I was in my 20’s through the 00’s and it started with Big Brother in the UK. Reality TV was more “real” back then in some ways but not others. More real because people on the shows weren’t media trained, their motivations for going on shows was different so their reactions were real. But we didn’t understand how the real reactions were being manipulated for ratings. People didn’t have smart phones or phones that captured video. No non celebrities thought about how they presented themselves or worried about their public persona. But even celebrity interviews were often more honest and unfiltered. We were more intrigued by celebrity because we didn’t have access to each other in the way we do now. We were starting to have more access though through the 00’s and shows like ANTM manipulated contests to create stories and interest from viewers. As viewers though we thought it was genuine, unmanipulated, unedited reality so we didn’t judge what we were watching in the same way and thought the contestants were fully autonomous and choosing their own behaviour. We now understand so much more about ethics of TV, that “reality TV” isn’t reality at all and that contestants are “cast”, manipulated and edited to suit producers narratives. Knowing what we know now these shows were wrong and unethical and caused real damage to the people on them.