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The Voice Australia: Fans slam singing show for being 'trauma porn'
Fans are calling out The Voice for focusing too heavily on 'sob stories'.
The Voice Australia has been a staple on our TV screens for years now, with 12 seasons and a rotating list of celebrity coaches paving the way to making some epic TV — but now, disgruntled fans of the show are calling it out for trying to 'milk' drama.
While the show's format lends itself to contestants opening up and sharing their lives through bonding with their coaches and also through performing, people are now slamming the show for becoming 'trauma porn' and saying it's become jarring to watch.
Taking to Reddit, a user uploaded a thread to discuss the latest season of the show, calling out that every singer seemed to have to talk about some sort of trauma in their packages.
"Every singer that goes out to sing has some trauma story from their past forced into their intro piece before they go on stage and it’s so blatantly obvious that they are trying to milk the story," Reddit user tasmaniantreble said.
"Post-natal depression, father dying of cancer, parents separated when they were kids, overweight guy with body issues… Some of it is so jarring when you can tell the contestant doesn’t even feel that comfortable talking about it or they are forcing some scripted lines for the camera. The worst was tonight when Guy Sebastian surprised one of his singers during the rehearsal with a picture of him and his dead father.
Why do they shamelessly do this?"
'Everyone has a sob story'
The thread garnered a lot of comments, with people chiming in on their thoughts about The Voice and other reality shows following the format of using 'sob' stories to draw viewers in.
"You’re more likely to feel a stronger connection to that persona now that they’ve been vulnerable with you, albeit indirectly for the TV viewer," one person said.
"People love an underdog. So they make everyone an underdog," another said.
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"You've just noticed this now? This has been reality TV for at least 10 years. Everyone has a sob story," one person pointed out.
"I watch The Voice and fast forward all the talking and just watch the performances, lol. I do not care about their sob stories. Like the one you mentioned, he didn't have a sob story so they just had to talk about his divorced parents. You can imagine the producers being like 'Do you have a deceased family member? Anyone with cancer? Anyone in jail? No? Anything that is remotely sad in your life? Your parents are divorced? OK that'll do I suppose'," another joked.
'Manufactured by production'
Other shows were also mentioned for becoming too emotional, causing fans to switch off.
"Contestants crying over food on MasterChef was when I knew I was done with TV. God should give me a life where the most traumatic thing that ever happened was fucking up the profiteroles, farken hell," one person commented.
"My Kitchen Rules is the same," another said.
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"My dog’s groomer went on Ninja Warrior and didn’t get much air time because she didn’t give them enough of a story to run with for the show. She even said there was some sort of relationship between two contestants completely manufactured by production," another shared.
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