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Careful, now. If word gets out that the viewers of NBC's multiple channels are not just like the athletes, it might hurt viewership and then sales.
What is it that entices millions in the US to tune in every four years, if not exactly the sort of identification Jennifer Sey rails against here? And it extends far beyond the Olympics: If I just buy that brand of shampoo, I can look like that model. (No, you can't. Who knows what horrid surgeries or missed meals or tawdry private arrangements went into that 30-sec. turn on screen?)
We don't like being reminded that our weekend club tennis is many orders of magnitude reduced from Federer and Nadal. Break down this identification with the person on screen--the only way most of us become infected with the illusion that we're just like them--and you destroy what media use to get us to watch. What else are all those heart-warming biographical pieces for? If we didn't have that, we'd be reduced to, well, watching the competitions.
