The Hidden Camera Effect

by Victoria Gauthier

Would you stop a hate crime? What would you tell a stranger? Do you know who is talking to your kids online? The popularity of hidden-camera based programming on television speaks volumes about what television, specifically the camera, has the capacity to know, and what we, the viewers, want television to tell us. In some respects, hidden-camera shows are regarded as the “realest” of reality television programming. Since the people on tape do not know they are being filmed, there is an undeniable sense that what we see on the screen is a pure representation of human behavior. This is definitely the foundational allure of Taxicab Confessions, To Catch a Predator, and What Would You Do?, where we gawk at excruciatingly honest passengers, duped pedophiles, and daring/apathetic bystanders respectively. From the comfort of our homes, we simultaneously inhabit the unique roles of armchair psychologist, ethicist, and witness. And though we distance ourselves through the screen and our own judgments, we also insert ourselves into the scenario. From the onset of the program, the viewers are in on the illusion, standing on equal epistemological footing with the paid actors, producers, and “television” itself.

Taxicab Confessions is one of the most stripped-down examples of the hidden camera show. Unlike What Would You Do? and To Catch a Predator, there is no moralizing host to structure and interpret what we witness on the screen. Instead, Taxicab Confessions indulges the “if I could just be a fly on the wall…” fantasy by letting the viewer

ride along as an invisible passenger while another man voices his inner monologue. Additionally, the cab driver is always also a producer – as he guides the car, he also guides the conversation. In “Television: Live Witness Realized,” John Ellis discusses television’s unique ability to transform the at-home viewer into a live witness, to “provide the audience with a powerful sense of co-presence with the events it shows” (Ellis 32). Ellis’ argument stems from the technological: the immediacy of transmission turns witness into “an everyday, intimate, and commonplace act,” since we can literally be with the onscreen characters the moment we decide to turn on the TV (36). Ellis also claims that, as viewers, we are all too willing to “participate in the illusion” (33). In fictionalized drama, fantasy is one obvious answer, but it doesn’t really apply to the hidden-camera “documentary” genre in which the sensation of “live-witness” even more pronounced. Here, witnessing takes on the role of mirror: we want to delve into the seedier parts of human nature without the uncomfortable task of introspection. Instead of looking within ourselves, we look into the screen, hoping to attain “first-hand” knowledge at a safe distance.

In this episode, a Greek man is en route to Astoria to confront a cheating girlfriend. As he unloads about the issues that have surrounded this relationship since the beginning, the cabbie peppers him with questions: “If she didn’t go to Puerto Rico, where’d she go? So you think she may be, uh, you think she’s havin’ another affair or somethin’?” Obviously, these questions are for the viewers benefit. The producer preys on his passenger’s insecurities for the sake of entertainment, letting his blood boil for a bit before turning the heat down to simmer - a clear demonstration of the power relationship between the world of television and our own human nature.
But as soon as our Man from Omonia starts talking about beating up his girlfriend, the cabbie/producer takes on a more active role, dispensing ethical advice like “You wanna keep things as honest as possible.” (The Taxicab definition of honesty conflicts a little with my own, which I learned early in life meant don’t keep secrets, tell lies, or hide lipstick-sized hidden cameras in your car. But I let this one slide because the irony is too toe-curling to challenge.) Yet the best and most symbolic moment of this clip occurs at 1:49, when the passenger wishes he had someone to “guide” him about the right thing to do. Although the words sound slightly absurd coming from the backseat of a taxicab, a lot of us beg the same question of our television sets. It’s the same wish for guidance that prompts us to hang onto the news anchor’s every word in moments of catastrophe or watch a Suze Orman special. I think it might be why my mom watches Oprah. In many ways, the television screen has become the new pulpit, with the camera as god-figure highlighting its human vessel (the cab driver) and his audience (the passenger and the viewers). Similarly, shows like Taxicab Confessions implant the idea that someday, we might be the ones being watched. The degree to which this modifies our own behavior is debatable, but it does effectively nullify the distance between the television world and our own, forcing them into a state of overlap. Whether or not we’re watching television, we unconsciously inhabit both.

