Which would you pick: a weekend get-away with a beautiful woman, or a 60-inch plasma TV?
That’s the premise behind Playboy’s new reality TV show, Gadget or the Girl, which starts September 1st. After selecting between three lovely ladies — whom I can’t help but picture as Playboy bunnies, fluffy tales and all — the male contestant in question has to decide whether to head off on a romantic mini-vacation, or to receive a mystery piece of tech. The catch, of course, is that he doesn’t know what gadget he’s getting until he turns down the girl.
Cnet deftly points out that, while it could be an arcade machine, it could also be something embarrassingly useless, like a deodorant-emitting suit. Tom’s Guide, on the other hand, notes just how hilarious the pitch meeting for this show must have been. Imagine the execs sitting around doing the math: dorks + babes + tech = money! Of course, I expect the show will be awful. You can already see the shots of silicone-filled bunnies weeping off their mascara as the gadget-lovers they were trying to woo head home with new Blu-ray players.
What will make the show interesting though isn’t how the men decide (apparently 50% of British blokes already agree they’d give up six months of sex for a big-screen television) but how women and technology get juxtaposed. Yeah, I said juxtaposed. Does Gadget or the Girl imply we think sex-appeal and tech are opposites? Or are they so close that when we have to choose, presto, good TV? And isn’t the show saying that getting a new gadget to mess with is a lot like getting a new bedroom playmate? You take both home, you see how they work, you marvel at the sexy thing that’s yours yours yours.
Personally, I’d pick the gadget, then keep my fingers crossed for a sexbot.
Bonnie Ruberg is a sex, technology, and video games journalist who contributes regularly to publications like The Economist, Forbes, and The Village Voice. By day she's also a comparative literature PhD student at UC Berkeley, where she studies French, English, gender, sexuality, surrealism and perversion. You can reach her at [her first name and last name, all one big word] AT gmail DOT com.
August 18th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
hahaha, don’t we all?
But yeah, not so sure how I feel about this, ethically. I mean, Beauty and the Geek is one thing, but this? I don’t know which is worse, this, or mystery dating shows they used to have.
August 18th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
Beauty and the Geek makes me sad, because often the boys are cute enough, someone just needs to trim their eyebrows. I want to be like, “Look, you’re pretty now. Go off and do something useful!”
August 18th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
true; the moment they get to the makeover episode, its like “oh look, they’re normal now”
August 18th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
“Okay, so you’re either offering me a fake-girlfriend who’s only interested in me due to a reality TV show contractual obligation and will only bother hanging around with me for the weekend and is pretty much a dead lock for no sex, or a valuable bit of technology that’s likely something I’ll get more use out of in the months to years ahead but will make me look like a jackass in front of a national audience? Let me think…”
It’s patently obvious that they want you to either A) take the girl and affirm that the ‘normal’ lifestyle of america, IE chasing boobies is just and proper, or B) take the gadget and open yourself to endless ridicule.
What a strange game. The only winning move is not to play.
August 18th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
I hope everyone chooses the gadget, choosing the girls is a waste. Besides, if I get a sexy new gadget that’s sure to interest more females I’d want to be with than some random girl paid to be there.
August 18th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Gadget.
August 18th, 2008 at 11:08 pm
“Besides, if I get a sexy new gadget that’s sure to interest more females I’d want to be with.”
OMG you were that guy on the show who got the awesome new TV? I totally want to hang out/date that TV!
:P
August 19th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
I think guys sometimes go out with an attractive woman because she’s a status symbol for them – like the plasma TV – more than they’re interested in the sex. So the show is kind of playing off two status symbols against each other – the model you won’t get to have sex with anyway, or the TV that probably isn’t that great to watch, either.
I’d take the date instead of the gadget if it was with someone interesting.
August 19th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
They ought to try it with some girls as contestants … choose between the TV and a weekend with Hugh Hefner.
August 20th, 2008 at 11:47 am
The interesting is that the women involved also get rewards (not tech) if they convince the men to go away with them, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they do promise them sex. Whether they deliver is another matter.
August 25th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
“…but how women and technology get juxtaposed. Yeah, I said juxtaposed. Does Gadget or the Girl imply we think sex-appeal and tech are opposites?”
I think that it’s fairly obvious that, although we’re moving forward, gadgetry and geekiness are considered as unmanly or unattractive by the majority of the populace. The stereotypical gamer or ‘tech’ guy is a recluse with little to no interpersonal skills.
Therefore it’s not much of a stretch to see why sexual appeal (of men toward women and vice versa) and love of technology are juxtaposed so often. Part of it is bringing our cultural evolution forward to accept that the stereotype can be accurate but is not necessarily true for all geeky/tech-loving people. While it may not be a concious aim of the execs who green-light programmes like this and Beauty and the Geek, they almost always help to change the preconceptions of the populace they are aimed at.
For another example, think about the role of TV/films in the sexual revolution of the 60s/70s and the widespread ‘equalisation’ of women’s roles in society at and around that time.
I still find it strange that certain taboos are still restricted as much as they are but i’m guessing that there must be a large enough segment of the population who are just not ready to accommodate a change in the way they think about those particular things.
October 12th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Gadget…
Great article, Go Gadget go…
October 19th, 2008 at 4:05 pm
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November 21st, 2008 at 7:19 pm
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