(
)
Step away from the TV, bitches. It isn’t safe.
From the sluts and hos of MTV’s “Jersey Shore,” to the trailer-trash stars of “16 and Pregnant,” to the extreme girl-on-girl emotional violence committed on TLC’s innocuous-sounding “The Next Great Baker” (seriously), a strange planetary shift is occurring.
You see it on ABC’s “The Bachelor,” where women engage in hand-to-hand combat to win the temporary affections of a random guy they’ve never met. You even see it on NBC’s “The Apprentice,” where women get into hair-pulling fistfights in a demented quest for a crummy job.
Most depressingly, it’s inherent in the abject sexualization and violence directed by and against young girls of color in VH1’s much-repeated “Flavor of Love.” Here, gals humiliate themselves to win the bedtime attention of broken-down ’80s rapper Flava Flav, calling each other “ghetto” and worse. And celebrating every ugly stereotype attached to females.
It wasn’t long ago that people contended that TV was simply a reflection of the modern culture. Not anymore.
An emergency has been declared by three groups as disparate as the conservative Parents Television Council, the feminist Women in Media and News, and the stalwart Girl Scouts of America. All are alarmed that shows wildly popular with girls as young as 12 are seeping from reality TV — to reality.
It’s not just alarming to consider that your girls are at risk of growing up thinking that crude sexuality is the key to success. It’s extremely profitable.
“There is a special place in hell for the most evil people — Jerry Sandusky, Bernie Fine, for war criminals and pedophiles,” said Jennifer Pozner, executive director of New York-based Women in Media and News and author of “Reality Bites Back: The Troubling Truth About Guilty Pleasure TV.”
Next to these alleged sex criminals there exists a white-hot berth for television producers and the advertisers who support them, fond of pimping out virtual kiddie prostitutes to turn a buck.
A groundbreaking study that has united the left and right was released this month by the Television Council, examining the four highest-rated shows among girls 12 to 17, all of which are on MTV — “Jersey Shore,” “16 and Pregnant” “Teen Mom 2” and “The Real World.”
“There seems to be a fetish of sex crimes against women,” said council president Tim Winter.
“While women are being sexualized, teenage girls are being sexualized more. Violence on TV is up 2 percent, but women victims of violence are up 120 percent,” he said. “That was sobering for us.”
Meanwhile, the Girl Scouts found a link between TV-watching among the young, and appalling behavior.
“Regular reality-TV viewers accept and expect a higher level of drama, aggression and bullying in their own lives,” said the study, which queried 1,100 girls and teens.
Thirty-seven percent of reality-TV watchers told the Scouts, “You have to lie to get what you want,” versus 24 percent of nonwatchers. “Being mean earns you more respect than being nice,” said a like number of girls. Scarier, 68 percent said reality shows “make me think I can achieve anything in life.”
Diminished values, plus lack of female self-respect, is slipping into real life. Budding train wreck Miley Cyrus pretends to be a role model for her ’tween-girl fan base, while posing nearly nude and joking about smoking pot. (Wink wink!) Still a teen, Madonna’s spawn Lourdes Ciccone is photographed in obscene, torn duds, sending the message to little girls — you, too, can be as sluttish as Mom! And Britney Spears and Kim Kardashian . . . where do I start?
Even the scripted TV show “Glee” features a pair of supposedly high-school-age lesbians who bully fellow students in a quest for vigorous sex.
“The media has gone to the dark side,” said Trish Whitehead, mom of two teen girls. “I don’t let my kids watch these shows, but they are exposed to trash talk, slutty girls, the low-rent dramas of teen mothers and their useless families every day.
“And let’s not forget Lady Gaga taking the slut look to a new level of sleaze.”
You can’t put your daughters in a cave. But you can complain to networks and advertisers.
In reality TV as in life, the bottom line rules.
New ‘lowe’ on double standard
What a crock. The Learning Channel’s new reality show, “All-American Muslim,” will do more damage to the utopian ideals of tolerance and diversity than anything since celebutard Katie Couric stupidly suggested that the country fight bigotry by creating a “Muslim Cosby Show.”
Set in Dearborn, Mich., the TLC show centers around a small cadre of happy, non-religious Islamists who blend. Lowe’s Home Improvement pulled its commercials from the program after the Florida Family Association complained that “All-American Muslim” was “propaganda clearly designed to counter legitimate and present-day concerns about many Muslims who are advancing Islamic fundamentalism and Sharia law.”
If you thought people had a right to protest, think again.
California state Sen. Ted Lieu threatened to crack down on Lowe’s if the chain refused to apologize and reinstate the ads. Can you imagine the “Censorship!!’’ cries that would break out if the group went after a show critical of Christians?
Americans are losing the right to demonstrate their views with their pocketbooks when a protected group is concerned. That’s reality.
Havin’ a ball or two
You can’t put a price on ego. Yankee captain Derek Jeter has been making sweet love with a battalion of babes since his split with Minka Kelly, considerately sending a girl packing the next morning with a valuable parting gift of autographed baseball memorabilia, Page Six reported. (Baseballs signed by the Great One sell for about $200 a pop on eBay.)
The bad news? Derek evidently forgot one of his conquests, pulling the baseball trick on her twice.
The good news? Grateful gals get to stay an entire night before getting the heave-ho from the slugger. Then they get a tip. Great guy!
‘Gray’ area in strip-searches
Three grannies say they were strip-searched by security agents at JFK Airport before boarding. And the Transportation Security Administration denies it.
While I’m certain there exists a vast cabal of dangerous, colostomy-bag-wearing old-lady liars, I have a suggestion for the boneheads who rule the skies: Free Grandma and grope-search Alec Baldwin! We’ll all be safer.
Lohan behold!
Sex and sexuality are a part of nature, and I go along with nature. I think Marilyn Monroe once said that. I certainly agree with her.
— Lindsay Lohan waxing poetic on her nekkid photos in Playboy. At least the celebrity train wreck likely didn’t undergo a body- cavity search before taking it all off.
This time.