History Channel used to do actual programming squarely about history, but has lost its original purpose and mandate for some time now. This likely reflects a corporate decision to survive by playing to lowbrow, ‘redneck’ instincts and passions reflected in shows like Rust Valley Restorers, Counting Cars, American Pickers, Pawn Stars, and Ice Road Truckers. These are the glandular and money-centered shows its current fans now watch and prefer over ‘boring-ass’ historical content and academic discovery.
This massive shift is also likely due to a decline in tv viewers and people in general who are interested in history, period. All part of the decline of people’s interest in the past because of the increase in e-technology and personal phones which isolate users from the world and its larger long-term perspectives. The interest today, by and large, is simply, reductionistly, in Now and Me. Thus, History Channel’s adaptation using a crasser, glandular, materialistic approach. And voila, a channel with a completely misleading, misnomer name which is perfect for our distracting/distracted times.