I don't watch much network TV. There just isn't much on there that interests me, I guess.
When it comes to TV, I mainly look at CNN and The Golf Channel.
But Wednesday night my son was watching NBC and said, "Dad, you gotta see this."
He asked me if I'd ever seen "Dateline NBC: To Catch A Predator."
When I told him no he explained how NBC puts out a decoy, a girl who pretends to be 11 or 12 years old. She chats online with adult men who then stop by her house when her parents are away for, well, you know.While the predator guy is sitting there chatting it up with the pre-teen object of his desires, Hansen walks in with the chatroom transcript in hand and starts asking the guy what he thinks he's doing.
Hansen eventually identifies himself as an NBC reporter and the predator guy is allowed to leave the house.
Of course, when the predator leaves the house, he gets tackled by three or four cops and placed under arrest.
Evan told me I would be shocked at how unbelievable pathetic the predator guys were.
So I watched it with him, and he was right. It was unbelievable.
The things these guys said on the Internet to the decoy were amazingly perverted. Especially in light of the fact that they thought they were talking to such a young girl.
And when they showed up to meet her in person they were all trying to be sooo swank, suave and debonnaire.
It was truly disgusting.
But then, when Hansen rolls up on the scene it becomes almost amusing to hear the predators change their tune.
"Hey, I'm just here to talk." or "Hey, I didn't do anything wrong."
One guy even knew Hansen. This exchange between Hansen and predator Lubrano fully blew my mind:
Lubrano: You're Chris Hansen?
Chris Hansen: I am. Have you seen this show? You have seen it?
Lubrano: I thought you were real funny on "Opie and Anthony."
Chris Hansen: Oh, you - you listened to me on "Opie and Anthony?"
Lubrano: (laughter) Yeah ... Can I honestly tell you something?
Chris Hansen: Yeah.
Lubrano: I was thinking in the back of my mind that I almost wanted this to happen. ...
Hansen: Now, you seemed nervous about coming over, saying you're going to have to sneak in. What were you so nervous about?
Lubrano: (laughter) Running into you. But I -- I guess it doesn't -- you know? ...
Hansen: That doesn't seem like it was much of a deterrent tonight, now was it? How many times have you seen the show?
Lubrano: I'm a religious watcher. I --
Hansen: A religious watcher?
Lubrano: Well, I watch it whenever I can. Sometimes I go and, you know, hunt out clips on the internet.
Hansen: So you watch it on the internet, too?
Lubrano: I watch it any way I can. I love it when they play the clips on all the radio shows and -
Hansen: Yeah. Did you ever imagine that you'd be featured on one of our shows?
Lubrano: (laughter) Is there a hidden camera somewhere?
Hansen: Oh, yeah. Yeah, there's a whole bunch of them.
Lubrano: Wow.
Are you kidding me?
This guy is almost reveling in the fact that he's just been outed nationwide as a sexual predator.
The guy has seen the show. He knew he could get arrested. Yet he still couldn't resist the urge to hook up with this young girl.
Unbelievable.
Well, maybe not so unbelievable.
It's not that I am some huge prude or anything, but honestly, it seems to me we have pretty much sexualized everything in this country.
It's not that sex is a bad thing. Quite the contrary. But it has become so pervasive in our culture, it's everywhere.
If you were dropped into the U.S. from another planet and watched TV for more than an hour, you'd think erectile disfunction was the most urgent medical problem we have.
You would also notice that sex is the preferred method of marketing virtually everything to us.
Several of the predator guys - including that Lubrano character - bemoaned the fact that they didn't have girlfriends. Apparently, their desire for sex is so great they are willing to risk national humiliation and jail time to achieve it.
But don't take my word for it. If you want evidence of how pervasive sex has become in our culture, you need look no further than the current presidential campaign.
First, there was the Obama Girl and "I Got a Crush on Obama."
Democrat Presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama, of Illinois, says young people can make a difference in politics.
According to the Chicago Tribune, "... a very scantily clad young woman is doing exactly that - in an unauthorized music video about her 'Crush on Obama' that features her pole-dancing in a subway car and wearing a pair of 'Obama' shorts that barely contain her enthusiasm for politics.
"... The music video, the launch gimmick of a new Web site, barelypolitical.com, put the Obama camp in an odd position. True, the woman in the music video is clearly declaring Obama 'the best candidate,' arguably a message they'd like to see going viral on the Web.
"Trouble is, she's half-naked while lip-syncing Obama's praises and she's also warmly kissing his photograph."
Then there was Obama Girl V. Giuliani Girl.
And not to be outdone, former cast-off American Idolette Taryn Southern came out with Hott4Hill, which the Chicago Sun-Times described as a "sexually-charged, lesbianish ode to the former first lady..."
Southern appears alternately as an elementary school teacher and a bikini-clad political operative:
"H-I-L-L-A-R-Y - I know you're not gay, but I'm hopin' for bi," she croons.
For the record, Southern says she's not a lesbian. She's just having fun.
Pretty bizarre.
But just as the Internet has opened up a whole new frontier for predators, it's opened up a whole new frontier for the Hot4Hill types, too.
What would once have been an obscure oddity, now can hit the mainstream and be afforded the shining light of media scrutiny nationwide.
Obama Girl, Giuliana Girl and Hot4Hill have enjoyed literally millions of views on the Internet's Youtube.com.
And these vids are just scratching the surface of all the risque stuff online.
No wonder the rest of the world loathes the U.S. They all think we're a bunch of sex-crazed materialistic loonies.
