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don’t expect a miracle (today at least!)

TV Show: ‘Fearful People Are Freaks’

Once while channel-surfing I got caught up in an ugly wave. I fell into one of those television talk shows, or rather circuses, where people who suffer from an assortment of afflictions are on display. This particular programme prefers people plagued with mental and/or physical disorders. The heartless host feigns compassion. He has an insatiable appetite for bizarre family relationships, strange sexual tastes and other eccentric infirmities. While tearful guests bare their souls to millions of viewers, the studio audience hoots and hollers, egging them on to even more humiliation.

‘Ralph is afraid of peaches,’ the host gleefully announces.

‘Ooh,’ the audience chants.

‘He can’t come near them.’

‘Ooh,’ the audience chants louder. Then, a basket of peaches appears on a big screen behind Ralph. The host points up at it. Ralph turns, swears (bleeped out), screams and jumps up. His 270 pounds of sheer terror races down the studio hall, followed, of course, by the camera crew.

Hysterical laughter from the audience.

Ralph, covered by three cameras, cowers in the corner backstage. At the host’s goading, the audience begins chanting, ‘Ralph come back. Ralph come back.’ Ralph, still shaking, staggers back on the set.

The crowd applauds.

While winking at the audience the host asks Ralph, ‘Why don’t you like peaches?’

‘They’re fuzzy, they’re slimy.’ Then almost inaudibly, he mutters something about a girlfriend who had peach shampoo.

At that moment, two voluptuous women bring in two big baskets of peaches.

The audience’s gleeful crescendo is ‘Uh oh, he’s in big trouble now.’ At the sight of the peaches, the spectators are treated to a repeat performance from Ralph. This time he runs through the audience. They tackle him and succeed in pulling his pants down, which only adds to the ridiculousness of the spectacle. The camera catches the rear view of Ralph crawling away from the taunting audience, on all fours, his trousers around his knees.

Ralph once again crouches in the foetal position in a corner of the studio wings. The host follows and sneers, ‘Do you know what you are now? A 6-foot tall, 270-pound man cowering in the corner?’

Mercifully for me, just then my phone rang.

Phobia Coach Cures Acrophobia to Zoophobia. Success Guaranteed. Walk-ins Welcome

When I came back 15 minutes later, Ralph was happily holding a ripe peach in his hands. With a big smile he brought it to his lips.

The camera cuts to a self-described ‘phobia life coach’ and ‘therapist’ sitting paternally beside Ralph. He explains to a gullible audience that he cured Ralph by gradual exposure and he will never fear peaches again.

The screen fades to black and advertises for a future guest: ‘Do you have a child under the age of 13 who weighs over 300 pounds and is constantly teased and tormented?’ Contact us at …