NBC, Please make up your mind

I was watching the Today Show last week, and they were all ga-ga over the new pictures of Jamie Lynn Spears' new baby. I personally don't think that showing glamorous pictures of an unmarried teenage mother with no education and no job on national television is such a good idea. Let her raise her child and get out of the spotlight. I also almost barfed when the "reporter" on the segment mentioned how her mother, Lynne Spears, raised her in a traditional household. Yeah, traditional in the "let my teenage daughter dress up like a street walker and dance on TV" sense. Puhlease.

But I held my craw down and went on with my morning rituals while I waited for the real news to come on.

A few moments later, Today did a segment on the new NBC program called "The Baby Borrowers" in which teenage couples are given the responsibility of caring for children in different stages of development. The producer was on to defend the show as a social experiment which tries to convince teenagers in general how difficult it is to raise a family, especially at a young age. I'm not a fan of the show, but the Irish Woman is intrigued by it, so I've seen one episode. Some of the kids do really well, and most of them really try to do the best they can. Some are real train wrecks, and it's sad to watch them.

I don't agree with the idea of letting young strangers be responsible for your children, but I agree with the message.

But it occured to me that NBC was sending mixed signals here. In one breath, they were talking about how beautiful it is that an underage girl can have a baby, and in the next they're trumpeting a show that's ostensibly designed to prevent teenage parenting.

So which is it, or do they not have an agenda at all? Are they caught in a moral quandary where they want to coo over a baby while at the same time trying to prevent identical situations from happening, or is this a case of the right hand not knowing what the left is doing?

I dropped an email to the NBC ombudsman, but no answer so far. I'll not hold my breath.