I will promise everyone that this will not be an “X-rated” post. Funny perhaps; tragic certainly, but not “X-rated.” Although X-rates might get more hits. Just sayin’!
Not long ago, I wrote a blog about Reality TV and said that almost none of it is real. It is staged, edited, directed and produced. In a sense, it is emblematic of our times – virtual, and often without ethical compass and a complete lack of regard for consequences. There is a new show, and it is called “Dating Naked.” I am completely serious and completely baffled.
The program, like its name, shows couples getting to know each other in various contrived scenes, while being completely naked. This VH1 production is all about digital burlesque; that is, the nudity is subtlety and digitally obscured, much like the fans and feathers ladies used in the 1920s.
Enter Jessie Nizewitz. Jessie was on the show as a “contestant.” Jessie was not a woman looking for love (we’ll get to that) nor was she naïve to show business; in real life, she is a model of sorts. In her mind (and I am giving her great latitude here), she was using the show as a stepping stone.
According to an online article for TheWrap by Jason Hughes entitled: ‘Dating Naked’ contestant sues for $10 million after blur failed, we learn that:
“Jessie Nizewitz, a contestant on VH1’s “Dating Naked,” has filed suit in New York against the network’s parent company Viacom International Inc., Firelight Entertainment Inc. and Lighthearted Entertainment Inc., seeking $10 million in damages for emotional distress, humiliation and embarrassment after the show allegedly failed to properly blur her genitals.”
As the article goes on to explain:
Nizewitz signed on to the show before it had a name. She claims she was advised of the nudity, but was assured that all frontal and genital nudity would be blurred. During one brief moment, though, during a “wrestling takedown” of her date, her crotch was allegedly flashed on the screen without blurring.”
Nothing to the imagination
In one ridiculous and contrived scene, they had Jessie “wrestling” with her “date.” For some reason, the digital blur failed – and no one caught it. The entire world became intimately and instantly familiar with Jessie’s intimates. There was nothing left to the imagination. Nothing.
The images of Jessie, much like the shot heard around the world of the Revolutionary War, were seen via the internet and social media within minutes.
Embarrassed and humiliated, she hired a big time law firm to sue the pants off (couldn’t resist it, sorry) Viacom, but the damage is done.
To add insult to her plight, she was apparently dating a reasonably nice person and after seeing all of Jessie on a public stage, he took off and has not been seen since. Her family is refusing to talk to her as well, and can you blame them?
The purpose of this blog is not prurience, but propriety, and asking all of us the ethical limitations of what we are willing to accept or reject as a society. How much belief are we all willing to suspend when we watch programming that pushes the very limits?
It would seem that as viewers become more and more immune and dulled by the next ratchet, then producers must ratchet things up just a bit more.
I will assume, just for a minute that Ms. Nizewitz has delusions of being an actress. What was she thinking when she volunteered to roll around on a beach with a man with the cameras running? Did she think this was a fine art movie? To what extent was she willing to demean herself for the remote possibility of getting discovered? Even if the blurred shot had been successful in its execution, would it have made much of a difference? I think not.
Where will we take this?
Jessie Nizewitz will fade into obscurity, sell herself out further or, she will do it the right way and try to reclaim her reputation, her family and her acting career. She may never reclaim that relationship, but there will be another.
Psychologists warn of that our society has become over-sexualized. It seems to be getting worse, not better. Children and adults are doing more and more to their bodies to try to gain an ideal they will never achieve. Instead of becoming more intimate, we become more stylized and distant.
I am most concerned about the effects this type of junk is having on our children, grand-children, nieces and nephews. I am not looking through Victorian lenses but as a man who spends his life talking about ethical behavior.
The truth is that even if Nizewitz settles out of court for a mere few million, the show will succeed in gaining millions of dollars in media attention.
We are the losers and anyone who strives to live a good life. We can sit around and watch more boundaries collapse or we can turn off the programs.
Chuck
I believe because we have seen so much “killing” and “dying” over the years on television/movies/video games, we have become immune to it… I believe this in part along with our disposable society, we now see people in our Funeral Homes who want us to take into our care, their loved one, for a direct cremation, and DON’T want the cremated remains of their loved one back!
I reminded of a Funeral Director once telling me “You are a Funeral Director not the trash man. Don’t let your family walk all over you… direct them down the right path toward respect and dignity for their loved one”.