Some people wonder why I keep ragging on Havrilesky. That uncertainty about where sarcasm ends and honest beliefs begins is one of them. Most writers would write a judgment about programming as vapid as reality shows, and having writ, would move on. More people than I (and better writers than I, in many cases) have wondered why this column keeps returning to repeat the same kind of shows, instead of perhaps sampling other shows.

For instance, why not look at BBC America's Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares, a cooking show that features no cooking, only a Brit with a few opinions and a whole lot of bleepable vocabulary? The only thing I've learned about making dysfunctional restaurants work from the series is that contempt and cussing out the owners and the help is all that helps them straighten up. Ramsey waxes poetic about the locations and the city he visits, until he encounters actual human beings. You could call it the R. Lee Ermey School of Labor Relations.

And instead, we get long reviews of reality shows.

Like poverty doesn't disempower or desensitize people. LIke poverty doesn't enslave people. Right.

There are WAY too many people locked up in this country. In Salon we see endless gnashing of teeth over the poor prisonoers in Guantanamo, and the poor prisoners in Abu Ghraib.

Not one DAMN word here about all the human beings we've locked in steel cages in THIS country.

You want to lock every one up? That makes you the slave master, buddy.

And to accomplish your violent incarcerationist dreams -- you have to destroy the dreams of the poor for social mobility.

In order to pay the salaries of all those prison guards you'll need to accomplish your dream, you're going to have to fire a lot of teachers and cut off health care for poor children.

We are doing that in California RIGHT NOW. The prison budget is growing like a cancer, and we're having to lay off teachers and cut health care for the poor to afford it.

So the dreams of social mobility for the poor are being destroyed in California RIGHT NOW by people such as yourself.

This is happening NOW.

Our society is putting way too much money into violent and coercive means of social control.

I am a LIBERAL -- which means I do not believe that you can build a better world through violence and coercion.

Your solution to the violence and coercion of prostitution is to subject everyone to the violence and coercion of prison.

So you just want to solve violence with violence.

Good luck doing that. That's how we've been handling drug addiction.

Have the violence and coercion of prison solved the drug problem yet?

Call me when it does. If the world is still around by then.

Like a car wreck, you can't take your eyes off of the Housewives program (which Bravo shows repeatedly each day). Alex is by the far the WORST person on the show. She actually refers to people as "connectors" and only cares about making "connections." I would be surprised if anyone wants to "connect" with her after viewing this show. Too bad Alex can't connect her hair with some condition. It looks like a rat's nest, and she has the nerve to criticize other people's appearances?

I have to laugh every time LuAnn refers to her husband as "the Count." Perhaps she has to remind herself of his title daily to justify why she married him in the first place. It's not as if he spends any time with the family. ("Nanny Diaries," anyone?)

If these people were truly rich, they'd hide their money. You don't see true WASPs showing off their purchases. If anything, they are the dullest looking (and acting) group of people around. Just visit Newport or the tony parts of Cape Cod (Osterville and Chatham) to see what I mean.

If I ever win the lottery, I won't spend my days trying to impress loser women like this. At least I have real friends...unlike these "real housewives.' But then aagain,do these women even *want* friends or true love with their husbands? Could they ever love someone as much as they love themselves? Doubt it!

fortunately at least a pig produces food. all these women produce is hot air and mean spiritedness. what dreck....will it EVER end?

These women are almost all mothers. So they have, in fact, "produced" human beings. Just saying.

the real elite wouldn't let you watch their lives for entertainment.

that's britney spears' or anna nicole's job. either way, really desperate and pathetic.

so of course you get the tack. you'd be surprised at the tact of people who make that kind of money.

but it's cute, heather, that you think you have a VIP pass to the lifestyles of the rich and modest from your living room.

these women are touted as having taste and class. i've seen more elegance coming from a cat grooming itself. these women may be dressed well, have smooth skin and dine at three star restuarants regularly, but their transformations are truly like putting a mink coat on a pig. the result is that it is still a pig. fortunately at least a pig produces food. all these women produce is hot air and mean spiritedness. what dreck....will it EVER end?

....I would 1,000 times more prefer to watch Mike Rowe ("Dirty Jobs") slog through knee-deep sewage than spend 30 seconds watching any reality show, and ESPECIALLY any breed of parasite bored rich "housewives". Dear God. There's no END to this stuff!

During the Depression of 1930 we had the Marx Brothers making fun of the snooty rich folks. Now, in the Repression/Depression of 2008 we can all sit back and make fun of the vapid, fur-clad horrorshows that are the various "Real Housewives." Hopefully this is a start of the process that will usher in a new New Deal.

As for these reality shows, are they art? I don't know. Well, art is art, isn't it? Still, on the other hand, water is water. And east is east and west is west, and if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce, they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does. Now, uh... Now you tell me what you know.