Any Publicity is Good Publicity

During class we watched Tyra’s interview with Somaly Mam. There was a lot to be discussed between the class when referring to Tyra’s attitude and media’s portrayal of the sex slavery topic. The class spoke how Somaly’s situation was referred to as the next be hot topic as opposed to a topic that deserves advocating for. Although I agreed with these points I could not help to think to myself that sometimes any publicity is good publicity.

When looking back to our talk with the Pride Alliance panel a student in our class posed a question referring to how they felt about the representation of the gay community in the popular sitcom, Modern Family. One of the members responded to this question by stating, although the portrayal of the gay couple in Modern Family is very stereotypical, she said she would rather have a stereotypical portrayal than no representation at all. I think this quote really correlates to our discussion about the Tyra Show and her interview. Although Tyra did a poor job of introducing Somaly and advocating for her topic, I do believe she brought some awareness upon this topic. Just by having part of her talk show centered on this issue, we can only hope that this topic has inspired numerous viewers to do further research. I do wish Tyra would have put further information on her website or included at least the link to the Somaly Mam’s foundation. The important thing to remember that just because a topic is put out in the media with an inaccurate representation does not mean that it does not completely raise awareness to the every viewer watching. Topics such as sex slavery might instead influence viewers in a more personal way to make them think they need to take action.