by Ben Shapiro
To that end, the show now has versions of itself in countries all over the world, all of which lean left. Sesame Street is now viewed by 75 million people globally. “We definitely have a social agenda,” explained Shari Rosenfeld, vice president of developing and emerging markets. “In Israel, we focus on mutual respect and understanding and child empowerment. In Palestine, on boys’ education and positive role models. . . . But we don’t dictate that agenda.”23 In case you missed it, this is negative multiculturalism at work—preaching tolerance to Israelis while preaching boys’ education in the Palestinian territories isn’t exactly evenhanded, particularly when the Palestinian population’s normal children’s television teaches children about terrorism and murder. Just to ram the point home, Gary Knell, president and CEO of the Sesame Workshop, says that he’s proud to point out to Israelis that “the Arab child in the village near your home in Haifa has aspirations to be a doctor, just like you” (which, of course, the Israelis already know, since they are the only country in the Middle East that allows Arabs to vote); he says nothing whatsoever about what Palestinian children are to be taught, though the lesson not to murder seems much simpler.24
The bias at Sesame Street really broke out into the open in 2009, when Oscar the Grouch trashed Fox News on his Grouchy News Network. “From now on I am watching Pox News,” a caller to the show stated. “Now there is a trashy news show.” The PBS ombudsman suggested that the parody was “too good to resist.”25 It wasn’t an idle pun—in the same program, CNN’s Anderson Cooper showed up to chat with the children.
“EVERYONE IS SPECIAL”
It wasn’t a long way from Captain Kangaroo’s self-esteem philosophy to Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood was based on the same premises of diversity and tolerance as Captain Kangaroo, which was no surprise, since Rogers had been trained at the Arsenal Family and Children Center, founded by Dr. Benjamin Spock (a socialist and the founder of the modern children’s self-esteem movement) and Margaret McFarland, who would become chief advisor to the show.
Fred Rogers was a Presbyterian minister who believed that poor children in particular needed self-esteem. “We don’t need a lot of loud, fast-paced, violent images to fill the minds of children,” Rogers once said, no doubt with Sesame Street at least partially in mind. “I think it’s easy to make that kind of thing attractive. I think it’s difficult to make goodness attractive.”26 His slow-paced program was an antidote to the frenetic Sesame Street, which some educators argued made it a better choice (certain psychologists suggest that Sesame Street’s Laugh-In-esque quick-cutting promotes ADD in children).
Rogers was apolitical, but he combined a conservative view of the world with a liberal view of humanity. “The world is not always a kind place,” he said once. To teach children that lesson, he took on issues like divorce, telling kids that it wasn’t their fault; war, assuring children that they would be safe; and even death. Morality still played a role in his show, whereas it didn’t in later children’s productions. In one song, he sang, “It’s great to be able to stop / When you’ve planned a thing that’s wrong.”27 During another episode of the show, he encouraged kids to turn off the television when they saw something violent or scary. On a specific level, Mr. Rogers drew distinctions between right and wrong behavior.
But at the same time, Rogers believed that everyone needed to be accepted for “who they are,” no matter what their behavior. “You make each day a special day,” he’d say on his program. “You know how, by just being you. There’s only one person in this whole world like you. And people can like you exactly as you are.”
That second message became the basis of later children’s television, while the first message—traditional morality—faded away. The apotheosis of the self-esteem movement hit the airwaves in 1992. It centered on a make-believe big purple dinosaur who annoyed millions of teens and adults, but enthralled millions of children. The show, of course, was Barney & Friends.
Whereas Mister Rogers dealt with tough issues and attempted to cope with children’s feelings, Barney had one message and one message only: Everyone is special. In fact, it was a message the dinosaur often sang. “I love you, you love me, we’re a happy family!” Barney sang in his clumsy, good-natured voice. “With a great big hug and a kiss from me to you / Won’t you say you love me too?” This was innocuous. But another song was not. “Oh, you are special! Special! Everybody’s special!” went another ditty. “Everyone in his or her own way.” This is strict liberal thought down to the correct usage of alternative gender pronouns.
