It probably doesn't help that I caught a few minutes of the show after watching the first episode of the Mildred Pierce miniseries from HBO. In it, Mildred has too much pride to ask her ex for financial support (or to stick around) and is so ashamed of being a waitress that she won't tell her kids about what she is doing for a living.
Talk about opposite ends of the spectrum.
Even if you account for the fact that Mildred's story is fictional and takes place in the early 1930's,
I was really uncomfortable with Mildred. When it comes to feeding my kids and getting them other stuff they need, I don't have a lot of pride. I would do any job, if I had to. Being a waitress might not be as impressive as being a neurosurgeon, but it's hard, honest work. Why be ashamed of hard work? Only criminals should be ashamed to tell their kids how they put food on the table, right?
And yet, I also felt uncomfortable watching Here Comes Honey Boo Boo. Obviously, these people have no shame about putting their children on national television. . .or weighing them on national television. . .or having subtitles put under their comments because their accents are so thick. And maybe if I had 4 kids to feed and one of them was 17 and pregnant I'd be happy to get paid to live my life on television too. Hell, I'd think about it twice now, and I've only got 3 kids.
But as I watched them all eat Cheese Curls for breakfast, I just cringed. And it's not like I'm the poster child for healthy eating. I mean, I have eaten Cheese Curls for breakfast. Just not in front of my children or on national television. I felt shame for eating Cheese Curls for breakfast. I feel shame when I feed my kids fast food or my house is messy or whatever. There is not a time in my life - even when I wore a size 4 (which I did for quite a while) - that I would have been so comfortable that I would have let anyone weigh me on national television.
Too much shame is toxic. Obviously. But um, does that mean we should have no shame at all? For anything? Did Honey Boo Boo's family make me uncomfortable because I was jealous of their shame free lives?
What this probably means is that I should stop watching so much television.*
*Not that I'm ashamed of that or anything.