (1985, p.100): ‘‘The ironic viewing attitude places this viewer in a position to get the better, in a sense, of Dallas,to be above it.’’ By watching ironically, viewers can condemn the show as ‘‘bad’’ American television,yet still gain pleasure from its consumption.

Taking a different approach, Sontag (1999[1964]) discusses ‘‘camp sensibility’’ as a form ofreception in which the object of culture is ‘‘good because it’s awful’’ and claims ‘‘that there exists,indeed, a good taste of bad taste’’ (Sontag, 1999[1964], p. 65). In Sontag’s view, a cultural object can beenjoyed in a camp style when there is a ‘‘failed seriousness.’’ This occurs when an object, that is so fullof exaggeration and extravagance that it cannot be taken seriously, is esthetically redeemed as camp.Unlike Ang’s account of ‘‘ironic consumption,’’ ‘‘camp sensibility’’ is not about ridicule or evencondemnation. Instead, it is a form of admiration; ‘‘Camp is a tender feeling’’ (Sontag, 1999[1964],p. 62) that replaces the ordinary esthetic values of good and bad with its own standards of valuation.Exercising this ‘‘camp sensibility’’ is a contemporary form of elitism that allows one to transcend the‘‘nausea’’ of popular culture.

Bourdieu takes a similar line in Distinction (1984) when he discusses the concept of ‘‘kitsch.’’ Heargues that culturally savvy less wealthy consumers (i.e. intellectuals and artists) can ‘‘outflank’’ thedominant cultural tastes and gain cultural capital by redefining cultural objects ‘‘less obviouslymarked out for admiration [e.g., Westerns, comic strips, and graffiti]’’ (1984, p. 282) as worthy ofesthetic evaluation. A form of ‘‘kitsch’’ can be observed in cultural fields beyond the mass media. Intheir research on food and dining out, Johnston and Baumann (2010) discuss how certain ‘‘kitsch’’foods (e.g., tuna-noodle casserole) can be turned into gourmet dishes through the use of high-endingredients.

Alasuutari (1992, 1996) meanwhile shows how those who consume television programs at thebottom of the moral and cultural hierarchy are ashamed of their viewing habits (‘‘I am ashamed to


admit it but I have watched Dallas’’ (Alasuutari, 1992, p. 563)) and, thus, feel compelled to offer upjustifications for their actions. In his terms, viewers sometimes create a reflexive discourse that has a‘‘moral reference;’’ viewers are aware of the low position that certain television program hold in thecultural hierarchy and have a moral reaction of shame. The viewer may then offer up a ‘‘diagnosis’’ oftheir actions to make their viewing habits understandable to themselves and others; for example,offering a ‘‘psychological interpretation’’ that they want to watch a ‘‘light’’ program that they don’thave to think about (Alasuutari, 1992).

This body of research on non-traditional consumption informs our typology ironic consumption,camp sensibility, and guilty pleasure viewing styles. In this empirical research of televisionconsumers, we use and extend their work to understand how viewers can consume ‘‘bad’’ televisionwhile maintaining a symbolic boundary between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television.

3. Research design

To examine the practice of consuming ‘‘bad’’ television we conducted forty semi-structured, in-depthinterviews to understand how people are able to deal with the normative contradiction of bothcondemning and consuming ‘‘bad’’ television. We stopped recruiting interviewees when we reached atheoretical saturation point where no new patterns of television consumption were emerging from thedata. Twenty-five of the interviewees were recruited after they consented to be contacted when theyfilled out a survey on television viewing habits conducted in the medium sized, American, Mid-Atlanticcity. This survey used a multi-stage cluster sampling design and was generally representative of thedemographics of that town (see Scarborough and McCoy, in press for a more complete description of thissurvey). After exhausting survey volunteers, the remaining interviewees were identified through onlinepostings on craigslist.org and flyers placed in cafes and local shops. The length of each face-to-faceinterview ranged from 45 to 90min; on average, interviews lasted roughly 60min.

In terms of demographics: there were slightly more female (58.4%) than male interviewees;interviewees’ average age was 38.4; and the median income was $30,000. In addition, ourinterviewees tend to be highly educated; the average of highest level of education achieved for ourinterviewees is a four year college degree and 28.5% of our respondents posses a graduate degree. Ourrespondents also possess high levels of cultural capital. Employing accepted measures in the field, weadministered a cultural capital scale that ranged from 0 to 5 to our interviewees.3 On average, ourinterviewees scored 4.12 out of 5 on this scale. In terms of generalizability, this means that thepopulation our research addresses is more highly educated and more experienced in high culture thenthe average American television consumer. (The further significance of this aspect of our respondents’characteristics will be addressed below in Section 4.6.)

We began our interviews by asking interviewees basic questions about their television viewinghabits such as which programs they watched, why they liked to watch them, etc. To allow ourrespondents to have an object of mass media to focus on, we showed interviewees a clip from eitherJersey Shore or Desperate Housewives (their selection). These shows were selected because they areboth widely popular and are also considered to be lowbrow, ‘‘bad,’’ or, in the words of many of ourinterviewees, ‘‘trashy’’ TV. Specific clips from these television programs were selected because theyheld the potential for an ambiguous viewing. Some interviewees reported that they had watched theseshows and either genuinely liked or disliked them, while other respondent could (and did) enjoy themeven though they considered them to be ‘‘bad’’ television. We probed interviewees about theirreactions to the clips with the goal of understanding the different ways that viewers respond to thesame media. To ensure that we did not bias interviewees, we waited until the viewer had theopportunity to discuss their own reaction to the program before we explicitly engaged with the topicsof ‘‘ironic consumption’’ and the consumption of ‘‘bad’’ television. Nevertheless, many viewers,unprompted, brought up these topics and unaided used terms like ‘‘guilty pleasure.’’

