Parlor Spider...Step In, Little Fly

Insightful thoughts and/or rants from atop the soapbox from one who wishes to share the "right" opinion with everyone.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Golly, Beave, The Lure of Teen Pregnancy

The news surfaced today, and I can hardly believe it: MTV has selected 16 MORE pregnant teenage girls to feature on its hit (I suppose) show Teen Mom. Really?
Call me old-fashioned or a curmudgeon or any other of a handful of pejorative names, but I fail to see the value of installing TV cameras in the middle of what has to be one of the most traumatic experiences a teenage girl (and boy, lest we forget) can experience.
Call it the "Bristol" effect...and we know how well THAT turned out.
Seriously, what's the message here? "Get pregnant so you can be famous on TV and have all your friends be jealous"? I just don't get it, but I can imagine the conversations going on in every middle school (yes, I wrote "middle school") hallway:
"Did you see Teen Mom last night? That baby is just sooo cute. I'll be her mom gets a lot of free stuff from stores and the network. Plus...she'll probably be on Dancing With the Stars in a couple of years! I'm so jealous!"
"Me, too. I think I'll have that cute guy in my biology class come over tonight while my parents are gone. He's hot!"
On the other hand, the producers probably feel they are calling attention to a very real social ill here by showing how difficult life can be when a child has a child. Studies have shown, however, that children don't always get the right message from things they see on television.
So, there you have it: another example of exploitation of the willingly exploited. MTV, which stopped actually showing music videos ages ago, makes money; girls continue to get pregnant, and we all watch like voyeurs and hope our children are "scared straight." (so to speak)
I'll go to Hulu and watch reruns of Leave it to Beaver: equally unrealistic, perhaps, but not exploitative in any way.

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