The show was “inspired” by a video of this woman’s natural birth.And let’s be real here. The outcome could be completely devastating. Childbirth might be beautiful and miraculous, but it’s also one of the most dangerous things a woman can do. Children die, women die, and there are any number of dire medical complications that could arise. What are they going to do in such a situation, ask the sound guy to stop the bleeding? Yell at the dude holding the boom to perform emergency resuscitation? Rely on the director to prevent a woman dying from eclampsia?In 2013, according to the World Health Organisation, 289,000 women died giving birth. For every one of those deaths, there were another 20 women who suffered injuries during childbirth, became infected, or contracted a disease. 10 million women a year are gravely affected by giving birth.This TV show is an insult to every single one of them.Women and girls in developing countries have no choice but to give birth unassisted and ‘in nature’. Yet, here we have a group of privileged American adults volunteering to give birth in squalid conditions, consenting to have it filmed and broadcast on television for the purposes of entertainment. If that’s not the most perverse, repugnant indictment of our crazed desire for televised “reality” I don’t know what it is.
