“A girl this pretty is not supposed to be poor.”
That's what Samantha Horton, a character on the July 19 Lifetime movie “The Clint List” said in justifying her decision to become a prostitute.
Jennifer Love Hewitt played Horton, a former
Hewitt, who also produced the made-for-TV movie, said making the movie opened her eyes to the realities of the current economy, and the lengths to which people would – and should – go to make ends meet.
“I didn't realize how judgmental I was about that stuff,” Hewitt told USA Today [1] July 19 referring to prostitution. “As I kind of got into playing it, you start to understand. I was really interested in the fact that there are more housewives and women going into the sex industry than ever before. I think that I always thought that it was something they chose, but in my character's case, she's left with no other option.”
The way Lifetime and USA Today presented it, a viewer or reader might think prostitution was the only option. It's a solution the media have presented before [2].
Hewitt presented similar views on the necessity of prostitution in interviews on “Entertainment Tonight [3]” and “The View [4].” She cited unnamed studies she claimed showed more and more housewives were turning to prostitution to support their families.
“The Client List” isn't the only television show promotion prostitution as a way to make ends meet. The HBO series “Hung [5]” depicts a father entrenched in the life of male prostitution to support his kids.
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