(RNN) – A petition with more than 100,000 signatures is circulating to stop the release of an upcoming Netflix TV show called “Insatiable” that critics say is built around a crass, body-shaming premise.
The show is set to release on Aug. 10. Its trailer depicts the main character, Patty, played by Debby Ryan, as an unpopular loser who eats too much. Other students taunt her, saying things like, “smells like bacon,” when she runs by in gym class.
But, apparently after getting hit in the face and spending a summer with her jaw wired shut, she returns to school significantly thinner, more confident, and ready to exact revenge on everyone.
Netflix’s description for the show reads: “A bullied teenager turns to beauty pageants as a way to exact her revenge, with the help of a disgraced coach who soon realizes he’s in over his head.”
But the petition, posted to change.org, contends that the show reinforces a harmful message.
“For so long, the narrative has told women and young impressionable girls that in order to be popular, have friends, to be desirable for the male gaze, and to some extent be a worthy human… that we must thin,” it reads.
It adds that the series, “perpetuates not only the toxicity of diet culture, but the objectification of women’s bodies.”
So far the petition has gotten more than 120,000 signatures.
People adding their names have fiercely agreed wit the petition’s objection.
“OUR WEIGHT DOES NOT DEFINE OUR WORTH!” wrote Maria Simcina. “Women and young girls deserve more than being fed lies like these.”
“Such broadcasts have only led people’s lives to be full of inferiority complex, depression, suicides and the constant thought of not being good enough for almost anything in life,” another signer, Devyani Deo, wrote. “We must stop this.”
Ryan, the show’s star, responded to criticism with a lengthy note posted to Twitter over the weekend.
“As someone who cares deeply about the way our bodies, especially women’s, are shamed and policed in society, I was so excited to work on Insatiable because it’s a show that addresses and confronts those ideas through satire,” she wrote in part. “The humor is not in the fat-shaming … The redemption is in identifying and saying, ‘This is not okay.’”
— debbyryan (@DebbyRyan) July 21, 2018
Her message was retweeted more than 2,000 times and liked more than 16,000 times.
Alyssa Milano, a co-star of the show and outspoken liberal and feminist activist, also defended its content.
“We are not shaming Patty. We are addressing (through comedy) the damage that occurs from fat shaming,” she wrote.
But many respondents still criticized Ryan for wearing a fat suit to play the earlier version of Patty, and noted that any message of empowerment would likely be lost in the show’s optics.
“As an adult, this makes perfect sense,” one Twitter user wrote of Ryan’s explanation. “As a fat teen who sat alone binge eating in her room the only thing I’d have focused on is that a girl ‘gets hot’ in one summer. I used to daydream about going back to school thin and pretty so all other messages would have been lost on me.”
Netflix has not commented on the backlash.
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