It's official: Discovery Channel is a festering pile of shit

[Gullible Jones]

Just a few minutes ago, my roommate had the TV on Discovery, with some special on exorcism showing. Yes, Catholic-style exorcism of supposed demons, featuring a "possessed" woman by the name of Mary. The show did not show the slightest trace of skepticism or inquisitiveness. It accepted every single word of the "witnesses" at face value. Just to give you an idea of the absurdity: they described the possessed woman levitating the sofa she was sitting on. That's when my opinion went from "bad case of schizophrenia + obsession with the paranormal" to "bullshit fabricated from whole cloth".

Now, just to let you know: I already know and loath the standard supernatural garbage on the Discovery Channel. But IMHO, exorcism and the associated bullshit take things to a whole new level. This is vile, poisonous, subversive crap of a completely different sort, and just taking the whole thing hook line and sinker, as if it's real, is inexcusable. Observe:

Exhibit A: Torture. Oh sure, the Catholic church doesn't officially sanction it any more, but you know it happens. This particular show, at least, did not go into the usual "torture is a necessary part of exorcism blah blah blah" bullshit, and the exorcism was of the less nasty sort, but good gods, how many people have died horribly due to imbeciles trying to drive demons out of them?

(And I must ask: these supposed demons are agents of Satan, right? The ultimate evil, right? The one who delights in causing as much pain, suffering, and misery as possible... right? In that case, wouldn't they want their hosts to be tortured? Even if you assume the basic tenets of your religion are completely true, wouldn't you be playing straight into Satan's game?)

Exhibit B: Mental illness looks like possession. I've got a schizophrenic in my family; I know this shit. Heaven help anyone who gets a priest instead of a physician when they have a treatable mental illness.

(And what better way to cause dissociative identity disorder than to drill into someone's head that they're possessed by a demon? What do you think they'll do to make the exorcism stop? That's right, act like a fucking demon, and eventually believe that they are.)

Exhibit C: Manipulation of the audience. No fucking duh. Demons are all around you! You can't understand them! You can't ask questions or they'll get you! You have to rely on the clerics! You have to put your faith in Jehovah, even though he's a complete fucking asshole of a god who could just be playing games with you! It's an absurdly fucking nihilistic worldview, a pathetic one that doesn't even encourage people to fight back; and what's worse, it's sold as positive, syrupy glurge material. Oh look, if you put all your faith in the priests and the cosmic gamer you can survive demonic possession! Isn't that wonderful?

Exhibit D: Further manipulation of the audience. Have you noticed that in nine out of ten possession stories - at the least - the person who gets possessed is a woman? Just think about it. Not very fucking subtle, is it?

(Likewise with kids getting possessed. This is why I've fucking had it with "evil child" horror movies, especially the Christian variety: at the expense of sounding like an arch-conservative toad, "YOUR KIDS ARE DANGEROUS CREEPS WHO COULD BECOME PAWNS OF THE DEVIL AT ANY MOMENT" is not a message parents should be getting all the fucking time, especially given what your average "exorcism" consists of.)

In conclusion, the morons who came up with this show, the morons who work on it, and the morons who gave them all the sulferous stamp of approval should all be fired and repeatedly smacked over the head with a dead halibut. I rest my fucking case.

[Darth Wong]

The Discovery Channel has always been pretty spotty that way. It's a TV channel, after all.

[Gullible Jones]

I know... but I felt this goes well beyond spotty.

[Patrick Degan]

Discovery used to have higher standards than this. But then, I've seen just about all of cable/satellite TV turn to utter shit in the last ten years. Why should what was once a fairly respectable science-oriented network be any different?

[Master of Ossus]

Discovery used to have higher standards than this. But then, I've seen just about all of cable/satellite TV turn to utter shit in the last ten years. Why should what was once a fairly respectable science-oriented network be any different?

It's still nowhere near as bad as Sci-Fi. When I first got that channel I was really excited about it, but all they do is show HORRIBLE movies and bullshit TV spots. My dad and I always joke about it, when I go to his house--he frequently puts on one of their movies and we laugh at it for 10 minutes before it gets to be too much.

Discovery Channel, at least, still has SOME good programming, but they've always gone with the religious angle a lot because there are a LOT of religious documentary filmmakers aching to sell their product.

[K. A. Pital]

Discovery was tolerable in what concerned biology and other science (even there some glaring faults sprung from t ime to time)

Translations about religion, society, history were totally whackish.

[Aaron]

It's still nowhere near as bad as Sci-Fi. When I first got that channel I was really excited about it, but all they do is show HORRIBLE movies and bullshit TV spots. My dad and I always joke about it, when I go to his house--he frequently puts on one of their movies and we laugh at it for 10 minutes before it gets to be too much.

