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He may have pulled off his biggest provocative feat yet, at least in the eyes of some. Despite his previous highly criticized obnoxious stunts, including an embarrassing interruption of Taylor Swift at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards and his infamous 2005 post-Hurricane Katrina remark that former President George W. Bush “doesn’t care about black people,” West isn’t shying away from the spotlight. Last month, he unveiled the preview for his upcoming video to “Monster,” a single by West, featuring Jay-Z , Nicki Minaj & Officer Ricky. But the video has some provocative imagery, as Erin R. Brown at the...

Once again our society and our kids are under attack and being exploited by MTV. They are pushing the envelope by promoting and glorifying teen sex, the use of illegal drugs and alcohol, and other illegal activity. We all know this is wrong, but will we stand up and do something about it? The New York Times Headline Reads “MTV’S Naked Calculation Gone Bad” They are considering more editing for episode 3 where they allowed a minor to take a pill to enhance his erection and run naked down the street. Senior executives are now considering additional editing for coming...

What if one day you went to work and there was a meeting to discuss whether the project you were working on crossed the line into child pornography? You’d probably think you had ended up in the wrong room. And you’d be right. Last week, my colleague Brian Stelter reported that on Tuesday, the day after the pilot episode of “Skins” was shown on MTV, executives at the cable channel were frantically meeting to discuss whether the salacious teenage drama starring actors as young as 15 might violate federal child pornography statutes.

Some crimes deserve harsher punishments, because they hurt children. Producing child pornography is one of those crimes. But now that MTV has discovered their hot new show may be considered child porn, their biggest concern is showing things as close to child porn as possible without getting themselves in legal trouble. Instead of running away from the disgusting act of showing kids in sexual and even nude scenes, MTV is seeking legal advice to push up against state laws without breaking them. Skins (trailer here) is a new MTV show that premiered last Monday night. The program features teens involved...

Last week, the PTC warned parents that MTV’s new show Skins – which debuted last night at 10:00 p.m. ET, only 9:00 p.m. in the Central and Mountain time zones – was “the most dangerous program ever” for children. The first episode proves we were right! And this content was paid for by Taco Bell. Here are just two brief examples of the dialogue from last night’s episode: Stanley: "It's totally normal for a kid of 16 not to have had sex." Tony: "It's embarrassing, Stan. So we go to a party and get some girl racopiously spliffed up, in...

Leave it to MTV to take one of the most contentious issues of the last 50 years and turn it on its head. Not satisfied with showcasing the hardships of being young and with child in shows like “Teen Mom” and “16 and Pregnant,” the network sought to show the other side of the story: the girls who decide to terminate their pregnancies. In doing so, they present these girls as being more responsible and, oddly, as better parents than those who decide to keep their babies. The end result was a program that marginalizes parenthood and ultimately celebrates a...

Women who have had or work with women who have had abortions are reacting to the contorversial MTV show, “No Easy Decision,” featuring a teenage girl’s abortion decision.They represent the Silent No More Awareness Campaign, and they say they and other post-abortive women reacted with sorrow and disappointment to the show, which showed an abortion business misleading women about the development of the unborn baby.“My heart broke for Markai, not just for her difficult situation, but for the lack of counseling she received,” said Georgette Forney, a co-founder of the group who has had an abortion of her own.“This...

Late Tuesday night, MTV provided viewers with a candid look into the decision of a teenage mother to terminate the life of her unborn child.No Easy Decision, MTV’s special spun off from 16 and Pregnant, followed Markai Durham as she came to the agonizing conclusion to have an abortion. With a frankness rarely seen anywhere on television, No Easy Decision presented a vivid, unsparing look at something that’s not just an “issue,” but a harrowing decision. With that description, Entertainment Weekly perpetuates the view of abortion as a conscientious if tragic act which can be justified by circumstance. It is...

Early in 2010, feminist author Jessica Valenti was concerned about the show 16 and Pregnant not validating a teenage girl’s choice to have an abortion. Valenti argued in February 2010: Why are some teen pregnancies worth covering while others aren’t?  There is more than one kind of pregnant teen; even if a teenager decides to have an abortion she was still pregnant, her story is still important, and her decision is worth talking about.  This absence of teens who choose abortion in 16 and Pregnant feels like a dismissal of so many young women’s experiences.I strongly disagree with Valenti’s assertion...

