". . .I immediately stripped myself stark naked, and went down softly into the Stream. It happened that a Young female Yahoo standing behind a bank, saw the whole Proceeding; and inflamed by Desire. . .came running with all Speed, and leaped into the Water within five Yards of the Place where I bathed. I was never in my Life so terribly frighted. . .She embraced me after a most fulsome Manner; I roared as loud as I could. . .For now I could no longer deny, that I was a real Yahoo." (from Gulliver's Travels)

In the obscene amount of time I have logged in front of the TV I have never once succumbed to a commercial’s suggestion that I "Call and Order Now." I never even considered it. That is, until I saw the commercials for Girls Gone Wild. Not since FOX found whoever that creepy guy is who does their promos for when things attack and the worlds deadliest whatnots, has there been a voiceover guy who's voice drips with so much sliminess promising such tawdry thrills. After each Girls Gone Wild commercial (or "GGW" as it is know to fans, who are fond of the acronyms) all I wanted to do was take a shower to feel clean again. That and watch girls going wild, of course. Like Gulliver, I finally realized that I'm really no better than the troglodytes of Sigma Tao Deltoid who yell "WHOOOO!!!" as they dump pitcher after pitcher of water on their foolish victims. I wanted to see stupid girls drunk and flashing too damn it! The unrelenting assault of late night Girls Gone Wild commercials finally cracked my defense. The onslaught was simply too much for me to withstand. Of course, I finally broke.

Before I actually watched the tape, I was confident I had a good idea of what I could expect from what they show on their wonderfully salacious commercials. I expected poor, dumb girls, well lubricated with booze, flashing their breasts or maybe showing their thongs: a sort of "the girl next door" making a drunken mistake-type affair: painfully funny in the same way karaoke can be. I was very, very wrong.

Before the action begins, GGW tapes present an CYA disclaimer that starts, "AMX Videos are shot as a documentary of events that actually occur. They are intended to be newsworthy. . " Of course, this is bullshit. But in attempting to lie egregiously, AMX unwittingly comes close to the truth. These tapes aren't exactly a documentary, but they do allow the viewer a glimpse into a separate and foreign sociological group. There is a "Stranger-in-a-Strange Land" sensation that comes with watching these tapes, and it is a sensation that is heightened by their very low production value. GGW tapes are raw. There is no host, no voiceover, no music, and all the action on a GGW tape takes place at one location. They feel less like a produced product and more like a home movie. The spell of having been there, or perhaps even being there, is only broken by sporadic, nasally, and very lurid requests from the cameraman.

The tape I bought was one of the GGW "College Spring Break" editions, and it appears to have been shot at a lake in either New Sodom or East Gommorrah, USA. These are not the "girls next door" and their boyfriends cutting loose. These are a tribe of Yahoos. There is even common tribal body mutilation throughout; butchered tit jobs, Lee press-on nails, tongue piercing and bush-league tattoos are the obligatory adornments. As far as the flashing goes, it is extremely elemental. There's no teasing or use of legs or batting of the eyes or suggestion of any kind: none of that peripheral stuff. Its, "Here are ma' tits, Heresma' ass!, Heresma' vagina." The showing of the ass is usually accompanied by some sort of hip-poppin' arrhythmic shake, and the showing of the breasts is generally accompanied by the girl going slack-jawed and then wagging her tongue about. I think, but I can't be sure, that this tongue move is supposed to be sexy. Of course it looks more like a sign that the poor thing may have an extra chromosome. Add in roaming packs of frat boys pawing at the girls breasts and genitals like simians, and the whole affair takes on a sort of Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom feel. It ends up feeling a lot less like "Girls Gone Wild" and more like "Girls of the Wild."

The most disturbing aspect, however, is that unlike Gulliver's attacking Yahoo, the desire that inflames the Girls on these tapes is not sexual. The girls flash their breasts, tongue each other's tonsils, pull their thongs down, and even perform half-hearted oral sex on each other during the tapes, but it all feels like a performance rather than an outpouring of any emotion or desire. Further, it’s not just the slimy spirit of Mardi Gras or Spring Break mixed with unchartably low self-esteem alone that makes the Girls bust those knockers out. Low self-esteem certainly is an element of the whole affair. There's no other way to explain why these girls are willing to perform for a surrounding gaggle of men who pour hard alcohol down the front of their thongs as other girls get on their knees to lap it up. There's no other way to explain their unblinking compliance to shouts of, "Eat that shit", "Sit on her face!", and "Show your bare bushie!" Still, you get the feeling that it is the very proliferation of these type of videos devoted to documenting this particular type of feminine dementia that has killed its subject matter to a degree. These girls realize that they are being taped for mass distribution, or at least for an individual's collection, and they want to be part of it. In short, these girls are no longer flashing to be whores; they are whoring to become the most minor of celebrities, which is of course much sadder. GGW is just another example of our celebrity culture run amok. These girls aren't low self-esteem having hookas. They're media whores. The voyeuristic aspect is thus lost, and you and I, amateur sociologists, are the ones that truly lose out on the deal.