Insatiable Controversy

Insatiable+Controversy

Gabby Houde, Copy Editor

A new tv show aired on Netflix in August and twitter took it by storm.

Insatiable is about a young girl, played by Debby Ryan, who has had problems with her weight her whole life. Then, one day, she gets punched in the face. This causes her jaw to get wired shut, putting her on a liquid only diet, allowing her to lose all of her weight. The show’s premise is seemingly all about this girl coming back and getting revenge on all of the people who previously made fun of her.

Fat shaming is a very delicate topic, it is hard for tv shows to properly present it without offending anyone. It is more important that they show the actuality because their younger audiences look up to and are affected by these kinds of shows. It seems like Insatiable tried to use jokes to make the topic light and not as sad, but instead might have caused too much offense.

Many of the problems people had with the show resided in the fact that the main character had to lose the weight to become pretty. It represents a stereotype of what society deems beautiful, and many people do not agree with this. Scott Tucci, stated, “Insatiable does not give a good message to its younger audiences. A lot of people look up to Debby Ryan because of her representation on Disney Channel, and seeing how she is treated after losing all of her weight could really affect younger audience perceptions of themselves.”

Other people had problems with how the show handled the topic. Sometimes humor is okay, but other times humor is taken the wrong way and treated too insensitively. Alexis Schofield, stated, “I think Insatiable is bad news. It sends a bad message to its audience. It relies on bad humor to talk about a very touchy subject that shouldn’t be treated in such a way.”

However, the people who have actually watched the show feel otherwise. They think that the show is purely satire and should be taken as such. Alita Stukel stated, “My English teacher, Mr. Eleveld, talked about things being satire, which is what made me so interested in the show in the first place. I think it is really just a show that makes fun of everything to a point where people can laugh about the topics in a none crude way. but the way they talked about it, it was clear that they understood the delicacy of the topic. Debby Ryan would not have picked up the role if it wasn’t purely satire.”

The controversy over Insatiable is huge, and the show should have taken some of these things into consideration before making it. Despite the controversy, the popularity of the show allowed it to be renewed for a season two.