Survivor (Fall 2016)

[Timewalker]

Another September, another edition of Survivor. This time it's in Fiji, and the gimmick is Generation X vs. The Millennials.

I liked the fact that an advantage was just casually placed among the stuff the players were allowed to gather before going to their camps. So far nobody is standing out as either someone to root for or someone to want gone (except the one who says he's "scared of everything").

Nice of Jeff to allow them to save the chickens from the storm! I bet that made Tai (from last season) smile, if he's watching this season.


I didn't mention The Amazing Race in the thread title this time, because I can't find it on the TV schedule (I'd have expected it to start on Friday). They filmed a season, but are apparently not going to show it... Anyone know what's going on with that?

 

[mimic]

I'm playing Fantasy Survivor against my parents. Made up some rules, we had a draft - should be fun. My team is Mari, Zeke, Will & Bret

 

[Pegaritaville]

Not a bad start to the season. Looks like the weather could be a bigger factor this season.

The teams seem kind of mismatched. The Gen X team seems to have more than their fair share of out of shape players.

It's too early in the game to pick my favorite(s), but right now my least favorite is the paranoid guy that's frightened of everything. They gave him a lot of screen time so I'm afraid he'll be around for a while.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Giving him a lot of screen time could also mean he flames out spectacularly.

Seemed a bit unfair that if Millennials were allowed to take the chickens, the Xers couldn't take the fishing gear.

The casting seems good in general this year. They blatantly edited it to showcase behavior either reinforcing or refuting generational stereotypes so I'n hoping that stops later into the season.

Don't know about Amazing Race. Might be waiting to see what shows fail?

 

[Timewalker]

Giving him a lot of screen time could also mean he flames out spectacularly.

Seemed a bit unfair that if Millennials were allowed to take the chickens, the Xers couldn't take the fishing gear.

The casting seems good in general this year. They blatantly edited it to showcase behavior either reinforcing or refuting generational stereotypes so I'n hoping that stops later into the season.

Don't know about Amazing Race. Might be waiting to see what shows fail?

I think the reason they weren't allowed to take the fishing gear is because that's not alive.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

It's pretty clear why they could take the chickens and not the fishing gear, but since they turned down the chickens to get the fishing gear it would seem really lame if they lost it in the cyclone when the other team was allowed to protect theirs.

 

[Timewalker]

They weren't forced to take the fishing gear; it was their free choice. And if the fishing gear is gone, I expect another set will turn up in a reward challenge fairly soon, since the ability to fish is critical to keeping people fed out there.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

They weren't forced to take the fishing gear; it was their free choice. And if the fishing gear is gone, I expect another set will turn up in a reward challenge fairly soon, since the ability to fish is critical to keeping people fed out there.

The point is, they were given a choice, chickens or fishing gear, and didn't have the information available at the time "By the way if we have to evacuate for the first time in the show's history you'll be able to protect one but not the other". So letting them take one and not the other is preferential intervention that affects the game, even if the motive is just basic decency not to let the chickens die.

 

[Timewalker]

They were told to grab their personal belongings, and as for the chickens, the producers decided they could have live animals that would be confined. Yes, I know the chickens are destined for the pot or frying pan, but in the meantime, there is an expectation that they will be treated humanely. Leaving animals confined in a cage at the mercy of a storm like that would not be humane.

No doubt this is a question someone - an interviewer, or maybe at the final - will ask.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I know the reason they did it was to be humane. I'm talking strictly from a game equity perspective. The Xers turned down the chickens to get fishing gear and it'd be unfair if they got screwed just because their deferred gratification didn't have a face.

Not saying they should have left the chickens, saying they should have been able to protect the thing they took instead of the chickens for game fairness.

 

[Timewalker]

The chickens, being confined living things, would likely not have survived the storm. The fishing gear, being nonliving, inorganic things, would have been scattered (depending on how they stored it), but wouldn't have been dead and therefore not usable.

It's a bit unreasonable to expect a dead chicken to lay eggs. I don't think that tribe got screwed over at all. They have a chance to find their fishing gear. It's sometimes happened that an extra set of fishing gear has been part of the reward challenge, or maybe they'll just be given replacements for whatever they lose - after all, this storm was not anything the players could have helped, no matter what kind of shelter they'd built.

I don't ever recall that a second set of chickens has been offered.

 

[mimic]

The legacy advantage could throw a huge wrinkle into the game if it's made public, but it seems to be set up in a way that most players won't be aware that it exists until it's used. And it's not in Jessica's interest to tell anyone about it.

But seriously. If you had the advantage, your allies would try to vote you off just before it's usable, but do so in a way manner that doesn't piss you off.

 

[Timewalker]

The legacy advantage could throw a huge wrinkle into the game if it's made public, but it seems to be set up in a way that most players won't be aware that it exists until it's used. And it's not in Jessica's interest to tell anyone about it.

But seriously. If you had the advantage, your allies would try to vote you off just before it's usable, but do so in a way manner that doesn't piss you off.

In the hopes that you'd will it to one of them? Yeah, I can see that happening. If she's smart, she'll keep this strictly to herself until/unless she's in serious danger of being voted out and doesn't have any other lifelines. It could be useful if she were in danger of not making it to the final 2/3 (whichever they're doing this time): "I have an advantage that can't be used unless I'm still here on Day 36. Keep me and I'll take you to the finals with me."

