It's Cock-a-Doodle Twoooooo!

Hello. Let's revisit an old topic I like to touch on from time to time. Guilty TV Pleasures.

This past Friday it was late, the Hucklebug podcast was recorded and in the can, Stennie and I had chatted and played games online a bit, and I was again alone and the house was quiet. So I turned on the TeeVee and caught an episode of something I hadn't seen in a long time.

Dateline: To Catch a Predator.

Now, there are a lot of TV shows I watch from time to time that I'm ashamed of. But none more than D:TCaP. It's the worst form of trash-TV ever, even worse than the Jerry Springer Show, and really, I am so sorry that I've ever seen an episode of it at all, much less every episode they've ever made.

It's just that it used to show in the wee-morning hours while some of us lingered behind in the old poundsqueeze chat on Thursdays, and Stennie and I seemed to link into it at the same time, much to the chagrin of anyone else around, and, well, there's something about it, it's kind of like watching a man get eaten by a bear, and you can't turn away. And we never did.

For the uninitiated, here's how Dateline: To Catch a Predator goes. Some men are entrapped into being child molesters and then arrested.

Well, that's the short version. The long version is that some men are enticed into internet conversations with what they assume are underage girls (and boys), but they're not, they're adults, and these plants invite the men to a house, and when the men go there, the host of D:TCaP comes out and gives them the third degree and tells them they're scum, but they're scum that's free to go, and then the cameras come out and are shoved in their faces and they do go, where they are promptly arrested in the yard of the plant house.

Now, there's nothing I hate more than child molesters. Except Nazis, of course, and animal beaters, and rapists, and conservative wingnuts, but there's not much I hate more than child molesters. But I can't help it, there's just something about D:TCaP that stinks to high heaven in the legal technicalities department, and I don't care if it is against the law to chat up a teenager online, it's entrapment pure and simple, and I also can't believe that they can put these people's faces and voices and everything else on television without the people's permission, but I guess they can. Because they do, and I never read where they got sued. Successfully, anyway.

And as serious as the subject may be, child predators and all that, if you yourself have ever seen an episode of the show (and it's OK, you don't have to admit it) you know why Stennie and I sat through all those chats catching the action.

Because it's comedy gold.

First of all, you've got your host, one Chris Hansen. Here's a word I seldom use, in fact it might be the first-ever time I've used it in this blog, but Chris Hansen is a douchebag of the highest order. Sometimes a person just fits an epithet, and I believe if you look up the word "douchebag" in the dictionary, you might find Mr Hansen's picture. Chris Hansen is a self-righteous prig who delights in catching these guys red-handed, or red-penised. When the would-be molesters have made themselves comfortable (they never see the plant, who makes an excuse of putting up laundry, getting something out of the oven, or going upstairs to put on a band-aid), Mr Hansen swaggers into the room with some papers under his arm, doesn't introduce himself, and starts asking why they're there. If the would-be molesters lie, and let's face it, they always do, they're would-be molesters, for God's sake, he pulls out the papers, which are transcripts of the online chats, and the grilling begins. Then he announces who he is and waits for the "oh shit" reaction. Which always comes. So to speak.

We also get clips inserted into the above, clips of Chris "behind the scenes," in a studio in front of monitors showing the house action, where he gives his own impressions of what's going on. About how any given would-be molester is "on the edge" and could snap at any time, and all I can say is that where he's concerned all one can hope is that he's caught at a seedy motel one day in bed with two hookers and a goat. On CBS Network's 48 Hours: The Underbelly of TV Anchors.

Then, of course, you have your would-be molesters. They normally fall into several categories: sleazy truck driver guys, sleazy brash twenty-something losers, sleazy accented non-whites, sleazy mild-mannered religious people, and, well... and... sleazy flat-out retarded people.

The sleazy truck driver guys are always around 60, and show up to the plant house driving their 18-wheelers. Ever wonder why merchandise never shows up on time? Well, there's your answer. I have to say, with some slight begrudging admiration, that the sleazy truck-driver guys are generally right up front about everything. They just don't give a shit. "Yeah, she said she was 13, and I thought maybe I'd take her for a ride in my rig and see where it went from there. Brought some Jack Daniels, brought some condoms, brought some fried chicken. Good times!" They walk outside after their scolding from Hansen and assume the position for the cops.