The “you never know when you’re being watched” phenomenon is the backbone of more news-oriented shows such as What Would You Do?. The segment opens as though it were any other story typical of news magazines such as 20/20 or Dateline, complete with knowledgeable tone and characteristic voice over narration. For a moment, the viewing audience and the real-life, unknowing participants in this social experiment are both being duped by television. But campy music soon cues the ta-da! moment when host John Quinones reveals that every part of what we are witnessing is fake, except, of course, for the reactions the ruse incites. The first group of men essentially ignores the situation at hand. Their faces are blurred out, ostensibly to protect their identity. However, their anonymity also facilitates the viewers’ virtual inhabitations of their bodies: Would we do the same thing? The men also ignore Quinones’ subsequent questioning, which the resident behavioral authority, Yale psychologist Jack Dovidio, interprets as embarrassment for letting “concern for themselves override their concern for others.” But both Dovidio and Quinones refuse to acknowledge that this embarrassment could also stem from being fooled by national television. This is further evidence that the “raw” human behavior we are witnessing is not as unadulterated as it may seem. In addition to the fact that this scenario is being played out by actors in makeup and pads, the commentary provided by the show’s authority figures is both limited and biased towards the representation of investigative television as a neutral media.

Dovidio occupies a unique role in the program. Despite his credentials, he offers very simplistic interpretations of the behavior we witness. (I’d argue that anyone who’s caught a dog using the carpet as a toilet is familiar with the head-down-leave-quickly look of embarrassment that Dovidio astutely picks up on.) Rather than provide new insight, Sonia Livingstone suggests in her essay “Mediated Knowledge” that his “epistemological assumptions frame both images in the text and the relevance of viewers’ daily experiences to the process of viewing” (Livingstone 92). That is, Dovidio distills everything we do see into a concrete interpretation of what we should see. The content of What Would You Do is extrapolated from our everyday experiences; theoretically, we should already be familiar with what we observe on the screen. Yet as Livingstone points out, “information is significant only insofar as it becomes known…otherwise, it washes over us, as do most television images, as an excess of ‘information’ with which we do nothing and so which does not become knowledge” (97). Consequently, Dovidio and Quinones take on another god-like role: by speaking something, they bring it into existence. Due to the “coextensive audience” phenomenon that Ellis identifies, we often view the portrayal of others as a subtle reflection of ourselves. As a result, the mediated knowledge we receive on television easily integrates itself with our knowledge of the self.

How do we, as viewers, reconcile the uncertainty of our own reactions to ethical dilemmas? In “Working Through: Television in the Age of Uncertainty,” John Ellis suggest that television “performs an important social function in trying to come to terms with the uncertainties of the future” (Ellis 76). He argues that television accomplishes this by establishing a host of “possible narrative developments” (96). In the case of What Would You Do, the apathy of the first group of witnesses is balanced out by a feisty, 5’4” woman who decides to step in. Although What Would You Do strives to align itself with the news genre, it also relies on heavy narrativisation. For instance, the assumption that “only a bodybuilder or a cop would dare intervene” referred to by Quinones is largely based on stereotypical fictional scenarios created by the television. Casting the woman as an obvious underdog is another narrative trope that Quinones employs. Overall, her involvement is somewhat like a fable – a rare and somewhat dubious example of human goodness that we should nonetheless strive to match. Her inclusion is another example of Ellis’ definition of working through as “a constant process of making and remaking meanings and exploring possibilities…an important process in an age that threatens to make us witness to too much information without providing enough explanation” (79). In direct contrast with the previous example, Dovidio highlights this woman’s willingness to put someone else’s welfare above her own. And while commonsense or prior experience might tell us that taking on a group of three “thugs” alone is stupid and dangerous, Quinones and Dovidio both agree that her behavior is “inspiring.” This claim underlines the tension that exists between social commentary made in a virtual universe and what we know to be true in our own world.

