Tarrant On TV Receives Complaints About Obesity Clip

Eighteen viewers complained to the Independent Television Commission (ITC) about a clip of The Jerry Springer Show on Tarrant On TV which showed a man whose obesity was so great he was unable to move unaided.

The clip was ostensibly included to show the lowering standards of taste and decency in other countries’ programmes but complainants, and the ITC, believed that it in fact represented an invitation to laugh at “a distressed and tearful obese man”. This, says the Commission, contravenes broadcasting codes of taste and decency which refer specifically to the need to avoid the use of humour based on physical or mental disability.

The programme’s producers, LWT, denied that the clip had been in bad taste. The ITC did not agree and upheld the complaints.

The ITC publishes a bi-monthly Programme Complaints and Interventions report.

Independent Television Commission: 0171 306 7743