The Big Give

Ok...so I have been reading the internets, wanting to read that someone thought the same thing about this show, and many people had similar ideas, but I thought I should express my thoughts.

The first episode of this was great...until the judging. There were all of these inspiring stories--they made differences in people's lives, were able to raise lots of money to help these people out, and make dreams come true. And then they were judged on how well they did at making people's dreams come true. This seems counter-intuitive to me, and I saw in the next episode the repercussions from that. The first show, people were much more concerned with how they could help, stars in their eyes with the good they could do. The second show--people had that, but they were also combatting the feelings of worry over being judged unworthy to continue on. They worried about what the judges would think.

This seems like it could be a great feel-good show, just showing these ten people go all around the country, doing lots of good in the world. But, it just has this bitter aftertaste, that the cost of this show is that people have to be sent home, sad that they weren't good enough givers? That does not sound very inspiring to me.

And in this last show, they voted off a girl who was just trying to overcome her problems from previous times, and trying to make peace in her group. But apparently the judges wanted to side with the pushy overbearing woman.

I see how excited these people were on the first episode, to help people, to go out there and make a difference, and that is slowly disappearing. People are concerned about their image, how they will look to the judges, and TRYING to focus on the people they are helping. They are not being swept up into an environment of love and giving, an environment that could affect us all, and inspire us all to be better and give more.

It is just sad to me that a show such as this has to be tainted by the criticism and self-comparison that plagues our world. It is the kind of show that should inspire us to be better, and it may to some respect, but my first desire is to see this show do better to take care of the people they have involved in their project of giving.