Showing posts with label Media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Media. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Miss Bimbo Website

It's amazing what toxic websites are out there. Take Miss Bimbo as an example.

The Times Online says:

In the month since it opened the site, which is aimed at girls aged from 9 to 16, has attracted 200,000 members. Players keep a constant watch on the weight, wardrobe, wealth and happiness of their character to create “the coolest, richest and most famous bimbo in the world”. Competing against other children they earn “bimbo dollars” to buy plastic surgery, diet pills, facelifts, lingerie and fashionable nightclub outfits.

The website sparked controversy when it was introduced in France, where it attracted 1.2 million players.



My question is: Do the parents of the girls who play this game condone the messages their daughters get from this website? Or do they not really care and let their children surf where they will?

The Miss Bimbo internet game has attracted prepubescent girls who are told to buy their virtual characters breast enlargement surgery and to keep them “waif thin” with diet pills.


Don't you just love some of the rules?

Users are set targets:

Level 7
After you broke up with your boyfriend you went on an eating binge! Now it’s time to diet . . . Your target weight is less than 132lbs

Level 9
Have a nip and tuck operation for a brand new face. You’ve found work as a plus-size model. To gain those vivacious curves, you need to weigh more than 154lbs

Level 10
Summertime is coming up and bikini weather is upon us. You want to turn heads on the beach don’t you?

Level 11
Bigger is better! Have a breast operation

Level 17
There is a billionaire on vacation . . . You must catch his eye and his love! Good luck




I'm definitely in the camp that believes that a healthy body should be on the slim side but I teach my children that we do this by eating large quantities of healthy, phytonutrient dense foods and exercising, not diet pills. I also stress that good health is the issue, not body size.

I'm glad I homeschool. It makes it so much easier to control the media my children are exposed to. I know it will change as my children grow older, but right now, their peers are all children of mothers I happen to like and whose values I respect.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Reality TV has totally lost the plot!

I was reading Mothering.com this morning when I came across an alert to stop the NBC show, The Baby Borrowers.

The entire concept of reality TV befuddles me. I cannot understand the attraction of watching so called "real life" looks into dysfunctional people's lives. Why watch degradation, social dysfunction and just plain odd people? Why not watch something that reveres the beauty of the human spirit?

From Mothering.com

Presented as a "unique social experiment" the reality TV show "The Baby Borrowers" places real infants in the care of unrelated teen couples to "test" their ability to withstand the demands of parenthood and their relationship's strength to survive the pressure.

The show originated as a BBC production. This fall, NBC is rolling out its own version for a US audience. It films couples between the ages of 16 and 19 attempting to care for infants, toddlers, children, and eventually teenagers. Local authorities, concerned about the physical and emotional risk to the children, called on the BBC to cancel the show. Their requests were ignored, and social workers hoping to oversee the filming were turned away. Despite the protests in the UK, NBC seems equally determined to roll out their production of the show, describing it as an opportunity for the couples to "...peer into the future and see what they (and their partners) might be like if they remain together and decide to build a family."

The Natural Child Project is voicing its concerns to NBC and calling on producers to entertain people without jeopardizing anyone's mental health and happiness. Read the Open Letter to NBC by Jan Hunt, Director of The Natural Child Project. Send your letter of concern to:

Mr. Jeffrey Zucker
President
NBC Entertainment
3000 W. Alameda Avenue
Burbank, CA 91523



I'm stunned that real life parents are willing to entrust their own infants to strangers to be exploited for NBC's profit.