I hate people who say they never watch reality TV because liar, liar pants on fucking fire, everyone has seen at least one of these shows. Just stop it, please. Because it makes you seem like that annoying, foppish David Cross character from Mr. Show who couldn’t shut up about how he didn’t watch TV or use air-conditioning no matter how hot it got and would only listen to music on gramophone records played on a wind-up victrola. I know plenty of well-read, cosmpolitan, highly discerning consumers of culture who just couldn’t look away when I accidentally landed on a channel showing a six episode, back-to-back marathon of Real Housewives because I was bored and hungover and it is a perfect storm of terrible that can keep you fixated for hours at a time. And I watch Top Chef and Project Runway and Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern and No Reservations with Anthony Bourdain and not a one of those by accident, either — these are shows I actually and actively DVR. People like to pretend that because there’s a whiff of culture about these shows they’re not quite reality TV — they’re something better! But get serious, okay? It’s not Biggest Loser or Drunk Skanks on a Tour Bus, but they’re basically second cousins. Which is all kind of beside the point, because that’s not what this question is about.

So I’ll just get to it: No. And not because I’m opposed to fearfully, tearfully existing in some Desperate Living-style prison documentary with almost no protection (although, yes indeedy, that is a part of it). I’m saying no mostly because who the fuck goes on reality shows? And I don’t say this out of snobbery. I just honestly don’t understand who all these people are who are so willing to have cameras trail them as they get drunk and fuck and fight and share HPV. The one question I have always had for these people — the single thing I would ask any of them if they were to host a Q&A — is, ”Do you not have parents? Or do you just have terrible parents?” Because the last thing in the world my parents want to see is about 60% of my life. We have a tacit understanding that there are things they simply wouldn’t believe, don’t know and, I’m certain, wouldn’t want to know about my life and I am all too happy to oblige by not sharing them. That’s the contract. And I’m fine with terms, and unwilling to opt out — even for one million dollars.

* What with the television and film industries being out of ideas and all, I fully expect to see this exact show in the new fall line-up.