Is Abby Sunderland just another reality TV scammer?

There is increasing evidence that the Sunderland family will take its place along side other recent scammers such as “balloon boy” and the Salafis (White House crashers). Andy Martin says reality TV producers are creating these strange people and deranged family ventures.

 

Andy Martin asks whether the entire Sunderland family is a reality TV scam

 

Martin says Abby Sunderland’s “rescue” may have been orchestrated by her father

 

The Sunderland appear to be the latest in a long line of reality TV scammers

 

 

ContrarianCommentary.com

 

Andy Martin

Executive Editor

 

“Factually Correct, Not

Politically Correct”

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

 

 

Andy Martin says the mainstream media are feeding the reality TV scammers by treating them as legitimate news events instead of commercial exploitationists

 

(NEW YORK)(June 13, 2010)  The Sunderland family, led by “Octomom” Marianne and her loopy father, appears to be just another reality TV scam. Someone has suggested that Octomom Sunderland, who has four teenage children, is pregnant again. All the better to provide quality time for her commercial brood.

 

I was alerted to the commercialization of this 16 year-old by a reader, who furnished me with a link to Magnetic Entertainment, which is shopping reality TV shows about the Sunderlands:

 

http://www.magneticent.com/html/projects.htm

 

A little more digging let me to a sponsorship page, with a price list of sponsorships for the 16 year-old, also linked to Magnetic Entertainment:

 

http://abbysunderland.com/images/sponsors/abby_sponsorship.pdf

 

First we had the balloon boy scam floating into space. Then we had the Salafis crashing the White House. Now the Sunderlands look as creepy as any of these whackos. When and where does it end? 

 

Why is there no critical analysis from the mainstream media. The “rescue” of Abby Sunderland is treated as a legitimate news event. It appears to have been a crass commercial exploitation. The Sunderlands even advertised that their daughter was sailing into the “fearsome rigors of the southern seas.” What kind of a parent would expose a child to that kind of danger, alone, for months? Only a deranged parent. Only a sicko.

 

After Abby’s initial masthead problems her father, who claims to be an experienced mariner, had to have known that she was in increasing danger. But he egged her on. It sounds like an increasingly staged and artificial “rescue.”

 

After being rescued, Abby’s snide remarks about her age and the dangers of the high seas have a Hollywood-like veneer to them.

 

And, by the way, why is Abby not in school? What kind of a scam did the Sunderlands pull to get their daughter out of school for a year, sailing alone? Is she "home schooling" herself? Hello, California officials?

 

The Sunderlands smell. But then the entire reality TV universe stinks as well.

 

Jay Leno and David Letterman, are you paying attention?

------------------------------------

Andy Martin is a legendary Chicago muckraker, author, Internet columnist, radio talk show host, broadcaster and media critic. He has over forty years of broadcasting background in radio and television and is the dean of Illinois media and communications. He is currently promoting his best-selling book, Obama: The Man Behind The Mask and his Internet movie "Obama: The Hawai'i years." Andy is the Executive Editor and publisher of www.ContrarianCommentary.com.
 
Martin comments on regional, national and world events with more than four decades of experience. He holds a Juris Doctor degree from the University of Illinois College of Law and is a former adjunct professor of law at the City University of New York (LaGuardia CC, Bronx CC).
 
UPDATES:
www.twitter.com/AndyMartinUSA
www.facebook.com/AndyMartin
 
Andy's columns are also posted at ContrarianCommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com.

contrariancommentary.typepad.com
[NOTE: We try to correct any typographical errors in this story on our blogs; find our latest edition there.]
 
MEDIA CONTACT: (866) 706-2639 or CELL (917) 664-9329
E-MAIL: [email protected]
© Copyright by Andy Martin 2010

----------------------------