TV as Bully
This chapter pushes back against notions of meritorious complexity, moral ambiguity, and cognitive “richness” in recent, high-profile American television series. It questions the heralding of television’s artistic transcendence above that of other narrative media and the use of cognitive theory to make such a case. I turn instead to literature on social psychology and bullying to make sense of our relationship to longform TV serials and investigate the ways in which a kind of bullying in the content and form of both serial and reality television has been normalized in an era popularly dubbed the “TV renaissance.” It concludes with a look at the relationship between a rising endorsement of aggressive populist leadership styles and the prevalence of bullying as causal logic on TV.