So December 7th, came and went last weekend. We all know that this is the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, but does the History Channel? Ok, I should give them a little more credit. When I was young, I remember the abundant amounts of documentaries and historical programming on the History Channel. But things have changed a lot since then. While I was not watching it all day, I did not see any mention of the events at Pearl Harbor, instead the typical programming.
So what happened to the History Channel? It sold out. When it started rolling out it historeality shows, I figure that they saw a rise in the number of viewers. Instead of keeping true to their roots, they jumped on the opportunity to generate more revenue. There are a few shows that I can accept, Pawn Stars and American Pickers are decent, just because you can make an argument (a very small argument, though) that they have some sort of historical relevance. What about Ice Road Truckers or Swamp People? I don't see how they relate to the channel's original mission.
I can't really blame them for trying to make more money. That kind of thing would be hard to turn down. But where do we go to watch some historical programming? National Geographic was pretty close for a while, but even they are starting to go to this historeality programming. So, I end up with two options from my point of view. The first is Netflix, which has some very good documentaries, but they do not change very rapidly. The second is to crack open a book. Thankfully, Swamp People would not make a very good book, so this media form won't be bastardized like the History Channel. When all else fails, non-fiction still prevails and I guess that is good enough for me.
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