Fox's “The Mick” Continues to Exploit & Sexualize Kids for Laughs

In the year since Fox Broadcasting’s “The Mick” debuted, it has proven to be a one-trick pony, falling back on the same hackneyed gag of having the children in the show saying and doing grossly inappropriate things for laughs. It might be funny except that the show exploits and sexualizes kids. The episode that aired on March 20^th is the worst example to-date of the way this show imposes adult sexuality onto children. In the beginning of the episode Mickey tells the kids to put down their phones and go out into the real world to which Chip (a middle-school-aged boy) replies, “Real world blows. I can't wait ‘till I'm hooked up to an I.V. drip just hammering V.R. porn stars 24/7.” Later, Chip is found out to having created a fake social media profile where he is pretending to be a male adult tattoo artist in order to secretly get to know more about one of Sabrina’s friends. Alba hires a prostitute to impersonate Chip’s internet persona in an attempt to shake things up. Chip: “Yeah okay she's not gonna find out 'cause Marcus is gonna die of AIDS.” Alba: “But why AIDS?” Chip: “It makes sense. He's a baller tattoo artist, he works with needles, and he gets laid a lot.” Mickey’s live-in boyfriend Jimmy says to seven-year-old Ben, “Ben, feel that rumble in your balls?” Ben: “It kind of hurts.” Jimmy: “Yeah well toughen up once you work them over.” Mickey accidentally locks Ben in the back seat of Jimmy’s used police car and in an attempt to rescue him, gets herself trapped halfway between the trunk of the car and the backseat. She comes up with a plan to reach her cell phone that was left in the front seat and tells Ben, “So I want you to close your eyes and help me take off my bra.” After Ben’s attempts to reach the phone with the wire from Mickey’s bra she implies that she removed her bottoms to keep from overheating. Throughout the series’ run, the child actors on the series have been consistently sexualized and put in the position of saying and doing outrageous things. “The Mick” employs child actors, rates the series as appropriate for young teens, and airs it at a time and on a venue that is easily accessible to young children. The writers of this show are actively encouraging adults to view these children as sex objects and active, willing participants in their own sexualization, and these companies helped pay for it: MCDONALDS SAMSUNG GALAXY S9 CITIBANK PEPSI SPRINT HOTELS.COM OLD NAVY CLOTHING DUNKIN DONUTS VOLKSWAGEN NISSAN BOOST MOBILE ARBYS In this #MeToo era, can’t we also say #TimesUp to sexualizing children for laughs? [Tweet "In this #MeToo era, can’t we also say #TimesUp to sexualizing children for laughs?"] THE MICK season 2 episode 18 "The Car" airdate: 03/20/2018 from Parents Television Council on Vimeo.