Like a thousand other ads in "Backstage," this one was looking for just the right cast members. The production company, Spun Gold TV, was looking for "real food-loving families to take part in a new, experimental documentary that asks: ‘How much do we really know about the animals that we put on our plates?'" The concept seemed intriguing: "We're looking for warm, opinionated families who will share their homes with an animal they would normally eat (i.e. a chicken/lamb). For three weeks they'll learn all about the animals whilst living up close and personal with them!" In the world of reality TV, where people are dropped naked on desert islands and filmed trying to survive, a show about people cozying up to critters seems pretty, well, tame.
However "Meat the Family" was anything but. One analyst called the show "the most transgressive of the year." If you're unfamiliar with term it means "involving a violation of accepted or imposed boundaries, especially those of social acceptability." And once you get the hook, you might agree.
In the first set of shows, four committed top-of-the-food-chain families took home and looked after the animal which most often ended up on their plates. That meant individual episodes focused on folks taking care of a lamb, a pig, a chicken and a calf. In the installments, the families treat each animal as a household pet, feeding and caring and, indeed, growing to love them. They travel to learn about the food industry, and how their little Porky fits into the greater scheme of things. They are exposed to experts on animal welfare, learn about farming and production, and visit food processing plants. It's all aimed at giving each family a chance to better understand the impact that a carnivorous lifestyle has on the environment and our health, while relating it directly to their animal charge.
Then, at the end of the three weeks, they get a choice. They can convert to being vegetarians and send Lucy the Lamb to an animal sanctuary to live out the rest of her days in peace. No? OK, they can stay meat eaters, but then they have to kill their pet and eat it. Leg of Lucy anyone?
It is one of a new type of show that forces regular people to confront ethical questions and behaviors that have remained theoretical to many. Earlier this year Britain's' Channel 4 had "The Great British School Swap." The three-part series followed the lives of two groups of students from different schools with ethnic, cultural and religious splits. Twenty-four kids, half from an effectively all-white school, and half from a practically all non-white, mainly Muslim school, where paired up. They went to class together, and as well as participating in after and out of school activities. While there were certainly some positive moments, filmed interviews with the kids also produced some cringe inducing sound bites such as a Muslim child saying "I just don't like gay people, they make me feel weird" and a white child saying "The burqas are wanting to ban bacon." Disturbing, even if not totally surprising.
Then there's the new Dutch show called "The Cocaine Trials" and another similar British one named "Doing Drugs for Fun?" Both confront casual cocaine users, showing them the consequences of their habit on the Colombian communities where coke is farmed and refined, and life is controlled by cartels. The idea is to show them the impact that their habits have on others in the broader sense. And there's Australia's "My 80 Year Old Flatmate" which pairs millennials locked out of Sydney's pricey housing market with seniors who have an extra room. Admittedly this one seems less interested in bridging the May-December generation gap that divides, and more intent on looking for the gross out moment that comes from either being too young or too old to care.
But back to our friends in "Meat." The program is set to air next year, and while it will start in Britain, it is expected to quickly find an international market. For what could have more universal appeal than eating your pet? On the bright side, should Brexit indeed happen, it might cost a premium to see this. In which case you'll have a real reason to skip this red meat and load up on the veggies.
-END-
Marc Wollin of Bedford loves foods with legs and without. His column appears regularly in The Record-Review, The Scarsdale Inquirer and online at http://www.glancingaskance.blogspot.com/, as well as via Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
However "Meat the Family" was anything but. One analyst called the show "the most transgressive of the year." If you're unfamiliar with term it means "involving a violation of accepted or imposed boundaries, especially those of social acceptability." And once you get the hook, you might agree.
In the first set of shows, four committed top-of-the-food-chain families took home and looked after the animal which most often ended up on their plates. That meant individual episodes focused on folks taking care of a lamb, a pig, a chicken and a calf. In the installments, the families treat each animal as a household pet, feeding and caring and, indeed, growing to love them. They travel to learn about the food industry, and how their little Porky fits into the greater scheme of things. They are exposed to experts on animal welfare, learn about farming and production, and visit food processing plants. It's all aimed at giving each family a chance to better understand the impact that a carnivorous lifestyle has on the environment and our health, while relating it directly to their animal charge.
Then, at the end of the three weeks, they get a choice. They can convert to being vegetarians and send Lucy the Lamb to an animal sanctuary to live out the rest of her days in peace. No? OK, they can stay meat eaters, but then they have to kill their pet and eat it. Leg of Lucy anyone?
It is one of a new type of show that forces regular people to confront ethical questions and behaviors that have remained theoretical to many. Earlier this year Britain's' Channel 4 had "The Great British School Swap." The three-part series followed the lives of two groups of students from different schools with ethnic, cultural and religious splits. Twenty-four kids, half from an effectively all-white school, and half from a practically all non-white, mainly Muslim school, where paired up. They went to class together, and as well as participating in after and out of school activities. While there were certainly some positive moments, filmed interviews with the kids also produced some cringe inducing sound bites such as a Muslim child saying "I just don't like gay people, they make me feel weird" and a white child saying "The burqas are wanting to ban bacon." Disturbing, even if not totally surprising.
Then there's the new Dutch show called "The Cocaine Trials" and another similar British one named "Doing Drugs for Fun?" Both confront casual cocaine users, showing them the consequences of their habit on the Colombian communities where coke is farmed and refined, and life is controlled by cartels. The idea is to show them the impact that their habits have on others in the broader sense. And there's Australia's "My 80 Year Old Flatmate" which pairs millennials locked out of Sydney's pricey housing market with seniors who have an extra room. Admittedly this one seems less interested in bridging the May-December generation gap that divides, and more intent on looking for the gross out moment that comes from either being too young or too old to care.
But back to our friends in "Meat." The program is set to air next year, and while it will start in Britain, it is expected to quickly find an international market. For what could have more universal appeal than eating your pet? On the bright side, should Brexit indeed happen, it might cost a premium to see this. In which case you'll have a real reason to skip this red meat and load up on the veggies.
-END-
Marc Wollin of Bedford loves foods with legs and without. His column appears regularly in The Record-Review, The Scarsdale Inquirer and online at http://www.glancingaskance.blogspot.com/, as well as via Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
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