Evan Shapiro

(There's even a song.)

The question is not "Is Lena Dunham racist?"; it's "Is Lena Dunham any more racist than the rest of us?"

Recently, there's been a firestorm over the lack of diversity on Lena Dunham's HBO zeitgeist-apalooza, Girls. I will not rehash what has previously been hashed -- but if you missed it: Jenna Wortham wrote this critique of the blandness of the characters and casting of Girls; then the Twittersphere went apeshit; then Molly Lambert informed us that it's not Dunham who's racist, it's all of TV.

So, now you're up to date -- except for one thing: It's not TV that's racist, it's us. I've said this before, but it bears repeating: TV (especially right now) is far more of a reflection of who we are as a society, than who we ought to be.

TV, like the United States, is incredibly diverse. However, like our country, it is also quite segregated. You may not like it, but TV is a mirror image of America in the 21st century.

Segregation in America peaked in 1960. For the next 20 years, the country grew more diverse and more integrated -- at a rapid rate, neighborhoods less likely to be "all white," "all black" or "all anything." However, in 1980, that progress began to slow.

From 1980 through 2000, even though the country on the whole became more diverse, the rate of integration for all neighborhoods across the country declined greatly. And, a study from Brown University shows that from 2000 to 2010, the rate declined even more rapidly -- all but coming to a complete stop. In fact, by some respects, integration of races by neighborhood even regressed in the last 10 years.

The average white person lives in a neighborhood that is 77 percent white. While that's an improvement over 1980, when they lived in areas that were 88 percent white, it is surprising (and disappointing) to see how little progress we've made in 30 years. Black families -- the most segregated American minority -- overwhelmingly live in predominantly black neighborhoods, and segregation for Hispanics and Asians has actually begun to increase. To a certain extent, the more diverse we become, the more likely we are to each live in our own ghetto.

So, no, it did not surprise me to see Lena and her besties living in a 'white girl ghetto' -- even in New York diver-City; or to see The Game have an all-black cast; or to see Jersey Shore have an all-guido cast. Despite all our protestation and our diversity, we are segregating ourselves and TV is reflecting that back to us.

No, we don't have to like it. But, as the slogan goes: It's not TV, it's America.

Listen to 'Everyone's A Little Bit Racist' From Avenue Q:

Violence > Sex.

Google the words 'News for World Peace.' Go ahead, I'll wait. Do you notice something odd about the results? When you search for World Peace online, the first TWO pages of results are for The Artist Formerly Known as Ron Artest, and his now...

On April 7, Mike Wallace, the lion of the TV news magazine died. Wallace was more than a news man. He was a former actor and game show host who found a way to seamlessly blend news and entertainment into a combination that was far more than a sum of...

When a young white girl goes missing in America, it immediately becomes a national story. Nancy Grace dedicates her show to every aspect of every missing girl, regardless how long a case drags out. These girls, their parents and everyone associated with them gets a magazine cover, or two, or...

I am embarrassed to admit it: before my daughter posted the KONY 2012 documentary to her Facebook page two weeks ago, I had no idea who Joseph Kony was.

We monitor our kids' social graphs pretty closely, so when our 13-year-old posted the link to the...

As I've mentioned previously, I teach an undergraduate class at NYU on TV Management. This week, our mid-term assignment is due -- a 10-20 page paper in which each student must propose and defend their choice for the single most important thing to happen to TV in the past five...

Have you been watching New Girl? It's a pretty good show. They're funny -- especially Schmidt. She's adorkable. The unresolved sexual tension thing is not bad.

My one knock is this; where the hell are those perky hipsters supposed to be living? Not what city -- although that's...

In case you hadn't heard, the Academy Awards are on ABC this Sunday. Regardless of what you think of the nominees, it is clear that the film business is at a crossroads. Fewer people went to the movies in 2011 than any year since Al Gore invented the internet; our...

In addition to my day job, I teach a class at NYU on the Television Industry. Each class, in addition to a specific lesson plan, the students and I usually touch on the top shows of the week -- what they watch, what America watches; the overlaps and the disparities.

...

Let me make one thing clear: I really liked the remake of Battlestar Galactica. Seriously, I did. OK? Now that that's out of the way, here is this week's hypothesis:

TV Remakes Are Bad Mojo.

It's not that I think producing series that have already been made...

Once Upon A Time, in a dark, fearful period of our nation's history, America had absolutely no amateur talent shows on TV. Shocking, right? But this isn't a fictional horror story -- there was actually a time, in our not too distant past, when there WERE NO TALENT SHOWS ON...

It's been quite a week. It started in Utah, for the Sundance Film Festival, where, in three days, I saw seven great films, a pop up performance by Eddie Izzard and 30 inches of snow. Then Sunday, to Miami, via Dallas, for NATPE (the annual conference and sales market for...

This past week I went to The Consumer Electronics Show (aka CES) in Las Vegas. "Why would a TV executive go to CES" you ask? Good question.

First, there were almost as many TV executives in Vegas for CES as there were in Pasadena for the Television Critics Association...

Those three words are why I work in TV. Nobody Knows Anything.

William Goldman introduced that phrase in his book, Adventures in The Screen Trade -- IMHO, the best book ever written about the entertainment business. He originally used them to say that in Hollywood no one...

For the past two years, I've been lucky enough to be a small part of a show called Portlandia. The series -- created by the prolifically talented Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein and returning on Friday for a second season -- has been described by many a stinging...

In the past two weeks, I've posted two pieces about the positive and long lasting impact of TV. My main points were:

1. People DO watch a LOT of TV -- more than ever, in fact;
2. Much of today's TV is, generally speaking, awfully good;
3. When used...

Every Friday night, my kids, my wife and I boot up the TV and watch a week's worth of our favorite shows. We don't all like everything the same. Personally, I feel like Glee has jumped the shark, and it took a while for my kids to warm to the...

This year, I began teaching an undergraduate class on Television at NYU's Stern School of Business. If you want to feel stupid about your job, stand in front of sixty nineteen and twenty year olds, paying an exorbitant amount of money to learn about your business. After agreeing to teach...