Whether you are a regular watcher of VH1’s reality show ghetto over the last decade or a just a casual consumer of celebrity related news you have probably caught wind of the latest scandal in the world of pseudo-love and sports. Chad Johnson, formerly Chad Ochocinco, formerly of the Chad and T.O. Show, formerly of the New England Patriots and formerly of the Cincinnati Bengals was arrested last weekend for allegedly headbutting his wife Evelyn Lozada who made a name for herself as the volatile queen bee on the hit show Basketball Wives. The couple, who were just married on July 4th, got into a dust-up when Lozada found a receipt for condoms, accused Chad of cheating and then they got to fighting. Within 24 hours of Evelyn calling the cops, Chad Johnson was put in jail, cut from the Miami Dolphins and their impending VH1 reality show Ev & Ocho got cancelled. This case would be tragic if it weren’t so darn common.
On the one hand, I don’t see how anybody couldn’t see this train wreck coming a mile away. Wait, let me re-phrase that, everybody saw this train wreck coming a mile away, especially VH1. The network has specialized in celebrity coonery for almost a decade now with no signs of stopping. Chad Ochocinco is a nutcase, who fought with his teammates on the Bengals and had a rap sheet for hitting his ex-wife. Evelyn Lozada has never met a wine bottle she didn’t want to throw at somebody and no dinner table, coffee table, or potential law suit has been wide enough to keep her from jumping at a chick she feels has wronged her. You knew these two were going to start fighting VH1 is just mad because the fighting didn’t happen on camera or when Chad was in uniform. The larger social story in this whole mess has been completely usurped by the celebrity element.
Let’s not collectively waste our time analyzing why things went Southbeach for these reality yahoos, that was already coming. The bigger question should be, when they come back to television either together or separate (because you know they will) what is it about so many Americans that makes them want to see and love these kinds of violent people?