Sarah Palin’s New (Slightly Sinister) Reality Show

March 29, 2010

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ve probably heard that Sarah Palin has just scored a multi-million dollar deal for a reality show about Alaska on TLC.

Maud Newton suspects a sinister motive underlies the entire thing. And she thinks she knows exactly where Sister Sarah is coming from:

“Planet Earth,” like many of Palin’s favorite phrases, has one innocuous set of associations for the population at large, and also an inflammatory shadow resonance for her base. While most of us naturally think of the popular documentary series, the touchstone for holy-rollers is Hal Lindsey’s The Late, Great Planet Earth, an incendiary fundamentalist text published in 1970 that forecast the imminent dawn of the End Times.

Read the whole thing here. It’s fascinating. And slightly terrifying.

Also, I’m rather irked at TLC lately, what with their fourteen zillion shows about giant families with too many kids, half of them taking up way more than their allotted space and taxpayer money for weirdo religious reasons, and no doubt voting conservative despite the fact that they use so many public services.  Add Sarah Palin’s showcase to that and I’m this close to swearing off of What Not to Wear, the only decent show left on there. Hear that, TLC?