Upon seeing the submission's title, this was my first thought as well.

I was expecting a self-produced, retrospective documentary.

But I was HOPING for a new show that ended each episode with him facing off against that week's pedo in a steel cage match.

I pictured the same Hansen and Predator as you only I thought it would be like a Scooby-Doo-Like comedy where Hansen gets stranded in a cabin in the woods and has to solve the mystery of the disappearing Hansens, or maybe a horror flick where the Predators have to listen to Hansen.

I think you're talking about Hanson, meerkat

I thought he was going to fight Robocop. I was pretty wrong about this in a lot of ways.

The sequel was even worse, with that ridiculous looking "Predansen" that stalked its victims, forcibly sat them down and recited their sad, awkward sexchat logs back at them before goring them.

He put on some weight... what happened? The CIA have him pushing too many pencils?

Sure he looks terrible, but I bet he's still a goddamn sexual tyrannosaurus.

I would totally hit that.

I may have mentioned this before, but lately there's been a lot of controversy among palaeontologists over whether the sexual tyrannosaurus was a sexual predator, or a sexual scavenger.

Given that T. rex couldn't reach his own dick to jerk it he probably had the sexual stamina of a virgin on prom night every time. Remember kids, jerk off 3 times before every tinder date.

Nah the pencils aren't Chris' problem. That's Dillon you're thinking of, that sonofabitch.

I want to give you stars for that but I can't do it on the basis that Chris Hansen is the worst thing I can wish upon kiddie diddlers.

..that and slow cancer. Ain't no one 5 starring slow cancer.

Maybe the protection is a guarantee they'll only go after rally poor pedophiles who have no hope of mounting any legal defense?

Pledge 0 or more: a plate of freshly baked cookies.

There are a lot of questions to ask about the ethics of the show's vigilante acts. All I can say was I found the show entertaining. It was like watching some trashy day time TV like Maury and getting a good laugh at the dance some guys does when the results show he isn't the father.

The show was ethically dubious an counterproductive but completely entertaining and I've watched and enjoyed plenty of it. The point where it becomes actually morally offensive is the involvement of the police in the whole production.

At any rate, it's all Stranger-Danger fearmongering horseshit that mostly serves to divert people's attention from the real molesters, who are usually family members or close friends, shamelessly exploits human suffering for profit and degrades everyone involved including the viewer. So again, really entertaining.

It wasn't entrapment, and being a "lonely old man" doesn't turn someone into a pedophile, but that doesn't make the show okay... Zircon is right about the stranger danger angle. The show helped push the myth that child molesters are creepy strangers that are easy to catch and convict. People liked this show because it fed into their Just World fantasies.

yeah, there are a number of viral videos out there detailing how insane it is.

https://youtu.be/6jMhMVEjEQg

I have mixed feelings about this one. It's pretty famous. They basically have proved that teenagers want to have sex by meeting guys online and also these girls will never trust anyone ever again.

My big problem (other than vigilante justice almost always being counterproductive whether it's entertaining or not) is again the fact that the police were basically contracting out their services to a TV show. I think it set a really dangerous precedent. Stuff like Cops (also completely fun to watch) was problematic because it blurred the line between law enforcement and entertainment, but To Catch a Predator took it to a whole different level by actually handing over the investigation to the TV show. Cops was trashy and exploitative, but TCaP was straight out of a mid century vision of a dystopian future.


All this talk about it makes me want to rewatch it, though, because it really is a high water mark for trashy television.

It's the best worst television of the early 2000s.

This piece sums up the questionable legal stuff that goes into this: http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a3271/predator/

Let's try that again:

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a3269/predator0907/

Wow, that link lives up to your name, good sir. Even without the title, I had a good hunch how the story would end as soon as the words "district attorney" showed up, but not what sort of darkly incompetent steps would lead to it. Christ, the handling of the warrants alone... just take 'em.

Interesting food for thought from the article in question:

"Is it possible that Bill Conradt, an adult pretending to be a teenager, might have suspected, correctly, that "Luke" was also an adult pretending? Yes: Everybody knows that the Internet is a swamp of false identities. And is there any evidence that Conradt had ever acted on the longings that his chats illuminated? On the contrary, he chose not to when presented with the opportunity. Was it morally wrong for Bill Conradt to engage in online sex chats with an apparent child? Of course. But did his actions merit the response to them? Before answering this question, a man should take stock of the history of the desires he's never acted on, and whether he should ever have to defend that history in court, or see it detailed on television."

I'm sure I could look it up, but what are the actual legal boundaries with "sexual encounters" on AIM, Chatroulette and all the rest? Take DeviantArt for example. There's plenty of Simpsons porn featuring Lisa or sometimes even Maggie, and while you can say that those are fictional cartoons, this was a fictional avatar.

When the head of my university's comp lit department got busted, he said in his defense that he was acting out a Greek fantasy and that he never had intended to have sex with or touch the 13 year old boy. In his case, they did meet up in a (now very ironic) Subway parking lot, so it's definitely a blurred line. But simply living out your fantasy as a kid who's in love with another kid is no different than, as the article says, any other fantasy of, I dunno, fucking the cheerleader when you're in your 50s and have kids of your own and such. Just curious, really.. was any law broken?

(also my computer sucks and it won't load the article correctly so I apologize if this is a dumb question that was answered there)

He's a snake checking out it's own ass.

The little known analboros, or snake sticking it's head up it's own ass.

i like to tongue-kiss a young man, I like to *beep* a *beep* and *beep*