Discovery Channel, at least, still has SOME good programming, but they've always gone with the religious angle a lot because there are a LOT of religious documentary filmmakers aching to sell their product.

The Space Channel in Canada is just as bad. Shitty B movies and shows of real questionable value. They even ran Galactica: 1980 this summer. Unless you want to watch ST, nBSG or Andromeda there's no point in ever watching it. And those shows are on at least three other channels on the Bell satellite.

[Academia Nut]

I think the worst though is TLC. Anyone remember when it was "The Learning Channel" and had all sorts of cool stuff on it like Junkyard Wars and other science shows? And now... fuck that channel is nothing anymore, just a bunch of vapid design crap that I haven't watched in years. Such a terrible, terrible waste.

And from what I understand, Space still isn't as bad as Sci-Fi. Yeah, they've gone a little down hill, but at least their programming is more or less still all within the sci-fi/fantasy/horror umbrella, where the same can't be said for Sci-Fi.

[Admiral Valdemar]

The majority of TV has gone down in quality over the last decade. Even the flagship documentary and investigative shows of the BBC like Panorama have caused controversy for the wrong reasons. Namely for scaremongering or flat out bad research.

The Discovery and related channels have gone the same way and I find their older repeats are more worthy of watching than anything recently.

[Aaron]

And from what I understand, Space still isn't as bad as Sci-Fi. Yeah, they've gone a little down hill, but at least their programming is more or less still all within the sci-fi/fantasy/horror umbrella, where the same can't be said for Sci-Fi.

The programming falls within what you've listed but take a gander at their programming, lots of garbage. Including some classic garbage.

Space.

[Darth Wong]

The majority of TV has gone down in quality over the last decade. Even the flagship documentary and investigative shows of the BBC like Panorama have caused controversy for the wrong reasons. Namely for scaremongering or flat out bad research.

The Discovery and related channels have gone the same way and I find their older repeats are more worthy of watching than anything recently.

It's all due to supply and demand. Specifically, the supply of original programming has not expanded to keep up with the plethora of competing channels. As a result, those channels have severely dropped their quality standards in order to keep acquiring enough programming to fill their schedules.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Probably the best example is the fact that I haven't seen these three beautiful documentaries (one on Byzantium and two on Hellenistic culture under the guise of exploring the Seven Wonders of the World) by John Romer in, oh, a half a decade. They were the most wonderfully produced, informative, and touching things; he could really bring the attitudes of the Byzantines and their Hellenistic forebearers to life, filled with anecdotes both of later research and of the past while creating a whole picture, and the quality was really excellent. But programmes like that have simply vanished.

[aerius]

I think the worst though is TLC. Anyone remember when it was "The Learning Channel" and had all sorts of cool stuff on it like Junkyard Wars and other science shows? And now... fuck that channel is nothing anymore, just a bunch of vapid design crap that I haven't watched in years. Such a terrible, terrible waste.

They might as call TLC the Home & Garden channel, because frankly I can't tell the difference between the two anymore.

[Patrick Degan]

Discovery used to have higher standards than this. But then, I've seen just about all of cable/satellite TV turn to utter shit in the last ten years. Why should what was once a fairly respectable science-oriented network be any different?

It's still nowhere near as bad as Sci-Fi. When I first got that channel I was really excited about it, but all they do is show HORRIBLE movies and bullshit TV spots. My dad and I always joke about it, when I go to his house--he frequently puts on one of their movies and we laugh at it for 10 minutes before it gets to be too much.

Fuck, SciFi is nigh unwatchable. And what classic programming they do have they butcher horribly to make as much airtime for their vapid promos as they can squeeze in —which run three, four times each break.

[Shogoki]

The Discovery Channel used to be great like 10-15 years ago, when they showed great nature, history, science and engineering documentaries, the rest of the programming went to things like Beyond 2000, which was great back then when the internet was still small for getting up to date with gadgets and stuff.

Then it all just went away, all the nature docs went to Animal Planet, then they just stop showing any history documentary that wasn't about the US being attacked by terrorists, science was replaced by a seemingly infinite number of lame and boring shows about forensics in an attempt to make an "intellectual CSI" or something, and all of the engineering was replaced by stupid shows like Monster Garage and American Chopper, with vibes and content that can't possibly appeal to anyone who's not a retarded redneck or a white gangsta wannabe with any regularity.

It really pains me cause it used to be my favorite channel, so much i learned English mainly from watching it so much, it used to always have something at least mildly interesting, now i can rarely stand whatever they're showing at any given time.

