extreme home philanthropy
browsing around the d.c. blogosphere today, i came across a recent post by brooke at obernews concerning my favorite sob-inducing show: extreme makeover:home edition.
I'm not ashamed to say that I cry at almost every episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. You'd have to be practically inhuman not to. There's something satisfying about seeing actual good happen in the world, even for someone as jaded as I fancy myself to be.
you don't want to be sitting next to me if we're watching extreme home makeover on a sunday night together, because it's bound to be awkward and uncomfortable for everyone involved. i usually start off with a few sniffles and an attempt to restrain myself for the sake of tommy and charles' manhoods, because everybody knows boys suffer mental meltdowns when confronted with a female's tears. but unfortunately, the occasional times that i happen to catch EHM always seems to coincide with a monthly bout of PMS, and i usually end up sobbing hysterically into tommy's tear-soaked t-shirt, burbling, "the-hey-hey gave the parents a hot tub and the daughter a schol-hol-arship to the fashion institute of technology! OH MY GA-HAW-HAWD [insert unconstrained wails]!"
in case you haven't ever caught the show, it's hosted by ty pennington, the unbelievably annoying carpenter from trading spaces. every week, ty and his crew of jolly interior designers pick a needy family with a particular affliction (dad's gone off to iraq; son's in a wheelchair; house had a car crash into the living room and they can't afford to repair it; a few weeks ago it was two homeless families) and build them sweet new digs, complete with personalized touches. the whole thing is sponsored shamelessly by sears; the product placements are brazen and abso-fucking-lutely everywhere. sears' logo appears in glowing, angelic light about every fifteen minutes, accompanied by melodic trumpets and what have you.
but i don't really have a problem with this, and neither, thankfully, does brooke:
Between the obscene amount of product placement and the general feeling of goodwill generated by corporate benevolence, there's big money to be made in philanthropy.As anecdotal evidence, I hadn't been to a Sears in many years, but when faced with the decision between Sears and Marshall Fields one day in Chicago a few weeks ago, I decided to patronize Sears purely because of the warm fuzzy feeling it gave me to contribute in some small way to the Extreme Makeover: Home Edition project. (Let add some weight to this decision by adding that I often make up reasons to visit my mother in Chicago just so I can go to Marshall Fields--that I should forgo a trip to Marshall Fields to visit Sears, of all places, speaks volumes.)
So it wasn't just a nightgown for my mother that I bought: Sears has, in a way, put the very idea of philanthropy up for sale. I didn't have to do anything particularly philanthropic. I bought something that I was going to buy anyway, I came away feeling like I had done something to benefit a good corporation that would in turn do a good deed for a nice family, and Sears made a sale that it otherwise wouldn't have made.
I'm not sure exactly what my point is, but it strikes me as something libertarians generally should be particularly pleased with: whether it's selfishness masquerading as philanthropy or vice versa, there is a strong and thriving market demand for philanthropy. The ratings for EMHE prove it. I'm not suggesting ABC and Sears will be taking over the functions of the welfare state anytime soon, but still, I'd say there's strong support for the argument that communities--with a little help from ABC and Sears or other corporate sponsors (who can easily be convinced to help if it turns a profit)--can take care of their own.
there are plenty of people out there who will argue against me in this point, and i don't blame them, but i have absolutely no problem with sears profiting off EHM. my take is that corporations are going to do whatever they can to maximize profits and sales anyway, so they may as well throw some philanthropy into the mix, right? i know and accept the fact that my perception of sears and any other company contributing to the show are being totally manipulated, but if i'm going to be manipulated by ads, environment, social constructs anyway, why not have it be in this manner?
a while back when tommy and i were discussing the show, i believe he brought up the point that shows like this are ridiculous, because a) they exploit the subjects and b) it seems as if they're doing a lot for poverty, when really, they aren't doing very much; they don't help out a large number of families, and the money could be better spent on federal programs or in another more large-scale manner. i agree with all of this, but i can't get past the fact: corporations and tv execs are going to do bad, manipulative stuff anyways that's not going to help anyone except their bottom line. so why not take on this format and help out a family here or there along the way?
but maybe i'm just a sucker. feel free to slam my naive ass in comments.
UPDATE: in comments, both kriston and scott have pointed out good reasons why i am indeed a naive sucker, and today slate has an article on the ever-annoying ty pennington, which is mostly positive but reveals:
What we're saying is, Ty is not an excessively introspective creature. His do-gooding can be so relentless that it sometimes leaves its recipients in a pinch. As Newsweek has pointed out, an Extreme Makeover makeover could add thousands of dollars in new property taxes—which, in all likelihood, the owners couldn't afford. Last year, Ty led his troops on a mission to house on a depressed block in Watts, in South Central Los Angeles. The team performed its usual miracles, never bothering to consider the social consequences of erecting a fortress that towered over every other house on the block. And then there's the nagging feeling that building a 5,300-square-foot home, however magnanimous an act, may not be the most appropriate solution for a problem like sewage backup.
