"I can't think of any time in television's history that there's been a run on a state like this," said Tim Brooks, coauthor of The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows.
Is it the state's history as a stepchild to its big brother, New York City - all that pent-up need for attention finally finding the perfect outlet?
Is it the paradoxical authenticity of the fake-nail-hair-tan-loving denizens of the Turnpike State? Their keeping-it-real, don't-care-what-people-think dedication to preening and, redemptively, family?
Or it is something more basic? Is it because everyone in this state has an opinion?
" 'Cause we're awesome," responded one 13-year-old in a group of real-life Jersey Shore girls on their way to the beach for a little tanning last week in Ventnor.
" 'Cause we're hot," agreed a friend.
" 'Cause," summed up the first, "we're bitches."
No argument there.
If nothing else, Jersey on television has given a possibly dubious boost to the self-esteem of these post-Springsteen, pro-Snooki Jersey girls who previously thought their state - their Situation, if you will - to be somewhat obscure.
Did we mention the hardworking and funny Scali sisters and mom of Jersey Couture, an Oxygen show set in a family dress shop in Freehold ("We're looking for classy Vegas, not hooker Vegas") and the catty-beyond-belief (unless you've been to Margate recently) Real Housewives of New Jersey of Bravo?
"Jersey already has a well-established, ready-made cartoonish identity in popular culture," said Mark Andrejevic, an associate professor at the University of Iowa and author of Reality TV: The Work of Being Watched.
