Ethical 'Reality': A Proposed Code For Producers To Live By; NPR's Monkey See Blog, 8/31/11

Linda Holmes, NPR's Monkey See Blog; Ethical 'Reality': A Proposed Code For Producers To Live By:

"But just as responsible sports teams can make responsible decisions about minimizing risks where they can, there are ways for shows that absolutely don't have to be so exploitative and potentially damaging — shows like Survivor and The Amazing Race and Project Runway and Top Chef and even American Idol and Deadliest Catch — to take their responsibilities to participants more seriously and to distinguish and brand themselves as the shows committed to existing on the do-less-harm end of the spectrum. How do you accomplish that?

With a voluntary, industry-adopted ethics code that would allow a show that wants to agree to specific measures that minimize (do not eliminate, but minimize) potential harm, and in return to be marketed as Not That Kind Of Show."