3 Following similar questions asked by Peterson and Kern (1996), Bryson (1996), and DiMaggio (2004), we created our

cultural capital scale by asking interviewees if in the last 12 months they had performed any of the following activities: read a

novel/play/or book of poems; gone to see a theatrical performance such as play or musical; visited a museum or art gallery; gone

to a live musical performance; or produced an artwork of any form.


Indeed, it was from the reactions and statements of the interviewees themselves that weconstructed our typology of viewing styles of ‘‘bad’’ television. We began our research into theconsumption of ‘‘bad’’ television with the established theoretical framework of ‘‘ironic consumption.’’We expected to find that many of those who chose to consume ‘‘bad’’ television would do so ironically;that is, as a sarcastic form of ridicule. As we conducted the interviews, we began to notice that viewersconsumed ‘‘bad’’ TV in other ways and thus inductively developed the viewing styles of ‘‘camp’’ and‘‘guilty pleasure.’’

As we transcribed the interviews (all interviews were transcribed verbatim), we engaged in aninductive process of identifying various styles of viewing. For example, if during an interview a personexpressed shame about watching a certain show (e.g., ‘‘I feel terrible about myself’’), we wouldhighlight and code that section of the transcript as an experience of watching a show as a guiltypleasure. This created an iterative process of conceptualization; we would code a certain section of aninterview as corresponding to a particular viewing style and then the coded section would give us agreater sense of the defining qualities of that viewing style. This allowed us to more clearly identifyfuture examples of that viewing style. In this way, the three distinct styles of ironic consumption,camp, and guilty pleasure viewing emerged from our interviews.

4. Results

Let us now turn to our interview data to describe how viewers manage the normative contradictionof labeling a television show ‘‘bad’’ while still consuming it. After describing the ‘‘traditional viewing’’style in which viewers refrain from watching ‘‘bad’’ television, we identify three styles of consuming‘‘bad’’ television: (1) the practice of ‘‘ironic consumption,’’ (2) employing a ‘‘camp sensibility,’’ and (3)viewing ‘‘bad’’ television as a ‘‘guilty pleasure.’’ (See Table 1 for an overview of these different viewingstyles.)

These different viewing styles are ‘‘ideal type’’ conceptualizations. Interviewees rarely use explicitterms like ‘‘ironic consumption’’ or ‘‘camp sensibility’’ to describe how they watch ‘‘bad’’ televisionshows. The exception to this is the term ‘‘guilty pleasure.’’ Most persons employing this style ofviewing explicitly use this term or some derivative thereof. Overall, ‘‘guilty pleasure’’ tends to be theviewing style that most clearly maps on to the exact descriptions of our interviewees. Nevertheless, allthree different viewing styles accurately reflect the actual television viewing experiences of ourinterviewees.

4.1. A traditional viewing style

Serving as a control group for this research, persons who engage in ‘‘traditional viewing’’consistently respond to television they labeled ‘‘bad’’ with avoidance and non-engagement. In linewith Bourdieu’s findings, those who employ a traditional viewing style uphold a symbolic boundarythat eschews certain shows or genres. In brief, consumers abstain from watching shows that theydeem to be beneath them.

For example, one viewer discussing the show Jersey Shore comments:

It’s just stupid; it’s just stupid . . . It’s extraordinary. No, I am not interested. I don’t need to seepeople drinking too much or beating people up in public. Who does that? I wouldn’t watch anyof them, these reality shows. I don’t watch Dancing with the Stars! I don’t watch America Idol!(female, 46, lawyer)

Those who employ traditional viewing tend to be particularly judgmental and condemnatoryabout television programming they consider to be ‘‘bad.’’ They tend to not only judge a television showto be inferior or in bad taste, but they are often incensed by these shows; they experience a strongemotional and normative response against them. For example, another interviewee reacts to realitytelevision shows like The Real Housewives series and Survivor:

I think it denigrates the people; it makes the people go through all those horrible exercises . . .

that denigrate human beings . . . Real Housewives, you know, they fight each other. People say

Table 1Overview of viewing styles of ‘‘bad’’ television.

Viewing style Summary of viewing

style

Resolving the normative

contradiction

Type of ‘‘bad’’ television

(or other media)

consumed

Typical type of

reaction

Traditional viewing

style

The viewer finds ‘‘bad’’

television offensive,

detests it, and abstains

from watching.

No contradiction:

viewing habits align

with normative

judgments.

N/A ‘‘That show is

awful, I would

never watch it.’’

‘‘That show

denigrates

people.’’

Ironic consumption The viewer revels and

delights in the

‘‘trashiness’’ of ‘‘bad’’

television, often

engaging in a mocking

and ridiculing viewing

style that may

incorporate a running

commentary.

The viewer feels above

the show and looks

down on it. Watching

from a ‘‘normative

distance,’’ the viewer

places herself/himself

on one side of the

symbolic boundary and

the show on the other.

Reality television (e.g.,

Jersey Shore, The

Bachelor), soap operas

and dramas (e.g., Grey’s

Anatomy), local news,

Home Shopping

Network.

‘‘This is so bad, I

love it.’’

‘‘The people on

that show are

such idiots; they

are hilarious!’’

Camp sensibility The viewer admires

‘‘bad’’ television and

celebrates shows for

being ‘‘ridiculous’’ and

‘‘over the top.’’

The viewer lifts the

cultural object up, above

the symbolic boundary.

A show is evaluated on

its own terms; the vision

of the creators is

admired, rather than the

end result.

Mystery Science Theater

3000, True Blood,

Desperate Housewives,

made-for-TV science

fiction movies, Direct-

to-video movies from

the 1980s.

‘‘The creators

had this passion

and a vision, but

it just doesn’t

work’’

‘‘It’s so bad

where it’s

good.’’

‘‘It’s a

celebration of

our failure.’’