Comments
You are only a sucker if you think that advertising does not affect you.
I have friends who are seriously delusional.
Now me, I specifically state that I am bought an iPod because they are cute and Apple has some kick ass marketing. (ok sure it is kind of a better electronics piece than most of the others, but still, it's blue, and little, and they have clean white graphics and bright colors in their advertising!)
Also, I heart product placements. They make me very happy for some reason. Especially when I notice the sneaky ones.
delisional = delusional
already fixed!
My Lord above, Catherine, it's like you wrote this post knowing how much I want to bite through my tongue every time I see even an ADVERTISEMENT for the show. I know that my aesthetic tv jihad isn't for everyone, and you've heard my spittle-fueled manifesto enough times that I'll spare you the footnoted version here. What I will say is that property taxes are a bitch. Awarding people with poor financial planning skills or external difficulties a home whose value and resulting taxes and insurance rates will quickly eclipse the owners' ability to pay the upkeep is a bad kind of philanthropy. Property taxes are annually reanalyzed, and even if the show's producers pay the first year premium, those taxes are based on the property alone and are orders of magnitude lower than fully realized property taxes. This problem happens frequently for "sub-prime" homeowners, who are given mortgages at rates that do not properly anticipate escrow funds (i.e., taxes and insurance); almost any first-time homeowner realizes this shock after the first year—the home is more expensive than the bank led the owners to believe—but it's the people who were the least prepared and qualified to sign a mortgage who get sacked the hardest.
Incidentally it's a criticism that has dogged Habitat for Humanity, who are hardly making making entertainment (or a lot of corporate money) out of the deal. The extent of the problem largely depends on changes in the market, but that to me is the point: People who take on a home must be prepared for those kinds of changes, etc. But as far as my personal hatred priority goes, the lenders who are scamming the lower rungs of the economic ladder are worse than the produces who are exploiting them.
And, obviously, I hate poor people.
However, reading this summary is a trump. I'm not really prepared to come down on allergen-free homes for people with weird diseases. There I would just say that I hate everything that tries to make me cry except A League of Their Own.
all definitely good points that i hadn't taken into consideration. but several times, i've seen the show buy the house outright for the participants and take care of their mortgage. and the last episode i saw, the show was building halfway houses for two homeless families; they were only meant to live there until they could get back on their feet. the father of the large homeless family was also given a job at a construction company. then there are all the college scholarships, etc that often accompany the house. i may be being naive again, but in those particular cases, i can't see too much pure evil.
EHM is fun until someone gets their eyes poked out or their taxes raised so high they can't afford to stay there. See our local brush with EHM.
http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/031005/met_18178734.shtml
yeah - these points that you and kriston have brought up are seriously lifting the wool from eyes, or whatever. but i'm probably still going to cry hysterically during the show.
Whoa, it's like I gave JSB an assist or something. This comment especially makes me want to claw my eyeballs out:
"ABC officials previously have said they make contestants sign forms and take personal responsibility for the increase. The builders said questions should be referred to ABC. ABC officials didn't return calls seeking comment."
So ABC is aware of the problem. I can't decide if that makes me feel better or worse.
I'd go for "worse". But, a major headache aside, ABC is giving these families an awful lot of money. Will many have to sell their houses for less than they're technically worth, then move? Yeah. They'll end up stressed but a little richer, with a few more plasma TVs. That's not that bad a deal, so I have a hard time getting too worked up about EHM (esp. compared to, say, The Swan).
And EHM's brazenness can be entertaining. On the episode where they built an interim house for a homeless shelter, they took a bunch of the shelter residents on a shopping spree to Sears. But it was a special shopping spree, scheduled "on the spur of the moment" for 10pm at night, when no regular customers would be underfoot! How convenient for everyone. Ah well. It's still charity, it'd just be nice if it wore a slightly less shit-eating grin.
Related: Slate's got a breezy piece up on Ty Pennington.
Hey Catherine,
I like the blog--sorry I'm so late to the party. I never really thought about the tax implications either. It does dampen the effect somewhat, but I'll probably still cry a little too. I've noticed lately that the community sometimes steps in the make the costs of ownership a little lower, like contractors agreeing to pay the bills or pay off the mortgage or whatever.
More than anything, my point was that sometimes when good starts to happen, communities step in to help out. Charitable giving tends to decline as government takes more money from people and assumes responsibility for "general welfare." As government steps in, the private sector often feels like it's off the hook. I just like EMHE because it's a nice reminder that when communities want to take care of their own, their certainly capable of it. The corporate sponsorship angle makes it marketable and profitable, but obviously in the episodes where communities contribute a lot, profits aren't a motive.
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