Riddle me this my friends. Why is MTV bragging about how well they've promoted a TV-MA show with tons of sex and drugs to 12 year olds? Here, I'll let Erin Brown over at the Culture and Media Institute explain the situation:
MTV has bumped up the smut and sleaze level on television with its new show “Skins” – a take off on a successful BBC series. The scripted show’s attempt to portray the real lives of high school students showcases casual sex among minors without consequences, a 16 year-old child purchasing four ounces of marijuana, an adult woman stripping for an underage peeping tom, parental verbal abuse, an overdose on narcotics, and sexual assault of a minor – all in the series premiere. [...] In a press release, MTV’s boasted about the premiere’s ratings, and its success among the 12-34 demographic, despite its TV-MA rating. On January 18, “Skins” drew the “network’s largest P12-34 audience for a series launch…and drew the most P12-34 viewers for a show launch in the network’s history.
Here is just one repulsive clip from the show.
What a disgrace. But it gets worse. Yea, much worse:
The Parents Television Council ™ today called on the chairmen of the U.S. Senate and House Judiciary Committees and the Department of Justice to immediately open an investigation regarding child pornography and exploitation on MTV’s “Skins.” The New York Times reported today that the network itself is concerned about violating child pornography laws. In addition to the sexual content on the show involving cast members as young as 15, PTC counted 42 depictions and references to drugs and alcohol in the premiere episode. The run-time was only 41 minutes excluding commercial breaks.
You read that right. Even MTV thinks they're probably making child porn. So I guess the bigger question is why the hell is MTV making a show it thinks is child porn?