Real Housewives Winners and Losers: Week 6

This week's episode of the Real Housewives of Washington, DC was a perfect example of the show's awful fascination. We got to see grown women destroying each other in front of their children, awkward political meetings, and some really terrible parenting. The show's far more real than any other installment of the Bravo franchise, and it's correspondingly much more uncomfortable. This isn't a matter of arbitrating a completely imaginary dispute between former BFFs over whether a condolence bouquet was appropriately ginormous. Here, winning amounts to scraping your way to decent humanity. And this week, it was in scarce supply.

Winner, Parenting Division: Rich Amons. God bless Rich Amons and his Pucci pants. This season, the man's been bossed around by his wife, endured discussions about penis measurements in the weirdest basement bonding session in reality television, and now, he's got to put up with a daughter who moved home, quit her office job because "It was cool for like five seconds to have a business card and a desk. After ten seconds, it sucked." “Birds do need to leave the nest and sometimes you have to kick them to help them fly," he declared, telling 23-year-old daughter Lolly that she needs a job, not just artistic aspirations, and perhaps to consider stop raiding her mother's closet.

Loser, Cattiness Edition: Erika. There's really nothing fun to say about a woman who stars off an evening by greeting another woman with the zinger "So you're mean, and klutzy?" And then goes on to lecture that harangue that woman. And lecture her about her body language. While she's crying. In front of her children. Even after being told that the woman she's attacking is going through a difficult time in her marriage. Good, Lord.

Winner, Political Issues Edition: Equal Marriage Rights. It might have been different if gay couples in DC still hadn't won the right to marry by the time the show aired. But now that marriage is a settled issue in the District, the Housewives' (plus Paul Wharton's) visit to Councilmember David Catania's office gave the castmembers a chance to rep for their churches, their gay sisters, and for Lolly Amons to demonstrate her true calling: gay rights lobbyist to middle-aged white ladies!

Loser, Sports Division: the Washington Redskins. Dan Snyder's taken a lot of serious publicity hits in his career. But even he should know that no one wants to be associated with Michaele Salahi doing fake cheerleading routines in her hotel room, Tareq slapping her behind, her declaring “now I’m cheering at a winery and I’m building a world empire with my husband,” and contemplating breast implants.

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Alyssa Rosenberg