'Gossip Girl' comes under fire over threesome plot

Washington, November 06 (ANI): CW network's hit TV show 'Gossip Girl' has come under fire from the Parental Television council (PTC) after trailers of an upcoming episode hinting at a threesome surfaced.

The PTC has now demanded the network's affiliates to stop the airing of the future episode.

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Parent Television Council President Tim Winter has released a statement saying that ads such as a "3SOME," is "reckless and irresponsible," since the show is primarily followed by young, female audience.

In fact the letter has sent letter to affiliates nationwide, asserting that they will "bear the financial burden of an FCC fine should any of the content on the November 9th episode be found to violate broadcast decency laws."

We don't know how it will be depicted yet. Our concern is really more thematic with respect to the target audience," Fox News quoted Melissa Henson, the director of communications and public education, as saying.

She added: "We know that the show is especially popular with teenage girls.

"CW has been defending graphic content on 'Gossip Girl' by asserting that they don't target teenagers. Such a claim doesn't even pass the 'laugh test.'

"Images of teenagers in sexual scenarios are nothing new. But the idea of a threesome is a fairly new phenomenon that has previously only been associated with adult films.

"The network is giving it a sense of normalcy and depicting it as nothing unusual and suggesting there are no particular consequences for this type of behavior.

"Parents are of course responsible for what children watch on television or online. But that doesn't let the network off the hook. They are using a public resource to send their message out, so they have to adhere to community standards of decency.

"And it's very hard for a parent to combat a multimillion dollar ad campaign telling kids to watch specifically because parents say not to do so."

Meanwhile, CW spokesman Paul McGuire has said that the network had no comment on PTC's complaint.

He explained that the show's target audience is 18- to 34-year-old women, with a median viewer age of 27 years old. (ANI)