From the same network that brought you Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire? and the glowing hockey puck, Fox is promising another blockbuster season of compelling programming. Headlining the onslaught of new shows is a drama about real life in a Boston high school. Boston Public is a new show premiering later this month that focuses on the daily grind of high school life from the perspective of teachers and administrators of a middle-class high school in Boston.

What caught my attention is the angle Fox is using to promote this new show. According to Fox's Boston Public Web site, the first episode features "a teacher meltdown, a failing football hero, and a legal battle."

Gritty Web site teasers such as "At Winslow High in Boston, it's the staff versus the students" only add to the suspense. Seems tempting — probably not the kind of thing that happened at your high school.

But the Web site makes little mention of the hook that has been used in every television and radio spot promoting the show. Advertisements running during the National League baseball playoffs and NFL football promise a more interesting topic in the first episode, namely the controversy surrounding a female student who decides to forgo the use of a bra.

While using sex to boost ratings is nothing new at Fox, this stoops to a new low. Fox pioneered the genre of sexually charged teenage programming with shows like Beverly Hills 90210.

But the target audience of Boston Public seems to be adult males. Running ads that deal with female teenage sexuality during programming geared towards middle age males suggests Fox is not interested in tackling a hot topic among teenagers or deal with an issue on women's rights. It instead suggests the rather demented notion that middle age males should be and are interested in the developing sexuality of adolescent women.

Several sexually flavored ads for Boston Public have appeared over the last few weeks. One spot cuts to a shot of a school official that refers to female students as "Communist sluts." If this is the conversation that takes place in the hallways, I wonder what the teachers talk about in the faculty lounge.

It is difficult to fully articulate how this type of programming should be accurately described, but the terms smut, trash, filth and rubbish come to mind. Exploiting women is disturbing enough, but exploiting the sexuality of teenage girls in an attempt to boost ratings and advertising revenue is disgusting. Unfortunately, it is not surprising. The Fox network has proven it will go to any length to garner ratings, including airing a shady game show where single females lined up to marry a gentleman with a fat wallet and a criminal past. While Fox is also home to quality shows such as The X-Files and The Simpsons, few would disagree that Fox was the bottom of the network barrel until the WB and UPN came along.

The Fox family of networks has tried to gain respectability, notably with the addition of the Fox News cable station and the purchase of the Family Channel. Nevertheless, the cavalier selling of pubescent sexuality on a flagship fall series shows where the true motives of the moneychangers at Fox lie.

Sadly enough, Boston Public will likely be hailed as a gripping series by the critics and a ratings winner by advertisers.

But, then again, maybe viewers will reward this trashy show with trashy ratings, and by the end of the season Boston Public will be remembered, along with the glowing hockey puck, as another Fox failure.