[Admiral Valdemar]

It's all due to supply and demand. Specifically, the supply of original programming has not expanded to keep up with the plethora of competing channels. As a result, those channels have severely dropped their quality standards in order to keep acquiring enough programming to fill their schedules.

I would've said it's because people are dumber today, but I'll go with that too.

In this age of Wikipedia and golden mean bullshit compounded by a love for jazzed up docu-dramas and reality TV with a hint of media alarmism, it's hard to not see how it would lead to a downfall in sound programming of an educational nature. It's not all bad, at least David Attenborough is still doing good and Adam Curtis. We just have to accept that the likes of The World At War, for instance, will be a lot less common nowadays.

[starfury]

I think the worst though is TLC. Anyone remember when it was "The Learning Channel" and had all sorts of cool stuff on it like Junkyard Wars and other science shows? And now... fuck that channel is nothing anymore, just a bunch of vapid design crap that I haven't watched in years. Such a terrible, terrible waste.

I still remember when TLC used to Show the Great Books Festival, it was really cool as wekk, looking and analysising books like Catch-22, the Naked and the dead, Lord of Flies etc. They or Discovery also used to have understanding as well. That was gone a long time ago as well.

And they Bastardized Shark week, it used to have stuff like Shark Battlefield or Air jaws, now it's more boring shark stuff after another.

[Jim Raynor]

Yeah, cable TV completely blows these days.

-Discovery has this crap you guys are talking about. But hey, at least it's no longer the motorcycle mechanic channel the way it was a couple years ago.

-SciFi is nothing but B-movie, Direct-to-DVD crap, which I can't imagine anyone actually liking. And oh yeah, pro wrestling.

-TLC is now the design and fashion channel.

-TechTV became G4, and its lineup is now composed of Cheaters (trashy show about assholes cheating on their significant others), reruns of The Jamie Kennedy Experiment (old hidden camera comedy show hosted by D-list celebrity), and Cops.

-AMC ("American Movie Classics") is now showing recent movies that came out 3 or 4 years ago, which weren't even successful or considered good.

-I saw a commercial the other day on Court TV, saying that in January they'll be revamping the channel into "TruTV" (reality show bullshit).

No wonder I hardly watch TV anymore.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Probably the best example is the fact that I haven't seen these three beautiful documentaries (one on Byzantium and two on Hellenistic culture under the guise of exploring the Seven Wonders of the World) by John Romer in, oh, a half a decade. They were the most wonderfully produced, informative, and touching things; he could really bring the attitudes of the Byzantines and their Hellenistic forebearers to life, filled with anecdotes both of later research and of the past while creating a whole picture, and the quality was really excellent. But programmes like that have simply vanished.

Is there any chance of procuring a copy of that?

[Zixinus]

And that is why I do not have a TV set in my room. No fucking point.

[Zor]

They did give us Alien Planet, hopefully they will wise up and go down that path sooner or latter, with CGI becoming cheaper and higher quality and such.

Zor

[Dooey Jo]

Then it all just went away, all the nature docs went to Animal Planet, then they just stop showing any history documentary that wasn't about the US being attacked by terrorists

Our Discovery Channel can't show any historical documentary unless it's about WW2 or criminals.

Also, Animal Planet sucks. They should call it "Planet of the Apes" to better reflect their actual programming. Enough with the goddamn monkeys already

[Setzer]

I know some of the shit History Channel has been showing. Crap on Bigfoot, the Kennedy Assassination, the Freemasons, and the Bermuda triangle. Dale Gribble must be writing all their shows now.

[Rye]

The majority of TV has gone down in quality over the last decade. Even the flagship documentary and investigative shows of the BBC like Panorama have caused controversy for the wrong reasons. Namely for scaremongering or flat out bad research.

I think this is being pretty selective, frankly, while it's true of most TV, the BBC (and channel 4) have peaks and troughs fairly regularly. Have I Got News For You and Top Gear, for instance, are far more entertaining and slickly presented than they ever were 10 years ago. Plus there's the occasional gem from drama and documentary (the power of the Earth series recently, for instance is quite good, and let's not forget the HD sexstravaganzas of the blue planet and planet earth), and on the whole panorama is quite good.

The Discovery and related channels have gone the same way and I find their older repeats are more worthy of watching than anything recently.

I never really watched the Discovery channel, so I don't know, but I find the recent offerings of the BBC like Have I Got News For You, Nevermind the Buzzcocks, Spooks, Doctor Who, the nature documentaries, the news, BBC online and Top Gear alone are worth the license fee.

I'm guessing that this ghost and ufo bullshit is just a shitload cheaper to produce and therefore buy.

[Soontir C'boath]

The only show I tune in for Discovery is "How It's Made". It's perhaps the only program worth watching.