and the decay of American culture continues like a bad tooth
Decay in American culture doesn’t have a thing to do with this particular idiocy-until the last 300 years or so, some kind of arranged marriage was how the nobility/upper class did that sort of thing-and until well into the Middle Ages, English kings had the last word about which noble families married with each other-people were banished and even murdered for defying the marriage edict from a king.
The difference between that and this reality show appears to be that the people on the show have an easy way out of the thing-in the far past, there was no out but annulment or death...
A lot of Native American tribes from Canada to South America arranged marriages within the same tribes, which narrowed the gene pool till they became extinct.
I watched part of the show last night out of curiosity, and from the flashbacks I saw, I failed to see how any of those people would have been compatible-the “experts” didn’t consider things like living nearby one another/near work-a big deal for most people in big cities-personality, expectations, future plans, etc.
Even in Europe in the Middle Ages, most of those in arranged engagements got to see their prospective bride or groom-or at least a miniature portrait of him/her before the wedding. Maybe next time the producers should try that...
Some groups in the West still arrange marriages-I’ve read that Irish Travelers, and some Gypsy groups of Eastern European ancestry still do-but if I were doing a show like that, I’d certainly change a few things to raise the success rate-and the ratings...