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Welcome to Thong Island

By Bill Zahren
(Posted 01/08/01)

What’s this Temptation Island thing? What’s that all about? Let me see if I have the premise correct here:

Take four unmarried couples to an island to hang out with 26 single people with single-digit body fat wearing clothing with a total combined area of roughly the top of my desk? Do I have it right? It’s set on the Island of Thonga.

If there’s an untanned female butt cheek on the whole island I’ll kiss yours. Ah, but it’s NOT about sex, according to FOX network, proud creator of Temptation Island. How would we get that idea based on relentless promos featuring people writhing in hot tubs? How could that be about sex?

But, let me just reproduce here how FOX.com describes Temptation Island:

“Temptation Island is a provocative new reality-based show produced by Rocket Science Laboratories. Four unmarried couples at a crossroads in their relationship and 26 singles that are looking for love travel to an exotic location to test the waters of temptation. The couples, who are willing to test their relationships, will be set up on a variety of dates with three of the singles that best reflect their ideal mate. After two weeks of exploring the single world again, the couples will have the opportunity to discover if they have found the perfect mate.”

OK, now it’s all clear to me. It’s about the “opportunity to discover if they have found the perfect mate.” Get to know members of the opposite sex on a deep, personal, spiritual level. So in that sense, it’s really a public service. So it’s 26 hard bodies basically there as bait for the “four unmarried couples” who are doing it based on their extreme, Judeo-Christian belief that finding the right life partner is part of God’s plan for their lives.

Look! Monkeys are flying out of my butt! Either one of two things makes this so not an “opportunity to discover if they have found the perfect mate”: Cash or exposure. Either the participants are getting cash or, more likely, they’re all doing it to get on the tube and fashion themselves television personality careers like the rat eaters from Survivor.

The sad thing is, I have no confidence that people will do the one thing that will kill Temptation Island and shows of its reality-based ilk. That is, not watch in great numbers. No ratings, no advertisers. No advertisers, no show. I’m hoping ratings stink, but I expect them to be HUGE, because people want to see if Bobby with the hot butt gets Janet with the bodacious ta-tas to go to his cabana and leave Jimmy the janitor, with whom she was “happy” for four years, weeping on the beach with a camera in his face.

I’m just angry in general at the “reality-based shows” that grow ever lamer. First of all, I got my own reality-based life to deal with. I don’t need to be watching others do reality-based things like cover themselves in ritual body mud and grovel for cash. And I could not possibly care less who the Mole is.

Sure, it’s a free country and people can watch whatever they want. You want to watch Speedo Island, knock yourself out. In fact, the reason we have this viral outbreak of “reality-based” shows is because so many people hung on every second of Survivor.

People vote by watching, and billions watched Survivor. Let the record show I am one of an estimated five Americans who didn’t watch even one second of Survivor. Because I got more important stuff to do than watch people eat rat and play silly reindeer games. I have to write incredibly valuable contributions to American discourse like this one. I have a house that’s just waiting for me to waste time watching a “reality-based” show so it can spring multiple leaks and heave up coffins in the backyard.

As for me, I've operated under a couple rules ever since becoming a married person, lo these 15 years:

No. 1: Always keep your pants on. Never remove your pants in the presence of someone who’s not legally your spouse, except in locker rooms and for qualified, medical personnel or in emergencies, like if your pants are technically on fire. Bill Clinton violated this one and flushed his presidency. How much relationship pain and suffering would be avoided if people just kept their pants on?

No. 2: If you get into a Temptation Island, run. Extend and escape. Don’t even put yourself in that position, Sparky. (Not that I’ve ever had any tempting situations, honey.) Frankly, I’m still in shock that I found one woman willing to marry and stick with me for nearly 16 years.

And if you think I’m shocked, you should see my parents, sister and the members of Rhonda’s family. Stunned is an understatement. “Do you think Rhonda has a brain tumor?” they whisper as she leaves the room. “She must. Why else would she marry Bill the Troll?”

So I’m not screwing that up any time soon. Besides, no tawdry hussy in a thong can put me asunder from the Squeeze. Still, you won’t see me going to Temptation Island to prove it. It’s the same as being confident I can survive a bullet wound to the leg yet not lining up to get shot.

And, if you think I want my wife cavorting around with a dozen Fabio-like guys, you’ve been huffing paint. Sure, I trust her with my life and consider us a unit and it’s all about “until death do us part,” but the Speedo boys can just back off. For the same reason, the thong women are going to have to sip tropical drinks in the hot tub without me. I’m pretty sure they’ll be busted up about it.

Don’t watch Temptation Island. Read a book. Take the life partner out on a date. Play Scrabble with the kids. It’s the only way we can kill the reality-based virus.

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