I chose to watch the show Saved by the Bell for my supplemental screening. This is a show that my generation has had a lot of exposure to because it was heavily syndicated in our early teen years. I have probably seen almost every episode of this show at some point in my life so I decided to re-watch a handful of episodes that seem particularly poignant to our discussions this week. The episodes I chose were selected throughout the seasons and I tried to find ones that hit commonly discussed teen issues like drug use, alcohol abuse, and sex. Surprisingly I was unable to find any episodes that dealt with or even mentioned sex at all. The whole gambit of teen topics are hit throughout the seasons but for some reason sex has been completely omitted even though there the main characters of the show are very obviously interested in the opposite sex and are often in relationships.
The lack of sex in Saved by the Bell contrasts sharply with what we saw this week in Secret Life of the American Teenager. While SLAT doesn’t show actually show any sex in the show, it is the show’s primary theme and it is discussed very frequently by the characters. Due to SLAT’s and the shows ever present message about teen sex it would seem to suggest that the life of an American teenager revolves around sex. However when watching Saved by the Bell I came away with a much different idea about what its creators think that lives of teenagers revolve around. Most of the story line in Saved by the Bell actually revolves around commentary on the dichotomy between the popular/jock/cheerleader crowd and the unpopular/nerdy crowd. Personally, I think that Saved by the Bell offers a more realistic portrayal of what is actually on teenager’s minds the SLAT. When I was a teenager I feel most people I knew were most concerned with their social standing then they were with sex. It is important to also note here that aside from their difference in portrayal of teenagers the shows are from two very different genres, sitcom and drama. SLAT carries with it a pretty serious message while Saved by the Bell is at its very core a fairly light hearted comedy but I don’t think that this difference in genre offers much of an explanation for why one show ignores sex and why the other discusses it almost exclusively.
One of my working theories for why sex isn’t present in the Saved by the Bell is something we discussed in class; the thought that teenagers will emulate what they see on television. This thought process coupled with a general hesitancy to show any racy material on television was much more prominent in the early 1990’s when this show was being made. Now it is much more common for television producers to push the envelope in terms of what they want to expose the general public to. By saying this I am not implying that SLAT is by any means a racy show but I am saying that in the early 1990’s television producers may not have been comfortable with a show target to teenagers openly discussing sex.
In the end I think that Saved by the Bell does a good job of touching on a wide variety of problem and scenarios that teenagers face in spite of its exclusion of sex from its plot lines. The show finds a way of demonstrating moral lessons without feeling preachy and in your face about it like SLAT does. Also, the show is just really entertaining and watching it again just reminds me of how much I liked the show when I was younger. I would hope that in the future teen television could gravitate back towards shows like this and away from overly message driven shows like SLAT.
Do you think that the reason Saved by the Bell does not deal with sex is because the producers do not feel that it is on the mind of high schoolers? Are the producers of Saved by the Bell try to emulate what life is like in high school? I decided to do my supplemental screening on Saved by the Bell as well. Interestingly, it seems like the episodes I watched were much earlier than the ones you watched. Just in the “No Hope for Dope” video you played, the characters looked much different and the guys had gone through puberty while this was not the case in episodes form the first season that I watched. For the episodes that I watched, it seemed that Saved by the Bell was clearly not targeting a high school audience, but instead was playing down. The humor was definitely targeting a younger audience and the show had an overall pretty goofy feel to it. Did you get the same sense from the episodes that you watched? I will agree with you that Saved by the Bell hits on a lot more social dilemmas that actually take place in high school like the jocks/nerds dichotomy you mentioned and social standing. However, I do feel that sex is a pretty big social topic in the later years of high school. I do not think that SLAT deals with the issue of sex well (I feel that abstinence and facts are shoved down the throats of the viewers). However, I am surprised that Saved by the Bell does not deal with sex at all. I agree with you that watching Saved by the Bell was a little bit of a blast from the past for me as well and I really enjoyed watching it again as it brought back memories.