Guilty pleasure The viewer feels

uncomfortable and

somewhat ashamed

for watching ‘‘bad’’

television, but feels

like it is something

they cannot resist

doing.

The viewer experiences

the tension of both

condemning and

consuming ‘‘bad’’

television and, hence,

attempts to excuse or

apologize for their

viewing habits.

Sensational reality

television (e.g., Teen

Mom, Toddlers and

Tiaras, Hoarders), day-

time talk shows (e.g.,

Maury, Jerry Springer

Show).

‘‘This is horrible.

I can’t believe

I’m watching

this.’’

‘‘It’s like a car

crash. It’s awful,

but I can’t look

away.’’


horrible things on TV. I don’t like this . . . and I think it is so low to do something just because youthink you are going to get some money afterwards. It makes me sad to see people do this just formoney. (female, 52, university professor)

Similarly, an 81 year old female retiree remarks after watching the clip of Desperate Housewives:

Those are awful, evil people. Everyone is cheating on everyone else. [scoffs] It is totally, totallyvoid of any social value – totally void. I mean, what does one learn? One learns that one can bedishonest and distasteful, rude, unkind. No, I’d never watch it.

Demonstrating a moral reaction to Jersey Shore, a male, 32 year old, craniosacral therapistcomments:

Wow. I’d never seen that before and I don’t think I need to see it again . . . Everything about thatshow is fake . . . Yeah, all they talk about is partying, alcohol, fighting, cursing, arguing . . . That’stoxic. It’s nothing but toxic.

As we see in the quotes above, when a person employing a traditional viewing style normativelydeems a television program to be ‘‘bad’’ then they cannot enjoy its consumption and generally abstainfrom viewing.


Adopting a traditional viewing style allows a viewer to avoid the normative contradiction becausetheir symbolic boundaries align with their television viewing habits. This is how most people consumetelevision most of the time. Nevertheless, many consumers employ modes of viewing that allow themto both condemn and consume shows that they label negatively.

4.2. Ironic consumption

The first non-traditional mode of consuming ‘‘bad’’ television is an ironic viewing. Unlike the‘‘traditional viewing’’ style, one who engages in ironic consumption is not offended by ‘‘bad’’television. On the contrary, they seem to revel in the ‘‘badness’’ of the television they watch. Whilethey label some of the shows they watch with negative terms, such as ‘‘trashy,’’ ‘‘stupid,’’ or ‘‘horrible,’’and describe the characters on these shows with similar labels, this categorization does not inhibit apositive viewing experience.

The prototypical ironic consumer delights in how bad the television shows are because it givesthem a chance to make fun of and mock both the show itself and the characters/actors on them. Onemale in his late-twenties typifies the style of ironic viewing:

My wife and I have started watching The Bachelorette together, and I think it’s absolutelyhilarious, but not for the rationale why they’ve probably put it out there . . . [It’s funny], I supposebecause of the overt sincerity of everyone on the program, which comes off as really hollow andhow it really tries hard to conform itself to a convention, which means that everything that goeson just seems really ridiculous . . . So, there’s a lot of really common phrasing that we just diewhenever we hear somebody say things like, ‘‘I’m here for the right reasons.’’ Um, all the sort ofquizzing like, ‘‘Are you here for the right reasons?’’ ‘‘Are you doing this for me?’’ All those sorts ofthings. (male, 29, student)

Similarly, a female college student describes watching a reality TV program called Tool Academy, ashow in which romantically unskilled men and women are sent to a ‘‘charm school’’ by their respectivepartners:

On this particular show the bad people are told go through activities where they are told, ‘‘Youneed to change.’’ Like there was one activity where they had to share their true feelings andappreciate their girlfriends. One guy started crying and he said, ‘‘You complete me.’’ And, I waswatching this with six girls after class and you couldn’t hear the TV for the next three minutesbecause we were laughing so hard. (female, 20, student)

Rather than personally identifying with the lifestyle depicted in the show or seeing the worldthrough the eyes of the characters, those engaging in ironic consumption watch shows from a‘‘normative distance;’’ they look down on the show and its characters. The ironic consumer plays withthe normative contradiction of both watching and condemning ‘‘bad’’ television. Doing this places theviewer on one side of the symbolic boundary and the television that they watch on the other. In thisway, ironic viewers tend to see themselves as completely separated or apart from the production ofthe show. Ironic viewers are able to keep the show esthetically and morally at a distance because theysee themselves as just a viewer of ‘‘bad’’ television – a viewer who is, in their mind, not even theintended audience for the show.

An important part of this ability to watch television from a normative distance is creating a runningcommentary on the show. This can be done alone, but is more often a social event; ‘‘bad’’ television iswatched with others and part of the enjoyment comes from talking about the show as it is occurring.For example, one interviewee discusses the show Mystery Science Theater 3000, a show in which poorlymade older black-and-white films are presented with added commentary, in this way:

There is an incredible pleasure in mocking bad films, but it’s only fun if you are doing it withsomebody else, because part of it is, honestly, showing off that you are both funny. But if you areby yourself, there is no point in making all these witty comments because nobody is there tohear you. You are honestly doing it for an audience. So, there is no point in watching it alone.(female, 32, artist)


Interviewees’ most common reason for engaging in an ironic viewing is that it provides a sense ofsuperiority or positive self-image for the viewer. For example, a male 37 year old, veterinarian, whoironically views Fox News, comments: ‘‘I am sure some of it is ego. You are probably like, ‘I knowsomething that they don’t know.’ That has to be part of it.’’ Similarly, another viewer comments on herviewing of the show Hoarders:

It depicts such a bad scenario, but it’s pleasurable to watch because it makes you feel betterabout yourself . . . I think it takes a process of reflection first, and then you’ll see a situation, and aperson will think, ‘‘Thank God I’m not like that.’’ (female, 28, teacher)

Another interviewee, a female, 18 year old university student, who watches ‘‘bad’’ 1980s horrormovies, describes the pleasure of consuming in an ironic manner:

Because I guess you feel better than them, it kind of elevates yourself. It’s like, ‘‘I didn’t make thismovie . . . I know this isn’t a good movie and . . . the director doesn’t . . . You know, more thanthem . . . You feel better than them because you are laughing at this work that they spent weeksdoing . . . You are above them.