MTV Show "No Easy Decision" a Reminder Abortion Industry Misleads Women by Laura Echevarria One of my concerns before watching the show was that it would document the effects of facing an abortion decision but not the after-effects of the abortion itself. And while it turned out to be true, I think Markai’s decision and some of the comments made reveal more about the abortion industry than pro-abortion groups would care to admit. http://www.lifenews.com/2010/12/29/mtv-show-no-easy-decision-a-reminder-abortion-industry-misleads-women/

If you’ve ever seen Teen Mom, you know that it in no way glorifies teen parenthood. Those young moms and dads are struggling, and despite the rumors that MTV pays them around $60,000 a season, (which MTV refuses to comment on) many of them are shown relying on government assistance to get by. The young women on the show, as much as their lives are put under the microscope, do get famous in their way.

America Prepares to Get Angry at Jon StewartBy Elspeth Reeve | October 26, 2010 11:38am Jon Stewart has begun his tour of the nation's capital with a taping of The Daily Show before a "very, very policy-oriented" audience in Washington, The Washington Post's Dan Zak reports. ("We're not used to people nodding, like, 'Oh, I worked on that bill,' " Stewart said.) Stewart and Stephen Colbert's many young fans are packing their bags and arranging for sofas to crash on as they ready to head into D.C. for the comedians' pro-satire Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear. But not everyone's...

Going after the youth vote, President Barack Obama got a grilling Thursday from a mostly under-30 crowd of adults, who sternly challenged him across his economic and social agenda and showed little hesitation to press him for greater results. The tone at the president's latest town hall was set from the start when a woman identifying herself as a Republican asked Obama about his inability to foster his promised bipartisanship, and then a man disaffected with the state of the economy asked Obama: "Why should we still support you?" What emerged was a sharp, genuine question-and-answer session, not the easy...

MODERATOR: "Mr. President, we asked people to send in their greatest hopes or fears. I'll read a couple of the fears here first. 'My greatest fear is we're turning into a communist country.'

Question from Adam Hunter: "When you were first elected, it seemed as though the sky was falling in terms of the economy. There was a bailout that you supported, there was stimulus that added to our deficit, but yet it seems as though our unemployment rate still rises. You said it won't go past 8% and now it's at 9.5% … So, my question to you is: Why should we still support you going forward with your economic policies and if the economic does not improve over the next years, why should we vote you back in?"

A writer for the gay advocacy blog AMERICAblog Gay says that when he applied to be a participant at Thursday afternoon's MTV/BET town hall with President Obama, MTV representatives asked him for a "lighter question."

Since MTV claims that the Obama townhall will not be political, I'm left wondering what questions the ever-shrinking number of young Obamabots will ask. Any ideas? Useful Info Nation

Viacom networks MTV, BET and CMT are giving an hour of free air time to President Obama less than three weeks before the midterm elections. The so-called “A Conversation with President Obama” will be live and commercial-free on six Viacom networks at 4 p.m. on Thursday. The networks will not give equal time to a Republican before the election, according to a spokeswoman. MTV denies that the Obama hour of TV is political, despite the timing, weeks before the midterm elections.

Now that the establishment’s favorite comedian, Jon Stewart, has the state-sanctioned approval of no less than the President of the United States for his upcoming “Mock-The-People” rally on October 30th, it only makes sense that Comedy Central’s state-enamored sister company, Barack-The-Vote MTV (both MTV and Comedy Central are owned by Sumner Redstone’s Viacom) would team up to do everything possible to help President Obama’s party in these dire final campaign days when the only question about the coming Republican wave is just how large it will be. An internal email reveals that MTV is investing heavily in making a success...

When President Obama sits down for his MTV town hall this Thursday, the audience of young people who will ask him questions will have been gathered by a casting call. According to the casting call for the event from talent agency Backstage.com, first reported by National Review Online, the company requests applications for the event, asking what issues the person is “passionate about,” requiring a “short description of your political views,” and also asks for a recent photo.