Many reality television shows share the same premise, a view that I consider deeply harmful and deeply untrue. There is a presumption of scarcity, that there is an exceptionally limited number of spots (ultimately, only one) to whatever sort of prize is being offered, which eliminates contestants week after week until only a winner is left. This particular mindset is a part of many of the reality tv shows that exist, whether it is a man seeking to trim his harem weekly until he ends up with the suspicious woman who ends up most closely approximating his ideal lady, or whether one is racing amazingly around the world or trying to outwit and outlast one’s competitors on a Redneck Island, or whether one is an ambitious person seeking to lose the most weight, win a recording contract, or become Kazakhstan’s next top model.

There are several problems with this particular construct, the most glaring of course is that it is simply not true. The entire reason for the whole competition is a contrivance to drum up popular support by pitting people (or groups) against each other. Mind you, this is a very effective way to ensure control of a given social sphere, because it focuses attention on rivals for limited prizes in a competition where someone must lose, rather than uniting people in appreciation of skill or hard work and in providing opportunities for enjoyment that do not require winners or losers. The fact that this mistaken view of life is so prevelant in our day and age is a major difficulty on a variety of levels. The fact that it is a lie and is not the truth is fairly evident. For exampole, if the producers of American Idol (and the name here is significant, in that winners are idols in our culture) wanted a different sort of show, they could chose what they viewed as the most talented people, put them in a recording studio, and let them all record an EP, and then they could celebrate the quality of these undiscovered artists (most of whom have some experience in the music industry before they succeed on the show) by releasing the EPs and in providing quality music to increase the limited playlists found in radio stations. More quality music and less repetitious playlists would be a good thing, and it would allow there to be a variety of winners–someone’s EP/album might aim at an adult contemporary audience, while another might be a rock or a country musician, and there need not be any hostility or competition between them, as they can all succeed so long as their music strikes a chord with a music audience. This would be a more realistic and ultimately more helpful view of reality, which might decrease the sort of internecine conflict we find in our world.

If you hear stories about the success of others, one finds some common threads. It is commonly said that behind every successful man is a successful woman (and the reverse, from such experience as I have, is also true). People who succeed do not do so on their own strength or talents or abilities alone, but rather because they have a network of people who help encourage them and challenge them and edify them. People are successful because they have family that teaches them the right way to live and that provides models of successful behavior, because they develop strong relationships with others, find positive role models and mentors, and receive opportunities by developing skills and showing talents with people who reward hard work and success and provide opportunities for advancement. All of these aspects are not strictly competitive at all, but have a strong aspect of cooperation and mutual benefit. When we develop networks of friends and family and loved ones, we do not do so for our own advancement alone, but rather in mutual supporta nd encouragement of our dreams and aspirations and those of others. We each use what we have to help serve and benefit others and receive service and benefit from the God-given talents of others. In so doing we build success through a mindset of abundance rather than attack others with a mindset of scarcity. Since we all have a unique set of experiences and interests and talents, there are enough niches for all of us given the right work ethic and the right opportunities, and it is our job to both take advantage of our own opportunities and also serve to provide opportunities for others as well.

This separation of mankind into winners and losers, rather than the quest to work for the sharing of opportunity to all, extends into all aspects of our life, and is a great cause of much of the misery that we find on this earth at the present time. We face what we view to be a scarcity of government funds and we fight over wish cpecial interest group can be a winner, and which has to tighten their belts through austerity, instead of seeking opportunities for everyone to win through whatever talents and abilities they have. Because of our fear and uncertainty, we act in ways that exacerbate the scarcity we perceive in the world around us, making our fighting and misery a self-fulfilling prophecy because we blind ourselves to ways to make greater opportunity possible, irrespective of our political partisanship, which ultimately becomes no more profitable than the squabbling over which Super Bowl team is better.

The problem with our times is not so much our resources, but our mindset. The fact that we believe in a scarcity mindset means that we condemn others to suffering so that we might be better off. Depending on our own identity and interests, we support our success given limited resources and view the suffering of others as a necessary element to our survival, instead of seeking ways that everyone can benefit by finding places of honor, places where their talents and gifts may be rewarded, and where that increasing success may serve as a model for others as well as an opportunity for even greater success in the future. Before we can change our world and change our fate, we must change our mindset toward the world around us, to see that there is room for all of us to have a place in the sun, and that the failure of our world to provide honor and dignity for its people is not a necessary part of the world, but rather a sign of the failure of our institutions and our civilizations to live up to their obligations. We can and must do better, but so long as we spend our efforts fighting with others in an ever shrinking island of few winners and many losers, we miss the opportunity to provide victory for all who are willing to put forth the effort to obtain it, which would make our world a great deal more just, if we would only make our own mindset more just and fair-minded toward others.