Thus, the ironic viewer consumes ‘‘bad’’ television, in large part, by feeling superior to it. Byreveling in the ‘‘ridiculousness’’ of the show and its characters, the ironic viewer is able to watch ‘‘bad’’television while feeling morally and/or intellectually superior to the actors, the content of theprogram, and non-ironic viewers of the program. In this regard, reality television programming hasbecome a popular genre of television to watch in the style of ironic consumption; as we see in theabove quote about Hoarders, many contemporary reality shows appear to invite the feeling of a senseof superiority among their viewers.

What we have described is similar to Ang’s (1985) account of ironic consumption, yet, in terms ofcontemporary television, there is an important difference. In Ang’s account, the ironic consumerchanges the intended meaning of the show; Dallas is transformed from a serious melodrama into acomedy. When our ironic interviewees discuss how shows like Jersey Shore and Desperate Housewives

are intended to be viewed, more often than not viewers claim that they thought the intended purposeof the shows is to make fun of them. For example, several interviewees comment that the voice-over atthe start of Desperate Housewives intentionally invites viewers to create a mocking commentary aboutthe show.

While, at face value, Desperate Housewives may be dismissed as just another soap opera and Jersey

Shore can be seen as simply a ‘‘real life’’ depiction of certain cultural lifestyle, ironic viewers feel thatthe real underlying meaning that the producers of these shows are aiming for is a type of ‘‘absurd’’ or‘‘ridiculous’’ comedy. For many viewers, this actually diminishes their ability to watch the showironically. For example, one viewer of Jersey Shore comments:

My problem with watching [Jersey Shore] ironically is that it’s so manufactured. You probablyread this the other day, but somebody interviewed people who interacted with these people,and effectively they’ve rented out the place where they’re supposed to be working and they’vehired actors to come in and they stage car crashes, these sorts of things. The parts where it seemsdeeply sincere are the funniest bits. That’s for sure. For example, when they had that montage ofher crying and walking around and it was filmed sort of grainy, that’s really funny to me becauseto me that’s the show trying to emulate a sort of genre, but doing a very poor job of it,particularly given the context. (male, 29, student)

Previous research on reality television (Hill, 2005; Jones, 2003) describes how viewers harbor botha deep skepticism about the ‘‘reality’’ of such programs, presuming the programming to be largelyfabricated, and yet also search for moments of genuine emotion and action. Similarly, viewers using anironic viewing style must feel like they are watching television shows that are genuinely (i.e.unintentionally) ‘‘bad’’ in order to feel above the show, superior to it. If they suspect that the show ispurposefully made to be bad for their ironic viewing pleasure then, in a sense, it is the show that isgetting the better of them, rather than the other way around.

Thus, viewers using the style of ‘‘ironic consumption’’ find themselves in a game with ‘‘ironicproducers.’’ Their mocking enjoyment relies partly on the belief that the ‘‘characters’’ are sincere and


the show is genuine, but there is always the suspicion that the content is being manufactured to bepurposely ‘‘ridiculous.’’

4.3. Camp

Another mode of consuming ‘‘bad’’ television involves employing, to borrow a term from Sontag(1999[1964]), a ‘‘camp sensibility.’’ Those utilizing this mode of viewing, experience the contradictionbetween condemning and consuming in the inverse manner of ironic consumption. Whereas theironic consumer mocks, ridicules, and looks down on the cultural object, the camp viewer reveres thecultural object for how bad it is and admires the vision and passion of the producer. When consuminga television show or other mass media, viewers exchange the normal esthetic standards of taste for anevaluation of the object on its own terms. The viewer understands the show to be objectively ‘‘bad,’’but uses the framework of camp sensibility to lift the show upward.

Instead of ironic consumption as ridicule, camp sensibility could be characterized as ironicconsumption as admiration. For example, one interviewee describes the series of Final Destination

horror movies in this way:

I have watched all of them because it is so over the top and ridiculous how these people aregetting killed. [laughs] When you suddenly watch a wire go through a whole boat load of peopleyou are like, OK. But it is almost like you are watching a cartoon; it is that over the top . . . Iusually mock the producers [of bad movies], but in the Final Destination series I applaud them,the writers, because how the hell can you think of this. (male, 27, case administrator)

Thus, the camp viewer solves the contradiction between condemning and consuming by lifting thecultural object out of its negative evaluation by using a different set of esthetic standards.

To offer another example, many viewers who employ the camp sensibility have a certainfascination with low-budget or poorly produced B-movies from the 1980s, made-for-televisionmovies, and predictable romantic comedies. The interviewees hold no illusions that these are well-made movies, but nevertheless they appreciate them using a different framework of evaluation. Thiscan often mean admiring the creators’ vision and, ultimately failed, endeavor to bring this vision tofruition. For example, one viewer who employs a camp sensibility describes why he likes to watchmovies from the 1980s, even though he thinks they are bad:

You watch this movie and you get the sense that everyone is very serious about this movie: theactors are doing the best that they can, regardless of how good or bad an actor they are; they aregiving it their all; like the directors and the creators have this passion about it. But the movie ishorrible in the sense that the acting is bad, the story is bad, there are plotlines that don’t makesense, you know, the sets look cheap, you can tell it’s like a green screen. And, so the fun ofwatching those kind of movies is that you know, um, you can sort of laugh at them, because theyare taking themselves really seriously . . . and they don’t think it’s silly; they think it is veryserious. But for whatever reason, it just doesn’t work . . . The ones I like the best and what I amlooking for is people who had a vision, you can tell that they had an idea that they were reallypassionate about and they tried to execute it on the screen, but it just doesn’t work. (male, 32,student)

A camp sensibility is a kind of admiration of the vision of the producers, even if the final productis a failure. At the end of the interview, the respondent above sums up his appreciation for badmovies by talking about it as a type of celebration: ‘‘It’s a sort of a celebration of our failure. Like, Ican’t believe someone spent so much time on this and it’s so bad; maybe that’s it, celebrating ourfailings.’’ Contrary to ironic consumption, where the viewer feels apart and above the culturalobject, a camp sensibility allows a viewer to identify with the creators of the movie or televisionshow; they appear to emphasize with and commemorate the failed and ultimately disastrousoutcome of cultural production. As the respondent here expresses, it is our failure that is beingcelebrated.

