Sister Wives – from abhorrent to acceptable?

By: American Decency Staff

 

Sunday night the TLC network aired the continuing saga of Sister Wives, a reality show that attempts to portray this polygamist "family" of one husband with four wives and 17 children as just like any other American family.  Normal – except for the fact that the husband rotates wives like a mechanic rotating tires.

Last week we asked you to contact the sponsors from the Mother's Day season premiere episode of Sister Wives. Of the 25 advertisers from last week's episode, only four returned to sponsor the show this week.  We must not let up now! That comes out to an 84% withdrawal rate of advertisers that chose not to sponsor Sister Wive after hearing from you and thousands of others!

Last week we especially targeted the SC Johnson company (a family company) for their repeated sponsorship of Sister Wives.  This week SC Johnson did not advertise at all. Returning advertisers were Bissell, Burger King, Advil, and X Box. New advertisers include:  Subway, Lee jeans, Revlon, Allegra, Swiffer, Vlasic pickles, Allegra, Ikea, Baskin Robbins, OxiClean, Allegra, 3M Scotch tapes, and others.

Click here to let these advertisers know you will not support companies that empower the legitimization of illegal and immoral polygamy.

One writer described the show as putting sitcom gloss on a grim reality: Is Sister Wives the Hogan's Heroes of the 21st century? Let me explain. In the 1960s, CBS broadcast a sitcom called Hogan's Heroes that was set in a Nazi prisoner of war camp. It defied history and good taste in offering a goofy spin on "The Great Escape", where the clever POWs engaged in endless shenanigans and their German guards remained hapless and often kindhearted. Hogan's Heroes was enormously popular and ran for six seasons.

Generally speaking, when fundamentalist polygamous sects make the news, it's not a good thing. Too many stories have emerged about fugitive compounds run by violent patriarchs who marry off 14-year-old girls to their cronies. (Polygamy is illegal in all 50 states.) Now entering its third season, Sister Wives portrays polygamous patriarch Kody Brown as a pleasant if overwhelmed guy with the gee-shucks demeanor of a daytime talk show host. His four wives even assemble on a common couch to complain and kid one another, just like those gals on "The View".

Despite this whitewashed treatment, a creepy, cult-like vibe permeates the series. http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120512/ENTERTAIN12/205120310

The writer makes a great point.  As Hogan's Heroes whitewashed the true horrors of a Nazi POW camp into a silly farce, Sister Wives is whitewashing something that is truly repugnant – group marriage – and instead portraying a winsome depiction of polygamy. However, many undiscerning viewers seem to believe the whitewashed image of polygamy, with millions who tuned in to watch the Mother's Day season premiere episode. According to TV ratings site, TV by the Numbers, TLC's hit series Sister Wives premiered Sunday night at 9pm/ET delivering huge ratings for the network making the show the #1 primetime program among ad-supported cable with women 25-54, 18-49 and 18-34.

With the great power of television to indoctrinate, as these millions of viewers tune in each week to Sister Wives, what has been abhorrent to the vast majority of Americans can slowly become acceptable.

Click here to let these advertisers know you will not support companies that empower the legitimization of illegal and immoral polygamy.  The need is great!

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