The American Mirage: How Reality TV Upholds the Myth of Meritocracy
The American Mirage: How Reality TV Upholds the Myth of Meritocracy
Book • 2025
In The American Mirage, Eunji Kim uses original data and experiments to show how popular reality television—programs celebrating rags-to-riches stories like American Idol and Shark Tank—encourages belief in rugged individualism and upward mobility.
Kim documents widespread news avoidance and argues entertainment media repeatedly expose viewers to narratives that normalize inequality and dampen support for social safety nets.
Drawing on web-tracking, field experiments, and observational analysis, she traces how repeated exposure to these meritocratic narratives shapes political attitudes and policy preferences.
The book highlights the normative dilemma that such optimism can motivate innovation while simultaneously undermining collective political responses to structural inequality.
Kim calls for greater attention to entertainment media's political consequences and for more precise interventions tailored to varied media audiences.
Kim documents widespread news avoidance and argues entertainment media repeatedly expose viewers to narratives that normalize inequality and dampen support for social safety nets.
Drawing on web-tracking, field experiments, and observational analysis, she traces how repeated exposure to these meritocratic narratives shapes political attitudes and policy preferences.
The book highlights the normative dilemma that such optimism can motivate innovation while simultaneously undermining collective political responses to structural inequality.
Kim calls for greater attention to entertainment media's political consequences and for more precise interventions tailored to varied media audiences.
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The American Mirage: How Reality TV Upholds the Myth of Meritocracy