Another viewer sums up the camp mode of viewing with a discussion of Mystery Science 3000 andElvira’s Movie Macabre:


It’s campy and it’s fun and it pokes fun at them but not to the point of being mean. I mean someof them are really bad movies . . . and it always kind of brightens my day when I watch it . . . Youcan’t really stay mad at watching something so bad. [Laughs] I don’t know if that makes sense.It’s so bad, where it’s good. These people actually made, if you think about it, these directors hadput together, this entire movie that maybe 500 people had seen. And they took the time to dosomething . . . so horrible [laughs]. I guess that is the mindset; it’s just funny that way. (female,30, retail)

This type of reaction is not just reserved for dated television shows or movies. It can also bewitnessed in reactions to contemporary television. A viewer who watches evangelical preachers oncable television offers an example:

I think it is the greatest evil of humanity to pray on the old, uneducated people to send money tothese people so that they can buy another Mercedes . . . but I respect the hell out of them becausethey are the greatest con artists in the entire world. You are watching a person do the pinnacle oftheir profession (male, 37, veterinarian)

Although he condemns these preachers as ‘‘con artists,’’ he uses a different method of esthetic andmoral evaluation to admire them for how good they are at their craft. The television viewer employinga camp sensibility solves the contradiction between condemning and consuming by using a differentevaluation system to lift the object of popular culture out of a negative category so that it can beadmired and even ‘‘celebrated’’ on its own terms. In a very real sense, the cultural product is so badthat it becomes good.

4.4. Viewing ‘‘bad’’ television as a guilty pleasure

While ironic consumers revel in the ‘‘stupidity’’ and ‘‘ridiculousness’’ of the television that theywatch and persons employing a ‘‘camp sensibility’’ admire the vision of the creators, viewers thatwatch ‘‘bad’’ television as a ‘‘guilty pleasure’’ are ashamed of their television viewing habits. Thoughthey feel guilt, they feel as if they cannot stop watching.

Viewers who employ a guilty pleasure mode of viewing do not completely resolve thenormative incongruity of their television viewing habits. Instead, the viewer struggles with thedisconnect between their normative evaluations of the television they watch and theirviewing habits; the viewer is conscious of the fact that they are watching something thatthey have a negative opinion about and this makes them feel uncomfortable and often upset.In this way, viewing television as a ‘‘guilty pleasure’’ is closer to the traditional viewing stylethan the two other styles described because the viewer is deeply offended by the televisionshows they watch. For example, one viewer who watches reality television as a guilty pleasure putit this way:

You feel a little dirty in a way. Not so much with America’s Next Top Model, but with some ofthese other reality shows, where you go inside their home and see how they’re interacting withtheir spouse and their children. I’m like, ‘‘Oh my God. Why are you doing this to yourself, andwhy am I choosing to sit here and watch it when it’s just ridiculous?’’ I feel terrible about myself.I’m like: ‘‘I’ve wasted twenty minutes here, just watching America’s Next Top Model.’’ And, youknow, I resolve not to do it again. There’s some sort of, there must be some, guilty pleasure in it. Ifeel badly, like it’s been a waste of time, like I shouldn’t have spent even the twenty minutes onsuch a stupid show. (female, 50, non-profit management)

Unlike traditional viewers, however, their severe condemnation of these ‘‘bad’’ television showsdoes not inhibit their viewing. This creates a significant degree of stress and anxiety, especiallyamongst our respondents who tend to be highly educated and who self-identify as being cultured.Highly cultured viewers cannot understand how they could have sophisticated tastes (for example,know about art, literature, and music) and still watch these ‘‘awful’’ television shows. One femaleeducator in her thirties, who holds a graduate degree in German literature, describes The Hills, a showshe watches regularly, as ‘‘terrible’’ and ‘‘frivolity,’’ and comments:


I know it’s not good for me; it’s like junk food. Last night my husband was like, ‘‘Go to be bedyou have this important training in the morning,’’ but I want to watch these last fifteenminutes and it is of so little consequence. Why do I need to watch? I know it’s not good TVand there are so many other constructive things I could be doing, and yet I can’t stop.(female, 31, teacher)

‘‘Guilty pleasure’’ viewers address the problem of condemning and consuming a show by enactinga number of different strategies for relieving the tension of this contradiction. First, many guiltypleasure viewers describe ‘‘bad’’ television as something that they could not escape or refrain fromwatching. For example, one non-profit event planner states:

I’ll walk by and they’ll have on America’s Next Top Model. And I’ll kind of get sucked into that.Why am I spending even 10minutes watching this terrible stuff? . . .it sucks you in. It’s like somany reality shows, there’s a contest and you want to know who wins. So, you can easily fallinto the fascination of who is going to be eliminated next. (female, 48, event planner)

Many viewers, unprompted, offer the analogy of slowing down for the aftermath of a car or trainwreck to rationalize viewing habits that may challenge their morals. Although one might seesomething offensive, it is impossible to look away. One interviewee offers an example of this:

Yes, I really don’t like watching it, but it’s like a train wreck. I’m drawn to watching it, if thatmakes sense. Every time I watch I think: ‘‘This is horrible. I can’t believe I’m watching this.’’ Andsome of my friends are so into it, and I’m like, ‘‘What?’’ I don’t know, I don’t know why I’ll watch,because I’m disturbed by it. (female, 26, swim coach)

Another interviewee, a male, 29 year old, graduate student, comments: ‘‘It’s sort of like watching atrain wreck in slow motion, you know, or like an accident. You don’t want to look, but you can’t lookaway.’’ Similarly, a 74 year old, male, university professor describes watching Judge Judy as a guiltypleasure like this:

In some ways it is an absurd program and also sometimes I am watching it and I am like, ‘‘Whydid these people come on? You know, what on earth are they doing? Why did they subjectthemselves to this? Why are they so dumb? And so forth.’’ There is an element there of beingfreaked by something and watching it is almost like watching a car wreck. You know, you aredriving along the highway and you see a car smashed up, you slow down; it’s the same kind ofthing.

Although ‘‘guilty pleasure’’ viewers believe they may see something offensive or distasteful onshows like Jersey Shore, Toddlers and Tiaras, 16 and Pregnant and other (mostly reality) televisionprogramming, they feel as if they cannot stop themselves from watching the show. While they feel badabout consuming television programs that they ultimately hold a negative opinion about, they relievesome of this tension by claiming that it is beyond their ability to resist watching. In other words, theyuphold a symbolic boundary by separating the guilty part of the self, which deserves condemnation,from their true self (cf. Goffman, 1971 on ‘‘apologies’’).

A second technique to diminish the harm of ‘‘bad’’ television is to claim that while suchprogramming is ‘‘trashy,’’ it is also ‘‘mindless.’’ This approach frames the programming assomething to be consumed lightheartedly either after a long day a work or before going to bed.‘‘Trashy’’ television offers the chance to consume some ‘‘meaningless’’ popular culture that doesnot require any mental energy on the part of the viewer. Thus, while this form of entertainment isviewed negatively because it is ‘‘empty’’ or ‘‘pointless,’’ that is also part of the pleasure derivedfrom consuming it. Similarly, viewers allow themselves to view this ‘‘mindless’’ popularentertainment because the rest of their days are spent in occupations that are characterized byinterviewees as mentally engaging. For example, a viewer reflects on the show Hoarders in thismanner:

So, [watching Hoarders] would be the equivalent to reading Dan Brown or something like that,where if I’ve had an emotionally grueling day, it’s something where I don’t have to getemotionally attached that would be refreshing. (female, 28, teacher)


Alternatively, ‘‘guilty pleasure’’ viewers allow themselves to watch small portions of ‘‘bad’’television if it is offset by consumption of sophisticated high culture. For example, viewers who readliterature or generally watch intellectually stimulating television like documentaries or histories oftenallow themselves to watch ‘‘trashy’’ television as kind a pop culture reward. Similar to the car crashanalogy, ‘‘bad’’ television is also compared to fast food; it is okay to eat ‘‘bad’’ fast food once in a while,as long as one generally eats well and exercises. Similarly, it is acceptable to watch some ‘‘bad’’television if the interviewee feels like they typically consume a requisite volume of high culture.

Finally, interviewees who believe they are highly cultured imply that it is alright to watch ‘‘bad’’television because they are conscious of the fact that it is of poor quality. They believe that theirawareness equips them with the ability to consume ‘‘bad’’ programming without being negativelyaffected by it. For example, the young educator who watches The Hills, comments:

What troubles me is if people sit and watch [these shows] without equipping themselves withcritical thinking tools that allow them to be like, ‘‘My god, like . . .’’ [I have these critical thinkingskills] and that is why it is possible for me to enjoy it because I always have that option offlipping it off and it has not derailed me from my career or caused any kind of big problem for mebecause I am viewing this. (female, 31, teacher)

This interviewee holds the opinion that her ‘‘critical thinking’’ skills enable her to realize the poorquality of the show, which inoculates her from being adversely influenced by it.

Unlike those who employ irony or camp, viewing ‘‘bad’’ television as a guilty pleasure does notallow one to completely resolve the normative tension of consuming television one condemns. Rather,viewers experience this tension; they are aware of the contradiction and they feel ashamed about it. Tothe extent that viewers resolve this tension, they excuse or apologize for their practice of watching‘‘bad’’ television by claiming that it is only a little bit of ‘‘mindless’’ fun or it is something that is beyondtheir control.

4.5. Switching viewing styles

As mentioned previously, a viewing style does not describe different types of viewers, but rather thedifferent ways that a viewer may consume ‘‘bad’’ television. Though a single viewer often has adominant style of viewing, many utilize a range of viewing styles in their consumption of televisionand switch amongst them.

We observe this sort of switching among our interviewees. We find that some interviewees watch ashow ironically, but then after a period of time they become truly interested in the characters and theevents of the show. While the show still seems ridiculous, it takes on a form of ‘‘emotional realism’’(Ang, 1985) that makes the viewer feel genuinely concerned about what is going on. This then makesthe viewer feel ashamed for caring about a show that they previously mocked. In this way, theirconsumption switches between an ironic and guilty pleasure styles of viewing.

One twenty-seven year old male case administrator describes how his original ironic viewing of theshow 16 and Pregnant (a reality show about teenage mothers) became a guilty pleasure. While hebegan watching the show ironically and often still ridicules it (‘‘I am mocking the people who made itmore or less. It is about making fun of those people’’) he has grown to become genuinely concernedabout the well-being of the teenage mothers and their children. Now he feels ashamed about watchingthe show, but excuses his viewing by claiming that it is like seeing a car crash that you cannot lookaway from:

It makes me feel kind of disgusting when I watch it . . . I guess it’s kind of like one of thoseperverse things you all of a sudden you see something that shouldn’t be happening but it is soyou just keep watching like a car crash. (male, 27, case administrator)

There are other variations of this type of style switching. For example, some viewers watch a showas a guilty pleasure, but then become so ashamed that they would quit watching for a period of time,abstaining from it like a traditional viewer, only to find themselves weeks later in front of the TVscreen watching the show again as a guilty pleasure.


