Exploitation Island

[Gary Ruskin]

Commercial Alert				January 12, 2001

Following is an op-ed in today's Washington Post about the new Fox TV
program, "Temptation Island."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50378-2001Jan11.html

Exploitation Island 
By E. J. Dionne Jr.

Why let the Pat Robertsons and Jerry Falwells of the world have all the
fun in condemning "Temptation Island," the Fox television network's
latest contribution to the advancement of Western civilization?

This show is far worse than lascivious. It turns human relationships
into trivial, commercialized exchanges in which couples trade what are
supposed to be committed relationships for a free vacation.

Perhaps you are a good enough person that you missed all the hype. I
caught the ads because I have to watch Fox to see football games and
hear the brilliant analysis of John Madden. The show is the latest in
"reality" television, a phony term if ever there was one. Four unmarried
couples who have supposedly been together for a long time are put in
this beautiful place with beautiful singles ready to rock.

The couples are split up. The women are sent off with male hunks who
will tempt them, having been paid (or at least been offered a boffo
adventure) for this purpose. The guys are offered the same opportunities
with young female lovelies. "Twenty-six fantasy singles, chosen to
entice them" and "to indulge desire," the intro tells us. Maybe this
doesn't fall under the legal definition of prostitution, but we're
talking about Fox television, so there's no need to debate technical
terms.

If you want to know how chilling it is to put sexuality under the
control of corporate paymasters, there's a moment in the opening episode
when the couples have their "last" dinner before they are split up and
thrown into temptation. They are given 10 minutes to smooch and express
everlasting love. When their time is up, the previously friendly "isn't
this all cool" host issues his stern order. "Ladies and gentlemen,
you're allowed to walk the man to the boat, but you have to go now," he
says with the authority of a concentration camp guard. Abandon hope all
ye who enter here.

When shows of this sort go on the air, there's a predictable pattern of
argument. Moral conservatives denounce the horrid permissiveness of the
enterprise and say the program has no place on television. Some liberals
denounce "censorship" and say that people are free to watch what they
want.

These arguments are tiresome -- and not because the moral conservatives
are mistaken.

Censorship is not a threat, because it's essentially impossible under
the First Amendment, which is a good thing. The real issue is the
commercialization of absolutely everything, including intimate human
relationships. A program such as "Temptation Island" shows that the only
relevant question in our culture is what sells. If wrecking
relationships works as television, hey, go for it.

"Temptation Island" treats the connection between men and women with all
the seriousness of a beer ad (and I apologize for insulting beer
manufacturers). What's striking from the first episode is the banality
of the way these relationships are presented. We have no idea why the
couples in question came together in the first place. We know absolutely
nothing about the values or ideas or interests or hopes they might have
shared. The one and only issue on this show is whether some man or some
woman is "hot," what sex with might be like and whether that great sex
will consign a previous "commitment" to the dustbin of history.

There is nothing wrong with sex, and it is a fact that attractive
people, scantily clad, are tempting. But if you're worried about the
moral state of the nation and the messages we send our children, it's
worth considering that the real problem is not "1960s permissiveness,"
or gay rights, or even presidential immorality. Far more worrisome,
because it is so deeply embedded in our culture, is the imperative to
exploit our collective fascination with sex for profit on a supposedly
mainstream network where kids who like football may be exposed to
provocative advertising over and over again.

Fox not only has its entertainment network, it also has a cable news
network on which all manner of conservative talking heads regularly
denounce liberals for their lack of respect for "traditional values" and
"decency."

The next time you see one of these opinion-makers say such things, just
laugh at your television set. The strongest day-to-day threat to
traditional values doesn't come from those much-denounced liberals. It
comes from a certain kind of capitalist who is perfectly willing to
demean human beings to make a buck.

<----article ends here----->

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Gary Ruskin | Commercial Alert 
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Phone: (202) 296-2787 | Fax: (202) 833-2406
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