Whatever happened to relationships?

Why does anyone watch the Split ? I watched the first episode of the first series and felt that sorting out my button box woukd be a better use of my time.

Actually, I wonder what the drip drip effect of having serial adulterers in Government and in the Royal Family has on people ?

Davidhs absolutely, adults surely are just as susceptible. The pernicious drip drip drip effect of whatever they see on the screen can make any sort of behaviour seem acceptable and exciting and even desirable.

I felt exactly the same watching The Split last night.
I suppose, as someone said, if they all got on and had a normal life it would make boring TV. I find it sad all the same.

Around 40 yrs ago when East Enders started, that was the one TV programme that was banned, some of you might think that was extreme. My wife’s logic was “I don’t want my children to grow up thinking that behavior is normal”, they all in turn passed that on to their own families.
I understand that TV shows have to be dramatic but that does not mean that bad behavior should be every day entertainment and portrayed as normality. Not just children either I’m sure a diet of violence and adultery influences many adults too

Did you read my original post Eloethan (carefully) ?
Watching “The Split” - lovely family, got it all so why is the wife having an affair at the office
Yes it’s fiction, but my point was not about people having a really miserable time

Well I expect there are quite a few people on Gransnet who have had extra-martial relationships that have resulted in one or more divorces.

I also suspect that it is much easier to remain faithful if you are in a happy and fulfilling marriage than if you are having a really miserable time.

No maw it isn’t just you, I feel the same. I was yelling at Pete on Cold Feet to walk away and cheering when he did I know, I need to get our more. Yes it does all happens in real life but sometimes, just sometimes people do the right thing and walk away. Why don’t we we see that more often on TV, surely you don’t have to be boring to resist temptation? Or maybe I've just been boringly happily married for the past 50 years!

A case of life imitating art?

Yes those stories are not real life, but they reflect and exaggerate real life IMO. Affairs and cheating are very common and sadly always have been.
However I do sometimes wonder if the irrational, casually cruel behaviour we read about sometimes on Gransnet for instance hasn't been kindled by story lines absorbed from TV soap operas.

Which sort of proves Hetty58’s point - nobody could be more boring than the Turners

Well the Turners in Call the Midwife and Mr and Mrs Barnaby in Midsomer Murders are very happy and faithful

Hasn’t it always been so just not out in the open so much it’s in our faces now before it was hidden

TV dramas have to be just that, dramatic. If they reflected ordinary, everyday life, we'd all be bored stupid trying to watch them (mind you, I usually am anyway)!

I think it reflects the lives of the media folk who make these programmes. DD worked in the media, technical side, until a just over a year ago. She was quite scathing, and she can be very scathing, about the creatives in her industry.

She said that they lived a life completely out of touch with other people. Nobody she worked with or came across would admit to anything other than left wing politics, nor would anyone dare admit having religious beliefs. A disproportionate number at all ages and levels were single and divorce and marriage was generally seen as the fools option.

It is not really surprising that we get the programmes we do.

DD now works for an engineering research centre. She finds it wonderfully normal with diversity at every level from the nationality etc of her colleagues to their normal range of political opinions, religious beliefs (or none) and marital arrangements.

It’s not just you MawB . I think there is often a case of “the grass being greener on the other side” or at least they hope it might be. I didn’t watch the program but I know what you mean .