4.6. Normative contradictions and symbolic boundaries

Television viewers using the styles described above experience the normative contradiction ofconsuming and condemning in different ways. Those consuming television in a traditional manner,maintain a firm distinction between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ TV by condemning ‘‘bad’’ television andavoiding it when it is encountered. For viewers who consume television shows that they accept to be‘‘bad,’’ the experience of symbolic boundaries is more complex. For some, this contradiction producesanxiety and shame. Persons using a guilty pleasure style of viewing experience the contradiction as aform of psychological tension – they feel the contradiction. These viewers attempt to overcome thistension using a series of excuses, such as: ‘‘I can’t stop myself from watching.’’ While these excuses dono fully resolve the contradiction, they allow the viewer to still maintain a symbolic boundarybetween ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television even as they consume the latter.

For others, the contradiction does not produce a tension that needs to be overcome. Instead, theyrevel in how ‘‘bad’’ a show is while they consume it. Viewers using a style of ironic consumption playwith the symbolic boundary between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television as they seem to gain pleasure fromwatching something they consider to be bad. It is because a show is ‘‘so awful’’ or ‘‘so terrible’’ that it isgratifying for the viewer to watch as it provides the opportunity for mockery and a sense of superiorityover the cultural product and other non-ironic viewers of the show.

The experience of persons using a camp viewing style is the most complex to understand. Campviewers do not feel guilty about watching, nor do they appear to watch in order to mock or ridicule.Rather, they admire a cultural object for how bad it is. They transform ‘‘bad’’ TV and other objects ofmass media so that they become esthetically elevated. The cultural object is smuggled across thesymbolic boundary until it becomes something to be respected. It is so bad that it becomes good.Viewers of ‘‘bad’’ television or other media are placed in a contradictory situation of consumingculture that they themselves condemn as ‘‘bad.’’ Using these various viewing styles, they deal with thisincongruity in various ways. Viewers may feel ashamed of the cultural object, they may ridicule oradmire it, but at the end of the day they accept that it is objectively ‘‘bad.’’

Furthermore, we find that our highly educated interviewees have the cultural sophistication (i.e.cultural capital) to be able to redefine cultural objects using the different esthetic and normativeevaluations mentioned above. In line with Bourdieu (1984), we contend that ironic consumption, acamp sensibility, and a guilty pleasure viewing style are themselves kinds of acquired culturalcapital. They are a learned ability that is acquired through education and long exposure to a diverseset of cultural objects that allows the viewer to distinguish themselves from others. Just as the highlyeducated are able to appreciate the ‘‘beauty’’ of a piece of abstract art or a photograph of an oldwoman’s hands, their exposure and confidence with the cultural hierarchy allows the highlyeducated to transform low-brow television into objects of cultural significance and examination. It isto this highly educated and culturally endowed segment of the population that our research isapplicable.

There is not an absolute homology between culture and class when it comes to televisionconsumption, but distinction processes and symbolic boundary maintenance still occurs. Theboundary between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television may now be more confusing and porous, but it is stillupheld. Expanding upon Holt’s point that research should move beyond the identification of specificforms of culture as a basis for distinction, this typology of how people consume ‘‘bad’’ TV provides aframework for understanding distinction processes in an age of omnivorous consumption.Consumers now watch a range of television programs, some they accept as ‘‘good’’ television andothers they deem to be ‘‘bad’’ (i.e. ‘‘trashy,’’ ‘‘terrible,’’ ‘‘awful’’). Viewers deal with the contradictionof accepting this symbolic boundary, while at the same time still consuming cultural objects from thebottom of the cultural hierarchy, by actively using the different viewing styles that we describeabove.

5. Conclusion

This research is an attempt to understand the paradoxical cultural practice of denouncing certaintelevision shows and other objects of mass media as being ‘‘trashy,’’ ‘‘stupid,’’ ‘‘awful,’’ ‘‘terrible,’’ or in


other words ‘‘bad’’ and yet still choosing to consume them. While we began our research expecting tofind cultured viewers practicing ‘‘ironic consumption,’’ we find that consuming ‘‘bad’’ television isactually a more complex practice that involves multiple styles of viewing. The idea of ‘‘ironicconsumption’’ was that ‘‘bad’’ television was just an object of ridicule; our inclusion of the viewingstyles of ‘‘camp’’ and ‘‘guilty pleasure viewing’’ show that there are other ways to relate to culturalobjects that are considered to be ‘‘trashy.’’

We focus on how viewers who consume ‘‘bad’’ television are placed in a state of normativecontradiction; while they have created (or accepted) a symbolic boundary between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’television, they find themselves transgressing that boundary and consuming television they negativelylabel. Thus, we examine how viewers experience this incongruity in such a way that retains thesymbolic boundary between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television. Negotiating this boundary, viewers employdifferent modes of consuming ‘‘bad’’ television. Beyond the ‘‘traditional’’ reaction of contempt andsubsequent nonparticipation, we identify three different reactions to ‘‘bad’’ television (see Table 1):(1) ‘‘ironic consumption,’’ (2) viewing ‘‘bad’’ television with a ‘‘camp sensibility,’’ and, finally, (3) theviewing ‘‘bad’’ television as a ‘‘guilty pleasure.’’

