Staying Alive is more than a game in CBS's Controversial new mini-series

Four scantily clad men and women trudge through the mud, their faces and bodies camouflaged with leaves, desperately hunting for a scrap of meat in the dense jungle. They communicate with their hands, a language only they know, a language they invented so that they don't scare off dinner. Suddenly, a man in the pack yelps and falls to the ground. The other three panic, not knowing what's wrong. Did he step in a ditch and sprain his ankle? Or had he been bitten by the Sea Krait water snake, the world's most venomous serpent? The experts had warned them about that, but nobody really thought it would happen. Suddenly somebody snaps, running off into the woods alone in a blind panic. What will happen to him? Tune in next week.

No, this isn't another movie version of _Lord of the Flies_. This is a possibility for a real situation on "Survivor," and this summer, it's coming to network television, along with a similarly unpredictable show, "Big Brother." Although on the surface, these shows seem harmlessly entertaining, disturbing undertones peek through under closer inspection.

These two shows are the latest imports from Europe. ABC scored a huge ratings boost with England's "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" CBS hopes to match this with Sweden's "Survivor" and the Netherlands' "Big Brother," which has finished its run there and is currently filming in Germany.

However, German politicians have raised questions about the moral tone of these voyeur shows. They have called for a ban of "Big Brother," saying it violates media laws protecting human dignity. Bavarian official Erwin Huber calls the show "a new dimension in sensationalism... and voyeurism." But the laws' vagueness have prevented any action against the show, which has been very successful for the RTL II network, which had previously focused its programming on American reruns and soft-core pornography.

Is CBS trying to exploit this controversy for ratings success? The eye network does survive in the ratings wars between the Big Three, but just barely. And with flagships shows like "Touched by an Angel" and "60 Minutes," it often fails to capture the lucrative 18-49 demographic. So is CBS willing to air these shows which exploit their contestants in an attempt to win back the youth audience?

The first of these shows, "Survivor," is currently in production and slated to begin airing on a weekly basis starting Wednesday, May 31. Jeff Probst, of VH-1's "Rock & Roll Jeopardy," will serve as the host of this island odyssey, whose motto is "Outwit, Outplay, Outlast." In mid-March, sixteen castaways (eight men, eight women) were dropped on an uninhabited island in the South China Sea. They must build their own shelter and gather their own food. They are allowed only one "non-survivor tool" from home, like a picture or a hairbrush, but nothing else. They will have no contact with the outside world.