Here's the newsflash: television networks (NBC, my employer, included) are simply going for ratings. This
includes their news shows and is definitely more evident in their usage of shocking plot lines in their sitcoms and dramas. If they can draw you in for fifteen minutes, they get your share... that's all they want, folks.
More of a newsflash: November is sweeps month. Look for even MORE off-the-wall and shock-inducing story lines throughout the month. This is the time that if they get your share, it goes in the books and they can therefore charge more for their advertising spots, which, of course, makes them more money.
Beyond that, even before it got to the end of the episode on SVU (not SUV), my Husband and I were shocked AND appalled. While I know that these mental sentiments exist (racism, white pride, etc), hearing them with my own ears was just flabbergasting. My Husband asked me if they were "allowed" to say some of that stuff on television. While they are, and while I usually like SVU for entertainment purposes (not as an educational resource, since that's not why it exists), I was simply nauseated.
Here's the point: if you don't like it,
please turn it off. While that's usually a piece of rhetoric thrown at you by the networks as an excuse to be able to air whatever they want, it's the only way YOU can be proactive (short of standing outside the doors with protest signs). If they're not getting your share, their numbers/ratings are not going up which means they're going to lose money with advertisers. And as always, email email email. You may think it doesn't get anywhere. It does. A grouping of angry emails coupled with a dropped rating is a huge red flag that something is not working.
And, of course, keep venting.
My Husband and I had a LONG talk about that episode afterwards in which he allowed me to vent my head off. Sure felt good.