That’s pretty good. Do you write Hallmark cards for a living? 'Cause you totally should.
But . . . but . . . you didn’t leave any percentage points for captive audiences on airliners.
It’s Phillip Larkin.
Who, unless I’m gravely mistaken, did not work for Hallmark.
(I swear there was an attrib when I hit post… I blame pageant moms.)
Hell, I buy my nine year old daughter JEANS from the boy’s section. Since she’s pre-puberty, I can still get away with it and they fit ever so much more modestly than the low (and I do mean LOW)-rise jeans that are all they stock in the girl’s section.
Without wishing to derail this thread, and lords knows we’ve had enough discussion around pedophilia around here this past year…but wouldn’t the fact that these children are being dressed up as adults and being encourage to act as adults (such as the ‘sexy’ dance routines) make them less attractive to pedophiles, who are attracted to pre-adolescent bodies?
Don’t get me wrong, I hate these shows as much as the next person, but I don’t get this connection that people make. Maybe I misunderstand the sexual predilictions of pedophiles.
I can’t watch it, it creeps me out too much. Yuck.
As horrific as it is, I think the worst one is the Teen Mom one. You know they were preselected those girls,for being in unstable relationships, with dysfunction all around, so there’d be lots of drama = good ratings. These are teenagers, with no education, bad boy baby Daddy’s, with babies! Onto which they pour the two most addictive things ever created; money and fame. Stand back and wait for the fireworks and big ratings! And we’ll all get to watch as their trainwreck lives unfold. I predict Playboy, stripping, porn, addiction. A more craven exploitation of the vulnerable, for the entertainment of the savage masses, I simply cannot imagine. With babies, to give it true poignancy. All to make a buck. It’s like trainwreck porn.
Some pedophiles like them to look like little girls, some like them to look sexy. I bet there are pedophiles who still jerk off to some of JonBenet’s pagent videos.
Don’t get me started on the sexualization of children. I consider it to be one of the major shits in our society.
I caught some program on this topic once. A pagent sponsor tried to explain a video of JonBenet singing and sashaying like a show girl as “innocent fun.” In her book, Patsy Ramsey stated the pagents only took “a couple of hours a month.” Yeah, but the prep time is probably ten times that.
Well I’d buy a Phillip Larkin greeting card!
There are many jobs that my wife and I often wondered how we missed out on, and one of them has to be “child-beauty pageant organizer”. The few times I’ve been dragged in to watch these things, I’ve been struck by how incredibly cheaply organized they are. The entry fees are in the hundreds of dollars apiece, and almost none of it is returned as prizes. The trophies can’t be worth more than a few dollars apiece (they’re all the same cheap plastic with a tiny brass plaque, like the two golf trophies I somehow won as a junior). You couldn’t make more money for doing less unless you planted a money tree in your backyard.
Those are a bitch to grow - the last six I bought (@ $100 a pop) died. I’ve got hopes for the current one, though - it’s better stock, although a lot more expensive - $1,000. But, easy street here I come.
See, I actually have little to no problem with Teen Mom. Look, the reality is that if you have a baby at 16, you probably aren’t going to have a healthy relationship with the father, you are unlikely to finish school, and it’s going to be hard for you to get a job/your GED/ whatever the fuck you’re trying to do while having a baby at your hip. What I think is actually admirable about this show is that they show all sides of the reality of teen pregnancy- they even show a couple adopting out their baby and the aftermath that has on their emotions. On 16 and Pregnant, they even show girls who choose to get abortions. Say what you will about the show, but I think it does reasonably show the reality of teen pregnancy.
And it wasn’t until more recently that they started paying the girls more money. I think they got like, 5 grand or something early on.
I can tell you that I hear the high school students I work with talking about this show and it is not with veneration of the girls. Instead, the kids are having discussions about how awful it would be to have a kid at 16, blah blah blah. That’s good, in my book (because really: it would be seriously pretty awful to have a kid at 16-- there’s virtually no “upside”).
I recently heard a special on NPR about Teen Mom and how some schools were using it in their sex ed classes to teach the consequences of teen pregnancy. Apparently it has been pretty successful.
Re the OP: What also strikes me as kind of weird about T&T is the almost complete absence of their fathers. Where are they? Have they been steamrolled by their wives into letting their daughters do this? Are most of them divorced? Do they just not care or think it’s harmless?
It goes completely against my grain, but if I ever developed a second personality and suggested putting our daughter in a pageant like that, my husband would lose his shit.
They show the dad’s pretty frequently actually. Most dads fit into one of two catergories:
The Closet Case: This is the dad who is gayer acting than a Pride Parade- I mean, full on mannerisms, voice, etc. Dad is happily married to mom, who is usually very pretty. Dad then comes onto the camera and gleefully discusses how he makes all of his daughter’s costumes by hand himself, how he does all of her choreography, etc etc. Ava’s Dad is a notable example.
The Man Who Hates His Life: This dad is usually super quiet and macho seeming. He supports his wife and sometimes goes to the pageants, but you definitely get the feeling he’s just throwing money at his wife because the time she spends on pageants is less time he has to spend with her. Seriously seems miserable. Probably has a mistress or four.
As with all TLC/AE shows (seriously, I don’t know how they can call themselves ‘The Learning Channel’ anymore and actually keep a straight face), the show producers hunt until they can find the most outrageous example of whatever show it is they’re producing at the moment.
Storage Wars is a good example - they have 5 or 6 folks on contract to the show to act like loons, but there are always a big group of people in the back who are bidding and wining lockers that don’t get put on the show because they’re not on contract and they’re boring.
T&T is the same. They get the most egregious examples of bad parents, obnoxious children, gross judges they can find, and film them for HOURS until they get 44 minutes of absurdity for an episode. Not only are pageants not really that bad, the parents and children (probably) aren’t really that bad either.
Pageants are like any other childhood activity - kids can participate in a fun, low key way and still have time to do horse riding or dancing or chess or whatever and be a normal well rounded kid. Or they can have a loon parent that would push them into whatever their pet ‘thing’ is like a nut. Obviously the show is going to show the latter because it makes good TV. A show about normal, well adjusted children who do normal things, and have normal parents really isn’t very interesting.
Chee-rist.
Storage Wars? Toddlers and Tiaras? A show about people bidding to buy some loser’s leftovers and another about mentally disturbed parents tarting up their children for display to total strangers?
Is Ow My Balls far behind?
:dubious: You are a strange sad little person.
It’s called Jackass.
ETA - actually America’s Funniest Videos was there first I think.
Touché.
The worst thing about these pageants is that their audience is undoubtedly crammed full of pedophiles. They’re pretty much figuratively throwing them to the lions, not just throwing them to the lions, but dressing them up and making it easy for the lions to have full access. Not to mention justifying those psychos’ attitudes that “see? little girls are just asking for it, there’s nothing wrong with what we’re doing…see? little kids are sexual people”. It’s just sick. Especially, as several others have mentioned, with the sexy adult dance moves.
Say what you like about pedophiles, at least they slow down when driving past schools.