By Lori Bredemeyer, Copy Editor
The Learn-ing Channel created a new reality show about medical students called Residence Life. I think ACU could start its own reality show called “Residence Hall Life.”
Most students live or have lived in a dorm and know all about the drama that goes on. In fact, in my three years of living in a dorm, I’ve seen several parallels to reality shows.
For instance, look at Survivor. The participants compete for food and sometimes eat very little of the same thing every day. Residence hall participants usually have little money, so they eat the same thing at the Bean everyday, or they compete for the last packet of Ramen noodles.
On Fear Factor, competitors often are immersed in a container of one of many people’s biggest fears: bugs. These creatures make West Texas infamous for infestations every summer, from worms to beetles to crickets.
I live in Morris Hall, and the bugs are especially bad because of the open building. One night recently, my suitemate could not sleep because she convinced herself she could hear bugs crawling up the walls. She hid under the covers for a while and finally woke her roommate up and made her turn the light on. They discovered no bugs scurrying around, and she finally went to sleep.
If ACU created “Residence Hall Life,” it would probably compare to Big Brother, in which 12-13 people are locked in a house together and forced to live and get along. Most freshmen feel trapped in their dorms during curfew, like in the show. This can make freshmen crazy, forcing them to do insane things.
Of course the ACU campus looks like one huge set for a combination of several reality shows: A Dating Story, A Wedding Story, and for some, Race to the Altar. ACU is rumored to be a marriage factory, and right now four couples I know have gotten engaged or have made serious plans for their futures.
So who really needs reality shows when we already live them? In dorms, disagreements break out all the time, and sometimes the halls look like a WWF event because somebody forgot to take out the trash or wash the dishes. Then everybody whines about it, and in women’s dorms, (and probably some guy’s), crying happens a lot.
After living in a dorm and witnessing what some people view on TV for entertainment, I’ve realized the absence of a prize produces the only real difference between dorm life and reality shows. On TV contestants work toward winning money and bragging rights. Residents just work to live off campus, preferably without the roommate and the bugs.
