TARGET: TRASH

By Belinda Luscombe

ANYONE WATCHING DAYTIME TV this week will see loud people arguing over topics like "You Want More Sex Than I Do," "I Want to Be an Escort" and "My Girlfriend Is a Guy." To some viewers that's entertainment. To others it's idiocy. To former Education Secretary William Bennett, it's cause for alarm. Bennett and C. DeLores Tucker, noted gangsta-rap haters, have joined with Senators Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and Sam Nunn of Georgia in a campaign to wean Americans off what they call "cultural rot."

"These shows increasingly make the abnormal normal and set up the most perverse role models," says Lieberman. "It's time for a revolt of the revolted."

Bennett & Co. want to "shame" the shows' producers, advertisers and viewers into cleaning up. (Obviously there isn't much point in trying to shame the guests.) It won't be easy. Nearly every talk show that has tried "serious" subjects has floundered in the ratings, while those on a diet of sex and sensationalism have done well. Only Oprah Winfrey--held up by Lieberman as exemplary--has kept to the relatively high road, but her ratings (though still No. 1) are down.

Some talkmeisters respond with defiance. "Most of what we do on the show is funny," says Jerry Springer, who attended a talk-show summit in New York City last weekend. "The guests are entertaining. Our show is a silly show. Get a life!" But Gordon Elliott concedes, "I don't think Bennett is off the mark. The concerns he has, every family man and family woman would have." Sounds like fodder for at least a week of shows.

--Reported by Daniel S. Levy/New York

With reporting by Daniel S. Levy/New York