19 Kids and Counting will become the second of TLC’s shows to be cancelled because the southern minstrel spectacle it exploited turned out to be a pathetic cycle of ignorance. There’s a seedy underbelly to the backwoods fools you’re chuckling at.
Amid revelations that the Duggar family knew and concealed the fact that their anti-gay crusading son was a pederast a lot of fingers have rightfully been pointed at the family. But several people at TLC have played Joe Paterno on this and nobody is talking about it.
In 2006 the Duggar family was scheduled to make an appearance on the immensely popular Oprah show to talk about how their faith in Jesus affords them the money to shop at Walmart when their segment was immediately cancelled at the last minute for unknown reasons.
This is exceptionally uncommon.
It seems someone associated with the show would have asked, why? Getting Oprah is huge. Would they not have demanded an explanation?
Turns out an anonymous tipster had contacted Oprah’s people and informed them that the family was a crusty cult whose patriarch was brainwashing his children into thinking child molestation was no big deal and was at the time criminally involved in hiding this fact from the proper authorities. Praise Jesus.
So there would be zero possibility one could claim with a straight face that someone associated with the show hadn’t been informed of this very fact.
But they kept right on shooting, sipping their cabernet while looking at the dailies and thinking how they had a trainwreck of a hit on their hands.
There’s apparently a moral imperative to being on television. Brian Williams will be fired for lying. Yet how does his harmless transgression compare to that of the utterly gross Duggar family and why does this moral imperative not apply to the producers of the show or the people at TLC?
I contacted the executive producers of 19 Kids and Counting. Senior Executive Producer Bill Hayes, and Executive Producers Sean Overbeeke, Deanie Wilcher, and Alon Orstein. None of them responded.
At least one of these people, beyond any reasonable doubt, knew they were actively working to bring a criminal cult onto mainstream television. And they didn’t care.
It doesn’t matter if the Duggar girls who were molested by their gay bashing brother are able to shrug it off on Fox News and chalk it up to his going through puberty. It just shows they’re a bunch of brainwashed idiots who have been sexually repressed into oblivion and will probably end up voting for Mike Huckabee.
If it was so harmless why was this the floor plan of the Duggar’s home they built after Josh had molested his sisters?
Seems they were concerned enough. Just not to the point of doing the right thing. If you haven’t noticed, Jesus handles things pretty terribly. A lot of the people he vouches for are super into rape and fraud and warmongering. Lest you’re able to get him to stand guard outside the girls’ room with an aluminum baseball bat and a walkie talkie I’d say he’s worthless in this scenario.
I don’t understand why the producers of the show are being confronted for their lack of action. Clearly an executive producer was tasked with making an executive decision.
As a network TLC has the ultimate responsibility for their programming. They recently cancelled Here Comes Honey Boo Boo because the matriarch of that show is another god fearing perpetuator of child molestation.
There are all kinds of fucked up religious cults doing unspeakable things to children all over the country. It’s just not on TV because you’d be forced to surrender the footage to authorities once you witness Koresh in a mom/daughter threesome.
These people, again, Senior Executive Producer Bill Hayes, and Executive Producers Sean Overbeeke, Deanie Wilcher, and Alon Orstein, need to be held accountable.
They looked the other way for their own self interest.
There’s no gray area here. Joe Paterno was a disgusting person. Jim Bob Duggar is a disgusting person. These Hollywood producer’s collective silence and inaction on this issue puts them in the very same category.
I’m making the assumption they all consulted on this. Yet they enjoy their continued anonymity.
In a way they’re worse because they had the clear headed perspective to understand the implications of the actions of the child molester they were feeding lines to. And they did nothing because they are cowards who make shitty TV programs by the way.
I guess that’s why it’s The Learning Channel.