ITC rejects complaints over Channel 4 ‘placenta dinner’

A Channel 4 programme featuring a family eating a woman’s placenta to celebrate a baby’s birth provoked 21 complaints – but none were upheld by the Independent Television Commission.

The regulator concluded that the episode of TV Dinners, broadcast at 8.30pm last February, did not breach the Programme Code on taste and decency, because the subject was treated in an unsensational and responsible way.

LWT was rapped for a clip it showed of an obese man unable to move unaided. Tarrant on TV, broadcast last January, featured a clip from the Jerry Springer Show in which an obese man, who was visibly distressed, was interviewed.

Complaints from 18 viewers were upheld as the ITC judged that the clip “was intended not so much as an illustration of varying standards of taste and decency… but as an invitation to laugh at a distressed and tearful man who had admitted he was afraid he might die because of his condition”.

The regulatory body also judged Channel 4’s coverage of the NME Music Awards in January to be in breach of the Sponsorship Code, because it contained an excessive number of references to the sponsor, NME magazine. These references included an interview with the title’s editor and posters featuring the magazine frequently in the frame.