The viewing style of ‘‘ironic consumption’’ deals with the contradiction of consuming andcondemning by appreciating a show as a source of mockery and ridicule. The viewer watches from a‘‘normative distance’’ that allows one to consume the show while also feeling superior to it; theviewer places herself/himself on one side of the symbolic boundary and the show on the other. Aperson using this viewing style revels in how bad the TV show is. In contrast, employing a ‘‘campsensibility’’ allows viewers to admire the cultural object for how ‘‘bad’’ it is. The viewer does not lookdown on the show, but rather it is lifted up, above the symbolic boundary, as the viewer appreciatesthe cultural object on its own terms. Finally, viewers who watch ‘‘bad’’ television as a ‘‘guiltypleasure’’ seem to actively experience the tension of both consuming and condemning. In a sense,they do not completely resolve the normative contradiction, but instead suffer through it; they areaware that they are consuming something they negatively label and this makes them feeluncomfortable. They attempt to relieve this tension by excusing and apologizing for their viewinghabits as a bit of mindless, ultimately harmless, fun that is ultimately beyond their control to resistwatching.

Our research suggests that these three non-traditional viewing styles capture the most commonstyles of viewing ‘‘bad’’ television, but this typology is not exhaustive. It is possible that someconsumers also engage in what has been labeled ‘‘hate watching’’ (see Nussbaum, 2012) – a righteousviewing style in which the viewer becomes morally incensed about how bad the programming is.Another alternative viewing style, observed in one professor and one graduate student from ourinterview sample, is an ‘‘analytical’’ viewing style in which a viewer intellectually dissects a ‘‘bad’’television show, critiquing its plot and the characters’ performances. Although there is the potentialfor these alternative viewing styles, they are uncommon amongst our interviewees. The viewing stylesof ironic consumption, camp, and guilty pleasure viewing are the main ways that we observed personsinteracting with ‘‘bad’’ television.

It is important to note that these different modes of reacting to ‘‘bad’’ television are not abstractarchetypes; rather, they are specific modes of consuming cultural products in the landscape ofcontemporary television. Although we focus here on the reception of ‘‘bad’’ television rather than itsproduction, it seems that now a variety of contemporary television shows are produced in order toinspire the types of reactions we have described above. Television programs like Toddlers and Tiaras,The Jerry Springer Show, and Jersey Shore (among many others) appear to be produced in order to allowthe audience to mock and ridicule the show and their ‘‘characters.’’ Furthermore, the content of thesetypes of shows is typically so outrageous that the goal of the producers seems to be to make somethingso sensational that it really can become almost impossible to look away. Alternatively, shows likeDesperate Housewives or a show like True Blood (a melodramatic show about vampires) appear, at leastto many viewers, to have a campy esthetic, a style so exaggerated, that it can be characterized as ‘‘sobad, that it’s good.’’

Indeed, the rise of the contemporary genre of reality television appears to be produced to capitalizeon some television viewers’ appreciation for ‘‘bad’’ television. Daytime talk show producers primetheir guests to manufacture a ‘‘money shot’’ of an emotional and/or physical outburst that attracts


viewers to ‘‘trashy’’ shows like The Jerry Springer Show (Grindstaff, 2002). Yet, reality TV producers alsodesire to remain faithful to the facts and portray the ‘‘true stories’’ of the people on their shows (Wei,2012). It seems that similar to the desires of reality TV consumers, producers are also in a dilemma oftrying to guarantee that something lurid occurs, while portraying that event as genuine.

Future research should more fully examine the interaction between the production andconsumption of ‘‘bad’’ television in order to better understand how the producers of ‘‘bad’’ televisionunderstand how their shows are watched and what consumers actually do with them. Another usefulavenue would be to investigate how consumption of reality TV differs from traditional scriptedprogramming. Our research suggests that while viewers utilize comparable strategies to overcome thenormative incongruity of consuming ‘‘bad’’ reality TV, they are more likely to view reality TV through amoralistic lens. To be sure, the moral implications of consuming programming that portrays ‘‘reality’’must shape the way these shows are consumed and the symbolic boundaries that viewers maintain.

While the viewers of ‘‘bad’’ television transgress their own symbolic boundaries and consumetelevision that they have a negative opinion about, we show that they are still able to maintain theseboundaries by employing these various viewing strategies. A symbolic boundary is not always upheldby abstaining from shows that are condemned, like ‘‘traditional’’ viewers, but instead by consumingthem ironically, as a guilty pleasure, or with a camp sensibility. Diverging from Bourdieu’s theory thatpersons maintain their cultured status by abstaining from lowbrow cultural objects, we follow thelead of Douglas Holt and demonstrate how viewers engage with ‘‘trashy’’ popular cultural goods whilestill maintaining their sense of the symbolic boundaries between ‘‘good’’ and ‘‘bad’’ television in aclimate of omnivorous consumption.

Acknowledgments

A previous version of this paper was presented at the 2012 annual meeting of the AmericanSociological Association. We are grateful for the assistance that Sarah Corse, Andrea Press, and ThomasGuterbock offered during the research design part of the process and we want to thank MiltonVickerman and Shyon Baumann for reading previous versions of this paper and making criticalsuggestions. We want to thank our three anonymous reviewers for their insightful and usefulcomments. Lastly, we would like to thank each of our interviewees for the time that they took to speakto us.

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Charles Allan McCoy is an assistant professor in the sociology department at State University of New York – College at Plattsburgh.The main focus of his recent research is on the development of public health, specifically systems of disease control, and how thisrelates to the power of the state. In general his research interests include medical sociology, comparative-historical sociology,political sociology, as well as research on the reception of contemporary television.

Roscoe C. Scarborough is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Virginia where he is working on a comparative ethnographicdissertation that orders the micro-foundations of belonging and advancement. This research reflects an interest in the use ofqualitative methods to understand how shared culture, institutional processes, properties of encounters and characteristics ofindividuals produce solidarity, community and inequality. In addition to media reception research on television and music, hisresearch interests include cultural sociology, inequality, symbolic interactionism and qualitative methods.




"Watching 'Bad' Television: Ironic Consumption, Camp, and Guilty Pleasures"

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