Meredith Vieira tried her damnedest to understand the Jersey Shore this morning. She can't. The problem is that she tried to in the first place, and about a month behind schedule. When will the olds learn?

The cast was on the show to announce that a second season will be on by the end of this year and they start filming "somewhere warm" in March (so guess it won't be Sleazeside Heights). Because the Today show is for fuddy duddies, they had to recap all the "Italian Americans hate this trashy TV show" bullshit that those of us hip to the greatest sociological experiment of our time had already dissected and dismissed months ago. It tried to make assumptions about the show that the cast quickly swatted down. Awkward. Vieira even admitted that she didn't watch the show, but her daughter did. That's the problem here. Older people don't understand the desire to watch a batch of unprepared fameballs life their lives ablaze on camera, crashing even as they ascend. This is the hallmark of our new cultural era and even the hip cognoscenti of New York are embracing its culture wholesale. When we're all old and gray, this is what they'll be showing on CBS while our grandkids are going on about some new phenomenon that we think is irredeemable and unfathomable. So please don't try to get the Jersey Shore, Meredith. Just leave us our new shining gem and go back to watching your crime procedurals. It's the way the world—and youth culture—works.

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