As if shows glorifying polygamy, adultery and teen parenting aren’t bad enough, Oprah’s Oxygen cable network is planning a new show this spring featuring rapper Shawty Lo and the 10 women with whom he fathered 11 children.
According to a press release from the Parents Television Council (PTC), the show will be called “All My Babies’ Mamas” and is described by the network as being a one-hour special to air this spring “revealing the complicated lives of one man, his children’s mamas and their army of children.”
Needless to say, the show is sparking fury, particularly from the African American community which is accusing the network of stereotyping black families.
“As dysfunctional and violent as so-called reality shows are, could you ever imagine a one hour spectacle where 11 children are forced to witness their 10 unwed mothers clamor for financial support, emotional attention and sexual reward from Shawty-Lo, the apathetic ‘father’?” asks Sabrina Lamb, author of Do I Look Like an ATM? How to Raise Financially Responsible Children.
Lamb launched a petition drive against the show at Change.org which has already gained nearly 30,000 signatures.
“Enough is enough!” she writes on the petition. “This is not just an attack on African-American parents and children….but all parents and children.”
PTC president Tim Winter agrees. “Every time we think that the television industry couldn’t stoop any lower, sadly one of the networks steps forward to prove us wrong. This new project in development at Oxygen is grotesquely irresponsible and exploitive, and we urge the network to cease any further work on it immediately. . . . If Oxygen moves forward with the program, we will be contacting every corporate sponsor that buys advertising time on the Oxygen network to hold them accountable as well.”
At first, the network seemed determined to go through with the show.
“Oxygen’s one-hour special in development is not meant to be a stereotypical representation of everyday life for any one demographic or cross section of society,” an Oxygen rep told Fox News. “It is a look at one unique family and their complicated, intertwined life. Oxygen Media’s diverse team of creative executives will continue developing the show with this point of view.”
However, Oxygen executives weren’t so eager to talk about the show on Monday when the network’s programming chief went before television writers on Monday to tout their new shows. On a list of upcoming shows such as “Fat Girl Revenge”, “Too Young to Marry?” and “Find Me My Man”, “All My Babies’ Mamas” was conspicuously absent, leaving many to believe the network is already starting to distance itself from the show.
And for good reason. Judging by the comments made on an article about the show on Gateway Pundit, potential viewers aren’t too impressed with the idea either.
“Just one more push to mainstream the idea of polygamy . . . see ‘Sister Wives’,” wrote “Granny.”
“Greenfairie” summed it up very succinctly when she said the show represents “everything that’s wrong with America in one picture.”
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