Tuesday, May 5, 2009
New show humiliates overweight women
2 comments
WE-TV earns a hearty FAIL for their new sad excuse for a TV show. It's called I Want to Save Your Life, and it consists of the "Diet Detective" stalking overweight women and staging an intervention by request of their family members and friends. That's right. If a loved one of mine had me ambushed on a TV show to tell me I was too fat, I'd be inclined to storm away from the cameras and never talk to that person again. But then again, our culture just loves to humiliate people into losing weight.
My other beef with the show is that some of these women don't look as if their lives are in danger from being overweight! The woman eating the hotdog, for example. And speaking of eating, when are we going to finally break through this stereotype that all overweight people are lurking in ice cream shops and fast food joints, stuffing their faces every chance they get? Many people are overweight due to genes and slow metabolisms.
Bottom line: I'm all for losing weight if it's necessary to stay healthy, but why stalk women and humiliate them on national television?! That is not necessary.
My other beef with the show is that some of these women don't look as if their lives are in danger from being overweight! The woman eating the hotdog, for example. And speaking of eating, when are we going to finally break through this stereotype that all overweight people are lurking in ice cream shops and fast food joints, stuffing their faces every chance they get? Many people are overweight due to genes and slow metabolisms.
Bottom line: I'm all for losing weight if it's necessary to stay healthy, but why stalk women and humiliate them on national television?! That is not necessary.
Posts
May 5, 2009 at 2:54 PM
Hi -- the trailer is actually very misleading. Watch the show, it's good. The people (men AND women) actually applied to the diet detective for help, and he chose them from their application videos. Mostly what you see are people getting real advice on how to get their heads on straight in order to get healthier -- he focuses on why people are overweight (they're stressed, overwrought, out of control, too invested in the personas they've created around themselves, etc.) So.. not a great commercial, but the show's not like that at all.
May 5, 2009 at 3:28 PM
I'm sure it isn't as bad as the trailer, you're right. I had heard that the subjects of each episode were set up by people concerned for them and it was carried out in an intervention-esque manner. It's a bit better if the overweight people ask for help themselves, but I still have a problem with the negative manner in which they are portrayed.