“Gossip Girls,” the show everyone loves to talk about, but nobody watches, is making a play for viewers with an episode that includes three-way sex – outraging parents’ groups and titillating fans, who are more interested in figuring out who it will be.
The Parents Television Council, a TV watchdog group that focuses on salaciousness, is calling the episode, known as “3SOME,” reckless and irresponsible. The show’s audience includes mostly tweens and until this season had been set in a posh Upper East Side New York private school.
The group is trying to pressure affiliates of the CW network to ban the program, which airs Monday (Nov. 9).
“Gossip Girl” currently draws about 2.2 million viewers a week. The show is supposedly targeted at viewers between the ages of 18-34, but why anyone in that age group would be interested in the goings-on of high schoolers is anyone’s guess.
Parents’ groups contend that the show is more likely watched by tweens and young high-school aged teens, although the show contends that the median age of viewers is 27.
Whether the show will influence viewers to mimic the characters is problematic. But studies show that kids are engaging in sexual acts at younger and younger ages. Girls as young as 12 have been report to have engaged in oral sex with boyfriends.
Oddly, the show’s theme coincides with the release of Britney Spears’ new single “3” which is also about three-way sex. Why the sudden interest? Likely because not that is much left in the envelope to push.
While parent’s groups are in a dither over the show, fans are taking it in stride. They are more interested in trying to guess who among the show’s characters will sink to debauchery.
The show has teased about hot sex on the show before, and the ensuing episodes turned out to be relatively tame.
The show’s promos really on hint at the possibility of threesome, and will likely leave a lot to the imagination. After all, they are dealing with underage sex.
Though the CW wouldn’t comment on next week’s episode. But the CW has attempted to refrain from showing any sexual act between two characters if they are not over 18.
The network was reportedly scared off anything too risqué by a 2006 case, in which the FCC fined 111 CBS affiliates a record $3.6 million for airing what it viewed as an indecent depiction of teenage sex, according to Entertainment Weekly. The show included a teen orgy.
