I Like to Watch

Kids aren't people, too!
Which leads us right to the biggest, fattest TV Twinkie in the box: CBS's "Kid Nation" (8 p.m. Wednesdays). On this controversial show, which everyone loudly despises already, children are made to work very hard for next to nothing. Welcome to the real world, suckers!

You've got to hand it to CBS for its reasoning on this one: We don't treat our laborers with any respect or dignity in this country, let alone pay them a living wage. Why should kids be any different? As long as most of the population is being demeaned and taken advantage of and plowed under by the wheels of capitalism, shouldn't our kids be in on the action, too? What better way to teach them about the limited value of hard work than by making them work way too hard for almost no reward?

Thus do we find, in glorious Bonanza City (a ghost town in New Mexico), a miniature market system and four classes of kid citizen: Upper Class (who don't have to work at all, and presumably spend most of their time getting pedicures), Merchants (who work in the saloon and the general store), Cooks (who make all the food) and Laborers (who do the crappy work that no one else wants to do). Each class gets paid a different amount, from 10 cents to a dollar. The kids, who are separated into four gangs, compete to see which class they'll belong to.

This might look like a torturous way for a kid to spend his or her time. But really, what practical purpose do we serve by allowing children to play with blocks and ride their bicycles around in circles, when they'll spend the balance of their days on earth at a desk in an airless cubicle at a soul-sucking corporate office, pretending to work? Games of make-believe might be useful, but otherwise, playtime is just a dangerous fantasy that gives children the illusion that their lives won't be a living hell when they grow up. Is that really fair?

That's why it's so satisfying to watch as the kids realize that they have to work, and work is hard. Why, most of us have been coming to terms with this basic realization for most of our adult lives! What an advantage, to get it out of the way at a tender age!

And needless to say, CBS's child labor camp is like a saltwater bath to us emotional amoebas at home. Even when a bunch of 9-year-olds are struggling to cook breakfast, those quirky kiddies are so adorably plucky and sweet, amoebas nationwide explode in a spectacular burst of cuteness overload.

Now let's be clear about this: Most of us find kids in general to be, quite frankly, unsavory. They scamper and bump into things and screech unexpectedly. They speak at higher volumes than necessary, usually about repetitive stuff like the particular powers of this or that Pokemon. But CBS miraculously located the most charming and/or precocious and/or odd children in the country for its program. Take plucky Sophia, a 14-year-old who spots a bicycle that she wants in the general store and then dances in the street for spare change from the other kids until she has the $3 she needs to buy it. Or how about Alex, a 9-year-old boy who, after the two biggest kids write graffiti all over town in the middle of the night, says, "I think it was really stupid that they did that. It's juvenile. It's like 2-year-old behavior."

But these delicious youngsters don't impress our nation's concerned critics and parents, who find this show hideous and fake and boring, and believe that childhood should be spent fiddling aimlessly with blocks or dollies.

I disagree. I think kids are better off trudging around in the desert, tired and alone, with no one to turn to for comfort but other miserable kids. Doesn't that sound just like your first entry-level job? By lugging big buckets of water in extreme heat for hours on end, these children will gain an accurate sense of conditions in today's rapidly changing job market!

Betty grievances
Look at poor little Betty Suarez, who didn't know how brutal a job in the big city would be until she was thrust into it, unawares! But like those resilient kiddies of Bonanza City, Betty's stick-to-itiveness and "South of the Border spirit" (as editor/villainess Wilhelmina calls it) made her a trusted employee of Mode magazine.

ABC's "Ugly Betty" (premieres 8 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 27) may appear to be made for big girls, but in fact, it's the anti-"Private Practice": The zaniness and witty shenanigans are the main event, and the emotional twists and turns are treated as a sideshow attraction. Even when Hilda's fiancé, Carlos, was shot and Daniel was in a car accident at the end of the first season, it didn't really matter how it would all turn out. The colorful, fast-paced wit and fun of the show would live on regardless of who Hilda's main squeeze was or what mess Daniel found himself in next.

It's tough to make such a fantastical drama work. Without so much visual flair and such a rapid-fire pace, "Ugly Betty" wouldn't hold our attention as well. But these elements, along with a talented cast (America Ferrera just won an Emmy for her role), make this a show well worth watching, and this week's premiere doesn't disappoint.

Next page: Starbuck returns, and she's eeeevil!