I welcome back to the blog my daughter who has written this piece for her university newspaper. I think her point is well taken. Insert ANY other faith in the title and imagine the outrage…
Posted by Embowlee
Imagine this. You’re relaxing on your couch, channel surfing, and you come across a show titled “Good Christian Bitches.” Does this alarm you at all? Are you offended? I promise I’m not making this up. After running the pilot episode in March, ABC may air the controversial show sometime in its 2011 TV lineup.
While it may have the intention of poking fun at Christian circles, as Christians form the bulk of ABC’s viewers, in actuality it scornfully mocks Christians.
I’m not sure what I think is crazier—the fact that someone would title anything with both the word Christian and the word bitches in the same sentence, or the fact that ABC would even consider airing a show like this.
The very fact that a show like this exists makes me wonder if ABC is attempting to shed light on a perception or even a reality of Christians today. If that’s the case, this show could give Christians a valuable look into the way people view them. Furthermore, it’s entirely possible that this is just an attempt for Christians to indulge in a little self-deprecation.
When I heard the title, I struggled with conjuring up any sustainable storyline that this show could possibly center around.
I can tell you that the show portrays its main character, Amanda Vaughn, as a woman recently divorced who travels back to her hometown looking for a fresh start. There she encounters her old friends—with whom she had burned some bridges—who they set out to destroy her reputation by any means necessary. Then, in the midst of all the maliciousness, Amanda turns to those who love her and sticks to her faith.
Sounds like an award-winning show to me!
Not only is the plot completely unoriginal and predictable, it seems to have a striking similarity to another show, also on ABC, called “Desperate Housewives,” in which the women are catty and wealthy. I’d say the only difference between the two is that “Good Christian Bitches” has women that are not only catty in their social lives, but also in the church setting.
Based off of the book “Good Christian Bitches,” author Kim Gatlin has a website advertising her book. On the web page, as plain as day, she says, “For Heaven’s sake, don’t let God get in the way of a good story!” As if that’s the major issue here—that God is getting in the way of a “good” story.
Now that we’re introduced to this controversial show, imagine this. Let’s replace the word Christian in the title with Muslim or even Jew. It’s still highly and unacceptably inappropriate, except the reality is, if Christian were replaced with any other religious faith, people everywhere would be furious about it, not just the religious group. It would literally become an international feud against the network. The fact of the matter is, though, ABC would never dream of airing a show like that!
So what is this supposed to insinuate about Christians? We face backlash on the daily, and are expected to continue to act as Christians. We’re taught to turn the other cheek, and to treat our neighbors as we would like to be treated, but this allows people to take full advantage of us. But again, this only makes me wonder about the perception of Christians that could lead ABC to want to create a show about it.
But is that to say that we just sit back and let the media portray us however they darn well please? For a very long time, the “b-word” has been used to degrade, humiliate and harass women. Put that together in the same literary line with the word Christian, and you have the world’s worst combination of words.
However, our culture seems to have normalized the word bitch, turning it into more of a slang word, which has caused many of us to become desensitized to it all together.
If this show does end up being aired, the odds of the title being changed is almost a sure thing, said Fox News writer Hollie McKay. However, that won’t change the fact that the show will be mocking people of faith.
