LOS ANGELES (November 1, 2007) – The Parents Television Council™ criticized the season premiere of FX’s Nip/Tuck that included excessive foul language, nudity, bloody dominatrix scenes featuring fishing hooks though a man's chest and one of the main characters discussing how to enhance the taste of male ejaculate in front of his young child.  In response to Tuesday night’s episode, the PTC renewed its call for cable choice, a solution that would allow customers to choose and pay for only the programming they want coming into their homes.  According to the Miami Herald, “Damaged characters are never in short supply on Nip/Tuck…From transsexual incest to morbid obesity…Nip/Tuck revels in the aberrant and the appalling.” Additionally at the 2007 Television Critics Association Tour, series star Julian McMahon said, “I don't think this show is kinky enough so, I'm kind of trying to push for that kind of stuff consistently…I just want to push things further.”

“News Corp, the FX Network and the producers of Nip/Tuck have made it clear that they intend to serve the most profane, the most sexually explicit, and the most violent content ever seen on advertiser-supported basic cable television; and this season’s premiere is a prime example. Perhaps the most telling display of big-media irresponsibility was demonstrated by FX’s sister-network, Fox Broadcasting, when this MA-rated program was regularly and routinely promoted during the World Series. News Corp and Fox knew that millions of children and families were in the viewing audience, yet that is when they chose to promote material that should be relegated to a premium or pay-per-view category,” PTC President Tim Winter said.

“The FX Network in general and this episode of Nip/Tuck in particular offer an irrefutable argument for cable choice.  FX should be forced to face a true marketplace if they want to serve up offensive plotlines littered with explicit content.  Families must not be forced to subsidize such material in order to bring family-quality cable programming into their homes. But cable industry executives will stop at nothing to continue their cartel-like practices.  The millions of families who are the victims of this cable industry scam must speak out and demand change.  

“The PTC will be contacting every advertiser that sponsored Tuesday night’s episode of Nip/Tuck and ask whether their corporate values are consistent with content that reaches the depths of depravity,” Winter concluded.