The sleazy brash twenty-something losers tend to lose their brashness right quick when they see Mr Hansen. They generally assume he's the plant's father when he enters the room, and start backpedaling immediately. The girl said she was 18 in the chatroom, oh you have the transcript? Sorry, must have been someone else. It was only a fantasy, I wasn't going to act on it. Oh, I'm here? Well, I was just going to talk to her. Oh, I have a six-pack and a gross of condoms in the car? Um, can I go, please, sir? You're Chris Hansen from Dateline? Oh, there goes my career in the stocks business.

The sleazy accented non-whites, and this is going to be politically incorrect, but it's true, so fire away, are generally Latinos and Middle Easterners, sometimes turban-wearing Middle Easterners, and they are always extremely sorry for their deeds. They apologize profusely, beg for forgiveness from Mr Hansen, and often cry. The Latinos worry about their families and the Middle Easterners always admit that someone told them this is illegal in the States, which they really shouldn't do, because they're the only ones who have an automatic out in the whole shebang. "I didn't know! I didn't know 13 was too young!"

The sleazy mild-mannered religious people are all the same. "I was going to mentor this girl, tell her the dangers of talking to men on the internet, and possibly be a friend she could depend on to help her do the right thing." Yeah, I believe you. Many's the time I've gone into the #younghotnakedkids chatroom for the express purpose of setting a youngster on the right path. It happens all the time. How dare Mr Hansen of accusing you of showing pictures of your penis to a pre-teen! Oh, you have the pictures? Well, I was showing her what to be afraid of, you know, so I could be a friend to her. And just talk. Really. Praise God.

And finally, the only time the comedy gold of Dateline: To Catch a Predator tarnishes is when they get hold of the sleazy flat-out retarded people. OK, so they're not clinically mentally retarded, but they are slow, simple, or backwards, and often have lisps, thick glasses, acne, big ears, and are very socially inept. NBC should be ashamed of showing these guys on national TV. When they see one coming, Chris Hansen should take him aside, tell him he's done a very bad thing, and now it's time to go with the man in the blue uniform and we're going to tell your mother to come and bail you out of the lock-up and she'll be very angry at you, then you'll go to a big room in front of a man in a black robe and you'll spend the next several months picking up trash in an orange jumpsuit. And turn the cameras off.

However.

However, at least for Stennie and I, the "star" of D:TCaP is not Chris Hansen, or even the would-be molesters. It's the plant house itself.

They always pick a semi-secluded house as the plant house, and in the course of one episode eight or ten men will enter, flounder, and skulk out of the house, so we get to know it in that hour. I don't know who picks the plant house, and if it's redecorated for the occasion or not. But it's always something.

The main focus of one house was the bar. A big, dark, hulking 18-inch wide bar all the would-be molesters sat at to be grilled by Hansen. Another had flowered wallpaper that would give a totally healthy person a case of vertigo. Some have furniture straight out of 1974. Most have paintings on the walls that had to have been bought at gas stations. Gaudy mirrors abound.

But the best is the rooster clock. Oh, God, the wonderful wall clock that has appeared in at least three episodes of Predator, a large oval with the hands revolving on top of a gigantic rooster. And Friday night when the first would-be molester arrived looking for fun and frolic, he sat at a table and out came Chris Hansen and lo and behold, saints be praised, he took up his spot right in front of the rooster clock.

I got so excited I almost emailed Stennie. "Get back online! To Catch a Predator is on, and it's a rooster clock!"

But I didn't. The rooster clock was exciting, but it was still the same self-righteous Hansen, the same would-be molesters, and the same heaping of bullshit excuses we'd seen a hundred times.

By the way, as D:TCaP wraps up an episode, it shows the would-be molesters one more time, and superimposed over each is what happened to him after his arrest. All Dragnet-like. It's usually 3 months to 24 months. And another constant in the show - black men always get the harshest sentences. Always.

Stennie and I have decided that one day we'll see one with the epilogues: "Joe Smith was convicted and sentenced to 6 months." "Bob Anderson was convicted and sentenced to 3 months." "Ahmad Washington was executed without trial."

Betland's Olympic Update:
* Acrowinners, we have ac - wait, we don't have acrowinners. No one played acro this week. I will try to console myself by telling myself it was because you either couldn't think of enough wonderful things to say about me, or that you didn't know it was there. Acros have been sparse lately.