To Catch a Predator is another example of a show that employs a moralizing authority figure to guide us through an uncomfortable ethical situation. The clip with the team from Perverted Justice and host Chris Hansen letting us know that we are part of a sting operation. Essentially, we’re witnesses on both sides of the screen. As the decoy opens the door, she invites both the pedophile and the viewer into the liminal world straddling reality and virtuality that To Catch a Predator has created. But almost as soon as we do, host Chris Hansen enters and usurps our ability to make sense of the situation for ourselves. Even the pedophile succumbs to his authority, sitting down while Hansen stands over him; their body positions reflect the power relationship, even though Hansen has no legal power. Immediately, Hansen launches into a barrage of questions. Quick editing cuts increase the speed and intensity of the interrogation. The camera angle shifts from Hansen to our "predator," allowing the viewer to literally experience both sides of the table and hopefully dissuade him from taking the seated position. When Hansen begins to read the chat transcripts aloud, he recreates the televisual experience for the predator, forcing him to witness his own transgressions. Afterwards, the theme of his questions quickly turns from circumstantial to moral.

H: “Do you think it’s appropriate for someone your age to visit a 14-year old girl home alone?”

P: “No, I do not…but she is the one that invited me.”

H: “Does that make it right?”

Like Laurie Ouellette’s assessment of the Judge Judy program in her essay “ ‘Take Responsibility for Yourself’ Judge Judy and the Neoliberal Citizen,” Chris Hansen functions to “supplant institutions of the state and, using real people caught in the drama of ordinary life as raw material, train TV viewers to function…as self-disciplining, self-sufficient, responsible, and risk-averting individuals” (Oullette 224). Perhaps this is why Hansen’s indictment of the “predator’s” moral character is always followed up by “Have you ever seen our show called To Catch a Predator?” The intention to commit lewd acts with a minor is wrong, and doing so knowing full well that To Catch a Predator might find you out is doubly wrong. Like Judge Judy, To Catch a Predator also functions as a “‘panoptic’ device to the extent that it classifies and surveils individuals deemed unsavory and dangerous” and “instructs TV viewers how to detect and avoid the risks that certain individuals are shown to represent” (234,235). The implication is that without hidden camera shows like To Catch a Predator, predators would go uncaught, at least in the public eye. In this sense, the program functions like a public stockyard: public shaming is more damaging and more important than the eventual legal consequences. While the evidence that Hansen reveals is usually pretty incriminating, we never get to see the accused defend himself in a court of law. Additionally, Hansen’s own interrogation takes temporal precedence over police action, further insinuating that media opinion, particularly of arbitrary authority figures, trumps the power of the law. Arguably, the fear of being exposed on television is greater than the threat of potential legal consequences.

Overall, while the hidden camera genre occupies a small niche of television programming, it highlights many characteristics that define the televisual world as a whole. This is especially true if one considers that the camera is “hidden” in nearly all television shows. The hidden-camera relies on the sensation of live witness to establish credibility for the knowledge claims each program makes. While every show purports to capture “pure” human behavior, each also relies on actors, props, and costumes like any other fictionalized drama to achieve their end. Experts and host gain authority from the television medium, mediating and interpreting what we see into an established form of knowledge. Through the behavior of others on television, we come to know ourselves (or at least we think we do). But how much does this “knowledge,” along with the unconscious fear that we might be the ones being watched, influence our own behavior, thereby reifying knowledge claims made by television in the first place? As the line between actor and witness blurs and the space between the real and virtual world collapses, how sure can we ever be?

Works Cited

Ellis, John. "Television: Live Witness Realized." Seeing Things: Television in the Age of Uncertainty. London: I.B. Tauris, 2000. 31-37. Print

Ellis, John. "Chapter 6: Working Through: Television in the Age of Uncertainty." Seeing Things: Television in the Age of Uncertainty. London: I.B. Tauris, 2000. 74-89. Print

“Flagler Beach, Florida.” To Catch a Predator. MSNBC.

Livingstone, Sonia. “Mediated Knowledge: Recognition of the Familiar, Discovery of the New.” Television and Common Knowledge. New York: Routledge, 1999. 91-107. Print.

Oullette, Laurie. “‘Take Responsibility for Yourself’: Judge Judy and the Neoliberal Citizen.” Reality TV: Remaking Television Culture. New York: New York University Press, 2009. 223-242. Print.

“Season 1, Episode 3.” Taxicab Confessions. HBO.

“Would You Stop a Hate Crime?” What Would You Do? ABC.

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