"Nipplegate? What's the problem???"
Posted on 02/03/2004 10:13:26 AM PST by NorCoGOP
CARBONDALE, Ill. -- We are the MTV generation. It's a cliche, but it's true. The influence of the network that brought us "Beavis and Butthead," Britney Spears, "The Real World" and "Undressed" seems near ubiquitous among just about everyone under 30.
It‚s been the babysitter, the teacher, the parent and the preacher for an increasingly secular and jaded youth. It has helped homogenize the culture of an entire nation of young Americans.
And the only thing that beats MTV's destructive pervasiveness is its hypocrisy.
It preaches safe sex while airing soft porn. It promotes gender equality while celebrating rappers who refer to women as "hos." It tells us not to obsess about our looks while showing us all the beautiful people we should try to be like. It preaches tolerance for homosexuals while making gay bashers like Eminem a star.
If this is a joke, none of us should be laughing.
Consider MTV‚s "Undressed." The show has much in common with movies you might see late at night on Cinemax. The thin plots, frequent nudity (within legal limits) and sexual promiscuity remind one of the latest Shannon Tweed straight-to-video hit.
But while those naughty late-night movies are made for adults, this show is for kids. Maybe the young and invariably beautiful stars should be credited for frequently reminding each other to use condoms. Unfortunately, the only reason safe sex is preached so frequently on this show is because the kids are always busy having sex.
MTV‚s message to women is particularly sickening. It has aired videos in which sexy female performers, physically beautiful themselves, tell girls not to obsess about their physical appearances in songs like Christina Aguilera's "Beautiful" and TLC's "Unpretty."
Yet, MTV constantly bombards young girls with images of beautiful, voluptuous, scantily clad women like Spears and Jessica Simpson. Many girls learn through these images what they should strive to look like. The goal is, of course, unattainable, but they can nevertheless starve trying for it.
It would be outrageous enough for MTV to tell us, after helping to promote so many other kinds of self-destructive behavior, that we shouldn‚t smoke cigarettes. The one-two punch of irony here is MTV contradicts itself on this count as well.
Last year a friend of mine got me to watch MTV's Real World for the first time. One season's worth of watching beautiful 20-somethings party, get plastered and have lots of promiscuous and unsafe sex was enough for me.
But the show provided one of the clearest cases yet of MTV's uncanny ability to glamorize unhealthy behavior while simultaneously railing against it.
During commercial breaks for the Real World, MTV aired ads showing nauseatingly self-righteous teenagers warn against the dangers of cigarette smoking. Annoying, yes, but hey, it‚s a good cause.
Now back to the show. Of the seven hip, buff and beautiful cast members of "The Real World: Las Vegas," six were regularly seen smoking cigarettes. Anti-smoking advocates argue showing glamorous people smoking cigarettes on television may entice impressionable young people to smoke. MTV apparently thinks otherwise.
To its credit, there is one idea MTV appears to truly believe in: materialism. Music videos are commercials themselves, and within these commercials are advertisements for the kinds of clothes we should wear, the kinds of cars we should drive and even the kinds of jewelry we should wear on our hands and around our necks. MTV cannot be called hypocritical on this count. In its effort to crassly commercialize every facet of young people‚s lives, the network has never faltered.
I can‚t help but imagine that MTV's executives, in some boardroom far away, are laughing hysterically.
The only thing missing is a mention of the infamous "Shower Rangers" incident, in which two men featured in the taping of an MTV show sprayed two girls in the front row of the audience with their diarrhea.
Heck, video killed the video star!
Well, if you visit their website (www.fcc.gov), you'll see they're really big on complaints about your cell phone and phone company "slamming". Very user friendly on those issues. Try getting an email through to them with a complaint about tv programming. Believe me, it ain't easy.
Their website, as well as their accountability for what's polluting our airwaves during family viewing times, needs a drastic overhaul.
"Nipplegate? What's the problem???"
The really bad thing about this is that it promotes the worst of men's fantasies about sex (easy availability with no emotional commitment) while reducing young women to the status of possessions.
A few years ago wasn't there a Pepsi ad with a horny Bob Dole and a horny dog both getting excited about Britney Spears?
Woman Says She Was Raped In 'Real World' House
What does grabbing a star's boob on camera tell a global viewing audience? There is no sexual assault charge for Justin Timberlake.
Yep, always really liked Bob Dole, but after he sold out on that tasteless gem, he lost all credibility with me. I wouldn't vote for him now for dogcatcher.
And lest we forget those classy, awe-inspiring Mike Ditka "erectile dysfunction" ads that kids were subjected to, ad naseum, during the first half of game.
The soft(?) porn, drug promoting, pimping hoze rap videos aren't just on MTV or BET these days. They have a weekly show on PBS in Houston Texas on Saturday night (Isn't multiculturalism wonderful? The execs will tolerate anything in the name of "diversity"). These videos are also aired on Public Access here but Public Broadcasting is really the one that surprises me (yes these are the booty shaking thong wearing car jumping type of videos).
PBS airs no rock and roll videos (it's not in their charter).
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