Noting how many of the Cougar participants said they were more than happy to have a seasoned woman show them the ropes, the Los Angeles Times said: “Flip the genders, and this might feel unreasonably, and uncomfortably predatory. But The Cougar gamely toes the line between breaking taboos on exploring the sexuality of older women and wantonly exploiting them. As do the men, who are willing participants at the bottom end of the power dynamic.”

After The Cougar established that Anderson was smokin’ hot, it briefly -- very briefly -- let viewers see Anderson’s maternal side, something to which the young “cubs” were not privy. Viewers learned that Anderson got married at age 16 and spent her late teens, twenties and thirties raising four children. (No word on what happened to the husband.) Three of her children were shown on camera hugging her in their kitchen before Anderson traveled to Los Angeles for the show’s taping. Two of her children, one of whom appeared to be of grade school age, expressed interest in seeing their mom find a husband.

Interestingly, as the twentysomething were chatting up Anderson individually, a few speculated about how old she might be and raised the specter of motherhood. In her blog Anderson said, “Bodie, the pool boy [age 23], posed the question to the guys about children, but not one guy posed the question to me. It's very important to be able to share the fact that I do have children, and I'm curious who will ultimately ask me first. I'm not happy that these guys haven't been bold enough to ask me yet!” (For the record, Anderson’s oldest child is 23, the Arizona Republic reported. The first man with whom Anderson spent time alone had recently turned 21 and was still celebrating the fact that he could drink alcohol legally.)

The obvious question left hanging after the pilot episode: When these guys find out that Anderson gave birth to four children to whom they could potentially be step-fathers – the eldest of whom is older than some of them -- will Anderson suddenly seem not so attractive, or will her maternity be a non-issue? Overall, the notion of older women, particularly mothers, dating younger men becoming societally acceptable is interesting, laudable, worthy of sociological studies, books and thoughtful articles. But through the lens of this base-level exploitation-fest, not so much.

Writing in Salon, Rebecca Traister observed: “Cougars, as we portray and celebrate them, are mimicking the midlife crisis-penis-car-crippling-insecurity version of mature masculinity. They are trying to be the dudes who are half-reviled and half-heroic in the American imagination, the ones who ditch their longtime partners for uncomplicated trophy sylphs who supposedly won't argue with them about either U.S. policy in Afghanistan or whose day it is to drive carpool.”

While I, a newly christened 40-year-old, watched this show, I didn’t feel “hear me [the cougar] roar” empowerment. Instead, I felt sad for Anderson, who likely could’ve found love without the glare of the cameras, sans the cheap double-entendres and the immature males running around the “Cougar Villa” like little boys trying to get mommy’s attention.