 

[Spot's Meow]

I like this legacy advantage, it's creative. One thing I don't like about idols is that in recent seasons whoever finds one quickly tells someone else, and the information spreads through the tribe like wildfire. The others are then able to "flush it out" without much excitement. With the legacy advantage, there seems to be less reason to share the info with others, maybe until right before you are being voted out. But even then it might be an advantage to whoever you give it to to keep it a complete secret and let them just receive it by surprise after you're gone. We'll have to see what the logistics are on that. The way I see it happening is that after the person is gone, the next day the person they willed it to is given the secret envelope in one of those individual confessionals. I can't imagine they would require the person being voted out to give it to someone before they leave, because what if they don't know they're being voted out that night? I also can't imagine they would make it a public affair at tribal council. But who knows.

No one in particular stands out for me at the moment. But I do want to make clear that I HATE this generations gimmick! As someone on the edge of the millennial generation, I am so absolutely sick of being grouped in with people who are so much younger than me (not just in years but emotionally/maturity level), as if they represent all of us. I'm sorry, but my "life philosophy" has little to nothing in common with the average 20 year old these days. Not to mention that it's just stupid to generalize any group of human beings so widely. I don't get the media's obsession with playing up this division. It's not real, it's not accurate, it's not helpful. And OF COURSE they are going to cast the people that fit the stereotypes the best for a show like this, only reinforcing the stupid generalization. So sick of hearing the word millennial. So sick of it.

 

[Timewalker]

Agreed. I was born in the same year the oldest player was, but raised by my grandparents. So my take on life has never been in step with the rest of my generation, at least not without a lot of deprogramming on some of the negative stuff.

 

[Snaploud]

Part of the confusion is that there are a few different definitions of Millennials. Also, the term was first created before most of the Millennials were even born, so it would have been merely happenstance for the whole group to be very cohesive. Politically, for instance, pollsters have noticed a distinct difference between the half of Millennials who were able to vote for Obama in 2008 and the half of Millennials were not yet eligible to vote at the time. Specifically, the older cohort is very attached to the Democratic Party, while the younger cohort seems perfectly happy flirting between a socialist (Bernie Sanders) and a libertarian (Gary Johnson).

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I was born in 1983 and the definition of millennials on Wikipedia started in 1982, so I'm kind of in both camps.

When I was growing up I witnessed the transition between children encouraged to be independent and children overprotected. When I got out of college I felt entitled to immediately get a career, then I had to work hard in a low paying job while I got the degree I needed for a good job.

If Millennials are lazy, it's because they were given ridiculous expectations and absolutely no career prep by the baby boomers and gen-xers. They are not unwilling to work. They are young and haven't been put in a position to have to. They'll learn they have to just like I did. And the everybody gets a trophy thing? That was the GEN-XERS IDEA. Millennials hated it, but they were 6.

 

[Timewalker]

Yeah, I noticed that things started getting weird in the '80s. I was watching a soap opera one day (One Life to Live), and one character mentioned arranging a "play date" with another character for their kids.

That just threw me. When I was a kid (and living in the city, and not on an acreage), if we wanted to play with someone, we went to their house, and asked if they wanted to play. Or sometimes we'd phone (this was before the time when kids are basically handed phones as soon as they can hold one).

Every so often, I see articles on CBC.ca, where parents are complaining about the bus routes for school. They drive their kids to the bus stop, and then the kids have to spend 45 minutes on the bus to get to school... and this is seen as Horrible, Awful, and Let's Tar And Feather The School Board time.

I do get that many subdivisions don't have schools, and if they do, it might be the wrong one (ie. Catholic school and of course the non-Catholic kids won't be going there). Some of the newer subdivisions have dismal transit service, because the city planners just assume that "everybody" will drive.

But I've seen this whining in areas where the kids could easily walk to school. I used to do 2 round trips/day, 5 days a week, for a total of an hour of walking time per day (a bit longer in the winter, but shorter when we were able to ride bikes). Honestly, what is with the parents nowadays - that would be your generation, JirinPanthosa (not criticizing you personally), so maybe you could shed some light on this - that kids nowadays are too helpless to make a 15-20 minute walk to and from school?

 

[mimic]

Well, at least where I teach, the school sits on two busy roads. You would have to cross at least one four lane highway for all but one neighborhood to get there.

I'm a millennial, I suppose (1986) and I walked to elementary school and middle school. For the middle school they had a rule that if you lived within a mile, there wasn't any bus service. I lived just at that cusp. We had to cross one fairly busy road, where they'd stationed a crossing guard. However, some parents complained and wanted bus service, so to justify the expense they did a study and decided that particular intersection was 'hazardous' without a crossing guard and eliminated the crossing guard position. I walked anyway. For a few weeks, they had a police officer sit at the intersection and take down our names, I guess to try to intimidate us into taking the bus? It was ridiculous.

We've had school canceled in the past because it was too cold for students to wait outside for the bus. The argument is that our poorer students don't have proper clothing. I dunno. But it's ridiculous to blame the kids (Millennials) for being lazy when they aren't the ones making these calls.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I don't have kids so can't say too much about the millennial parenting experience. But I will say, if we let our kids walk to school we'll probably go to jail for child endangerment.

You know those kids in sports leagues where everybody gets a trophy? When the game's over and adults aren't looking they beat up the weak kids for being the reason they can't play more competitively. And the parents think they're helping the weak kids.

This whole culture that kids must be protected from ever feeling bad is the reason we have 26 year olds whose parents call their bosses at work on their behalf, and also the reason loud mouthed jerks get credited for 'Telling it like it is'. When you've had touchy-feely PC garbage shoved down your throat your whole life even other varieties of garbage sound like honesty.