SALT LAKE CITY, Utah—Utah has got to be one of the most conflicted states in the Union. Mormon to its core, porn-loving in its heart, one week it makes news when the Church of Latter-day Saints-controlled Salt Lake City NBC affiliate TV station says it will not air the new NBC series The Playboy Club, and two weeks later makes news when the city’s CBS affiliate, MyNetworkTV, says it will run the series—a decision that has drawn the predictable ire of the religious right wing anti-porn industry, whose national campaign to boycott NBC includes an appeal to its base for more money!
Salt Lake City is the country’s 33rd largest television market, according to the Washington Post, which reported, “The station that has snatched up the show is KMYU—a digital sub-channel of Salt Lake City’s CBS affiliate, KUTV, and is operated by Irving, Texas-based Nexstar Broadcasting… KMYU has agreed to air the new series in the Monday 9 p.m. timeslot NBC gave it on its own lineup, reported TV Guide.”
Yes, the television business works in mysterious ways. Utah will get its Playboy series thanks to a Texas-based company, and CBS will reap the rewards that NBC’s own affiliate passed up to avoid being associated with the Playboy brand, as if airing a program means the station agrees with its content.
Strange reasoning, especially considering the likelihood that oodles of Utahans will tune in to watch the Playboy series, which could have given the Church-controlled station an opportunity to turn all those troubled souls toward the light. Maybe next time.
In the meantime, Morality in Media's chief communicator, Pat Trueman, in a statement issued today announcing the second phase of the group's national campaign to stop NBC from blah-blah-blah, once again mischaracterizes Playboy founder Hugh Hefner as the "hardcore porn king."
As we said, Trueman is really only speaking to his own hardcore base—for money, of course—but still, he makes himself and his group look hopelessly out of touch when he consistantly calls the historically soft Playboy hardcore. That's like calling Ray Kroc the chicken king. It's a tactic the anti-porners have used for years in order to set a ridiculously low bar for sexual outrage, but as the actual bar has risen the Truemans of the world are being increasingly exposed as Puritan relics.
