PTC LAUDS MITSUBISHI FOR DROPPING ‘NIP/TUCK’

The Parents Television Council today praised Mitsubishi Motors for pulling its sponsorship of the FX Network’s Nip/Tuck, which PTC said has recently aired episodes containing scenes of explicit sexual situations.  PTC provided descriptions of the show to Mitsubishi Motors.

In a letter to PTC, a Mitsubishi Motors executive responded: “We certainly have no desire to offend consumers with our advertising, which is meant to entertain and inform potential customers about the benefits of purchasing our products.  With this in mind, we have decided to discontinue advertising on Nip/Tuck.”

“We applaud Mitsubishi Motors for taking a courageous stand against continuing to sponsor some of the most sexually graphic and violent content on basic cable today courtesy of Nip/Tuck,” said L. Brent Bozell, president of the PTC. “Families are counting on advertisers to be responsible corporate citizens and to stand up to the television networks, whose only purpose is to use ad revenue to underwrite filthy programming,” Bozell continued, adding: “Over the past three years, the creators of Nip/Tuck have devised some of the most disgusting and disturbing storylines imaginable. Episodes have included themes of incest, pedophilia, necrophilia, rape and more. Just four episodes into season four, Nip/Tuck reached new depths of depravity with a storyline about a woman who had sex with her dog. And not just any woman—the actress was none other than Little House on the Prairie star Melissa Gilbert.

“FX is part of most cable subscribers’ expanded basic package, which means this scene of stomach-turning depravity was available to the children in over 75% of U.S. households. Put another way, some 80 million children had the potential to have been exposed to this filth.

“We are calling on every current advertiser of Nip/Tuck to closely examine the value of sponsoring the vilest content on television.  Mitsubishi clearly sees the disincentive to polluting the minds of millions of impressionable children,” Bozell concluded.