This show is absolutely disgusting and its airing almost certainly harms FX's growing reputation in the UK. I am a big fan of FX and would like to vent some of my grievances about the show on this forum. Each show follows a similar pattern, which will be outlined below.
Once the online 'predator' has arrived at a pre-arranged location to meet a teenager (presumably for sex), the show's host, Chris, suddenly appears from nowhere and begins quizzing the 'predator' as to why he is meeting a teenage girl he met online. The host brings out a transcript of their original web chat and asks them a bunch of questions about it - not to titillate, no God no - but in order that we viewers might forge a better understanding of the twisted mindset of the child sex predator. And because it'll make us guffaw like cartoon donkeys when they desperately try to explain away all the references to blowjobs and penis size in their chatroom chinwag. It's the back-pedalling Olympics.
After making them sweat for several minutes, Chris reveals his camera crew and tells them they're on national television. Ta da! You're on Paedle's About! At this point their faces tend to fall still further. They start crying and begging. Some of them probably poo themselves, although they don't show that. But the worst is yet to come: at this point, Chris unexpectedly waves them goodbye, and they walk out, sighing with relief... only to walk face-first into a bunch of armed police who hurl them to the ground and arrest them (occasionally after a completely unwarranted surge of electricity from a taser gun). Then we get to see them being interviewed AGAIN, this time by the police, who aren't quite as debonair and charming as Chris (and are markedly less keen on poring over all the online sex talk than him).
And then it's over. Justice prevails - provided you overlook the several billion troubling aspects to the show. The overpowering whiff of entrapment, for one thing. The collusion between reporters, vigilante groups and police for another. And that "attractive young actress" who greets them by the door: make no mistake, she's hot. And at 18, she's US legal. Presumably someone at To Catch A Predator HQ sat down with a bunch of audition tapes and spooled through it, trying to find a sexy 18-year-old who could pass for 13. They'll have stared at girl after girl, umming and ahhing over their chest sizes, until they found just the right one. And like I say, she's hot. But if you fancy her, you're a paedophile.
'To Catch a Predator' really is a disturbing piece of trash-TV which fuels stereotypes about crap American shows and channels such as FX. If FX wants to be seen as an intelligent, pioneering and entertaining channel in the UK its executives should really consider pulling the show from its schedule. Any show which makes you feel sympathy for a potential paedophile has something inherently wrong about it.
I noticed that there is no dedicated forum for this show. I can only hope that FX's webteam aren't hoping to suppress any debate about what must be its most controversial show. I welcome any opinions regarding the show, and so should this forum's moderators.