So I got a slimy email message today from a reality TV producer. It reads in part:<\/p>\n
Let me take a moment to give you a brief rundown of exactly what we’re looking for and hoping to accomplish. First of all, I’m a Casting Producer for Shed Media. We are currently working on a great program that promotes family values by taking teens with relatable [sic] adolescent problems (smoking, drinking, defying authority, laziness, etc), and placing them with loving, welcoming, and structured families in another part of America for one week. The goal is to get to a ‘breakthrough point’ with the teens, help them turn around their attitudes, and maybe give them a new perspective on the relationship they have with their own parents.<\/p>\n
All around the Bay Area we will be looking for those families with a big heart and an open home who would like to mentor two unruly teens for a week. Does this family have experience in dealing with teenagers? Do they have strict morals, guidelines, and expectations for teenagers already living in their home? If so, they may be just what we are looking for!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I wiped the slime off myself, and sent off this reply:<\/p>\n
Dear Tyler Benton,<\/p>\n
As someone who’s spent 16 years in youth ministry, a week-long placement isn’t going to solve any problems for a troubled teen. I can’t recommend using troubled teens for entertainment purposes, nor do I believe that a troubled teen who is a legal minor can give informed consent to appear on reality TV. The short answer is “No.”<\/p>\n
Sincerely,
\nDan Harper<\/p><\/blockquote>\nMy reply is brief because I’m quite sure he won’t read it. If I thought there were any chance he would read my reply, I would tell him that it sounds to me as though he<\/em> needs a week-long televised placement with a family that would turn his unethical and exploitative attitudes around.<\/p>\n
If you’d like to respond to him directly, I’d be happy to pass along his email address and work phone number.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
So I got a slimy email message today from a reality TV producer. It reads in part: Let me take a moment to give you a brief rundown of exactly what we’re looking for and hoping to accomplish. First of all, I’m a Casting Producer for Shed Media. We are currently working on a great […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pop-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6323"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6324,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6323\/revisions\/6324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}