“Flavor of Love” (2006- ) is an American television show on VH1. It features Flavor Flav, a has-been rapper, in his search for a woman who will truly love him – or something reasonably romantical. At the start of each season he has 20 women to choose from. Every week he kicks off one woman until only one is left standing.
Even though the show is completely tasteless it is like a bad car accident: you do not want to look but it is hard not to.
The show puts blacks in a bad light as brainless and ill-mannered (Flav and most of the women are black), yet it has been able to pull in as much as a third of all blacks watching television in its hour!
It is one of VH1’s most successful shows. Three other shows have come out of it: “I Love New York”, “Flavor of Love Girls: Charm School” and “I Love Money: Challenge Show”.
BET, the main black cable channel in America, has never had a weekly show this big. It too has put out tasteless shows in hopes of getting bigger audiences, but without any luck.
Flavor Flav picks 20 women from the hundreds who try out. He gives the chosen women nicknames, like New York, Hoopz, Bootz, Buckeey, Hotlanta and Deelishis. That becomes their names on the show.
A few of the women are truly beautiful, like Hoopz, but most are more body than beauty.
The women’s motives are questionable. Since Flav is ugly and old enough to be their father, we have to assume that either they are after his money (does he have any?) or, more likely, the chance to be on television and maybe become famous.
So Flav’s challenge becomes to find which woman, if any, has a true heart. Sometimes he calls in help from his mother or an old girlfriend.
Flavor Flav was a rapper in Public Enemy, a well-respected hip hop act from the late 1980s and early 1990s. He likes to wear a clock, Viking horns and call out his name: “FLAY vuh FLAVE!” And say, “Wow”.
Flav and the women live in a big house in California. It has two dinosaurs in front, each wearing a clock and Viking horns. Of course.
Like a minstrel show, “Flavor of Love” holds up certain stereotypes of blacks for laughs: Flav as a coon, New York as a Sapphire and so on.
It is called a reality show, meaning the lines are unscripted. But just how out of touch the show is became clear when New York’s mother came to visit. New York told her mother that she loooves Flav and wants to marry him. Her mother took one look at Flav and said the man was a clown: he is 48 years old and wears a large clock!
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Flavor Flav used to represent the conscience of rising political awareness within the black community. His regression is embarrassing and baffling and all for what: that dolla dolla bill ya’ll.
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It is sad what he has come to. That is why I felt I had to say Public Enemy was “well-respected” because anyone who does not know or remember them would assume the opposite based on “Flavor of Love”.
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i wanna b on tv FLAV!
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new york is a very very pritty ghurl but her attitude GOT’S TO CHANGE!
IM FROM WAIANAE 96792
HAWAII !
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I hate this show – along with “Rock of Love” New Yorks Show, and all the others like it. Makes my skin crawl. My husband delights on flipping to it “Just to watch mommy freak out” – the new Chance and Luck or what ever is really sick. They used to at least pretend that actuall intercourse wasnt happening…this latest one is horrible. THe girls degrade themselves for the chance to get with some guy because of CASH – not because they actually like the person – they are selling their bodies. Its horrible.
But then the new Paris Hilton BFF show comes on TV I have visions of smacking the crap out of the girls on that show as well.
They remind me of the girls that cut you off in a mercedes or BMW – blonde hair with black roots showing – talking on a cell phone that has little gems glued to it with a license plate frame that says “Daddys Princess”. I actually have to supress the desire to ramn my big ol minivan into the back of their car…I can close my eyes and see me doing it…it would feel wonderful.
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i agree davida. this show gave black women a bad name but they chose to put themselves out there but want to make excuses and want people to look at them a different way. and ever since flavor of love came along, now we got all these fake ass, dumbass dating shows where people thinking they’re looking for love but they want to be famous and have money. but i guess people these days would do anything for the price of fame. look at new york. she’s famous for being a bitch and flav dumping her ass on national tv. then again i watched these shows to get a good laugh because i look at these women thinking they’re good for someone when really they want their 15 minutes of fame and then make fools out of themselves on tv. such a shame what people would just to be famous.
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hey fley soi d mexico saludos y besits
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What I found sad about “Flavor of Love” was how much women were willing to devalue each other to the amusement of Flavor Flav.
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FORGET ALL YAWL REALLY HOOPS IZ MY GURL
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And it gets better.
VH1 just did a “20 top celebrity reality show beatdowns” show which replays, well, the 20 top times two of tyhese so-called celebrities went at it.
Now, this is bad enough, but so far, I’ve been able to avoid watching Flavor of Love and its clones. I couldn’t, however, turn away from the spectacle of grown men and women getting involved in slapsies over Flavor Flav.
It was the most degrading thing I’ve ever watched on TV.
Halfway through it, a thought came to me:
“Wait a minute! Celebrities? Celebrities, hell! More than half of these people’s only claim to fame has been their participation on these reality shows.”
Once I got that, it then became obvious that most of these “celebrities” move from one show to the next. New York, for example, has been on almost all of them, garnishing success to the point where she has her own show.
Then the other shoe dropped:
“My God! What they’ve done is take the esthetics and ethics of All Star Wrestling and simply moved them into another arena! Like wrestling there’s clear-cut heroes and villians. Everything is in a constantly loud and stereotypical emotional tone and obviously scripted interactions are passed off as real. To complete the metaphor, like wrestling, the fan base is absolutely rabid and refuses to believe that anything’s faked.”
So there you have it: VH1s turned dating into wrestling. And not just dating: pretty much any human interaction whatsoever is now presented in this format.
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New york is a little hoe needs to get a life
likes to show off alot
little puff
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I feel conflicted when I watched this show.
Its so embarassing but also trashy entertainment.
at times it gets me down because it seems like its only furthering that ‘black ghetto’ stereotype if you get me.
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I tried to pitch a reality show about law students of color…go figure it didn’t make it.
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