I want to talk about reality television for a minute.

Not as entertainment. As education. Because whether people realize it or not, these shows have been teaching a generation how to handle conflict. And the lesson is devastating.

The lesson is this. When you have a problem with someone you do not sit down and work through it. You perform it. You make it loud. You make it dramatic. You make sure anyone watching gets a good scene out of it. The goal is not resolution. The goal is content.

I have watched couples argue on these shows where it is obvious that neither person is saying what they actually feel. They are saying what plays. What gets a reaction from the room. What will look good in the edit. The argument is not about the argument. It is about the audience.

The problem is that people watch enough of this and it rewires something in how they approach real disagreement. The camera is not rolling in their kitchen. But they act like it is. They are performing for an invisible audience that does not exist. They are manufacturing drama in a conversation that just needed honesty.

I have sat across from people in real arguments and recognized the exact moment they switched from talking to me to performing for a room that was not there. The voice changes. The energy changes. Suddenly they are not trying to resolve anything. They are trying to win a scene.

You cannot reach a person when they are in that mode. There is nobody home. Just a performance running until the applause comes or the curtain drops.

The show must go on. Even when there is no show. Even when it is just two people in a room who needed to tell each other the truth.

Stephon Rudd