CBS wants to entertain you with crying children.
If you’re the kind of sicko who finds this intriguing, then by all means mark your calendar for Wednesday, Sept. 19 – the scheduled premiere date for the new CBS series “Kid Nation.”
Or, if you can’t wait ’til then, you can get your jollies right now by logging on to cbs.com and checking out a 5-minute “Kid Nation” promo video whose “highlights” include four instances in which kids are driven to tears.
“Kid Nation” is the new fall “reality” series featuring 40 kid “pioneers” (as CBS refers to them), ages 8-15, who were trundled off to a New Mexico ghost town (with their parents’ permission, obviously) for 40 days last spring.
There, they supposedly set about restoring life to this “dead” town (it’s actually a facility that can be rented for movie shoots), including establishing a kid government and assigning each other responsibilities such as cooking and cleaning.
Their exploits were filmed and the result is this show, which has suddenly erupted in controversy, including allegations that the kids worked for unreasonably long hours, that some accidently drank bleach and one was burned with cooking grease.
CBS issued a statement yesterday defending itself.
“The few minor injuries that took place were all treated immediately and by professionals,” said the statement, which went on to describe a “behind-the-scenes support structure, including on-site paramedics, a pediatrician, an animal safety expert and a child psychologist” in addition to all the adult production personnel swirling around the children.
The network’s admission that the kids were supervised at all times by adults seems to run counter to the notion, implied in all the pre-launch hype, that the kids were out there in the New Mexico desert fending for themselves, like the castaways in “Lord of the Flies.”
We probably would have heard about it by now if groups of kids formed into tribes and made savage war on each other as in the book, but it is clear from the promo video that some of the kids became very stressed out.
“I’m feeling, like, really stressed and really worried,” says one of the crying children – Mike, 11, of Bellevue, Wash. “It’s just been really stressful and tough,” he weeps.
In another heartbreaking scene, 12-year-old Anjay of Pearland, Texas, cries at the sight of other kids arguing. “Yelling is not the way to settle things!” he shouts as tears stream down his face.
Promoting a show with scenes of kids in extreme emotional distress does not seem like a sound strategy for enticing viewers.
The truth is, it’s a crying shame.