In one sense, Barney was a step up from Sesame Street: Its milieu was strictly middle class, a clean preschool playground where you’d be astonished to find a monster that lived in a garbage can. And Barney was unsparingly saccharine, with no bad guys in sight. Critics preferred the occasional grumpiness and wink-wink urban nature of Sesame Street. “Barney is molding the future of our nation,” complained James Gorman in the New York Times, “and he’s a bad influence. . . . It’s as if the National Association for the Promotion of Blandness had created its dream show.”28 In a certain sense, then, Barney was a reversion to historic children’s shows, which sought mostly to entertain rather than to address controversy.
PBS’s response was the creation of another puppet show, The Puzzle Place. This show was unabashedly political, far more so than even Sesame Street. One third-season episode of the show, “Family Fun,” for example, featured discussion of same-sex parents. Cartoon shows from PBS became more and more openly liberal over time: In 2005, Postcards from Buster, an animated show about a traveling rabbit, courted controversy when it showed Buster traveling to Vermont and meeting gay parents. Brigid Sullivan, producer of the show, said that the show was designed to incorporate diversity into “the fabric of the series to help children understand and respect differences and learn to live in a multicultural society.” Sullivan added, “we are trying to do a broad reach and we are trying to do it without judgment.”29 Arthur, a well-made and tremendously popular PBS series produced by the same people as Buster, says that its purpose is to “chronicle the adventures of Arthur (an eight-year-old aardvark) through engaging, emotional stories that explore issues faced by real kids. It is a comedy that tells these stories from a kid’s point of view without moralizing. . . .”30 What, exactly, is the problem of “moralizing” to children? Isn’t that the point of parenting and/or educational television?
Tolerance and diversity geared toward fostering often unearned self-esteem is now the order of the day on children’s television. No longer are children even given the guidance they received from Mr. Rogers; now they’re told that they are special, that accepting everyone no matter their behavior is the epitome of goodness, and that all cultures are equal.
Children’s television programs universally embrace these messages. For example, in 2005, the good-hearted We Are Family Foundation (WAFF), created by Nile Rodgers, the legendary guitarist, organized a program spanning most children’s television shows, including Barney, Arthur, Sesame Street, Bob the Builder, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Jimmy Neutron, The Magic School Bus, Rugrats, and SpongeBob SquarePants, among dozens of others.31 The goal: the creation of a video “celebrat[ing] . . . the vision of a global family by creating and supporting programs that inspire and educate people about mutual respect, understanding, and appreciation of cultural diversity.”32
This is all well and good, except that appreciation for cultural diversity often means accepting lifestyles that are problematic (the treatment of women in Saudi Arabia would be an excellent example) or at the very least controversial (the Tolerance Pledge posted on the WAFF website included a request for respect for homosexuality, and the website itself also included lesson topics ripping “the concepts of homophobia and compulsory heterosexuality”).33 The more controversial material wasn’t included in the video, so the kids weren’t exposed to it. Nonetheless, Rodgers defended it, stating, “The fact that some peopl
e may be upset with other peoples’ lifestyles, that is O.K. We are just talking about respect.”34 That, of course, is the point—many parents don’t want their children exposed to these issues at an early age and taught values that jeopardize their innocence.
Did the video itself damage kids? Of course not. But as standards are lowered with regard to material appropriate for children—a process that occurs continuously—it may not be long before seemingly apolitical messages graduate into fully political ones.
NICKELODEON: MTV FOR KIDS
On PBS, political messages are sometimes concealed. Not at Nickelodeon. Nickelodeon is owned by MTV, which should say something right off the bat as to what they believe children should be seeing. Robert Pittman, a vocal liberal whom you may remember from our earlier discussion of MTV’s rise, ran the children’s network. Early on, it struggled. Then, in the mid-1980s, Pittman elevated Geraldine Laybourne to head Nick. Laybourne would later go on to found and head the Oxygen Network alongside Oprah and the Marcy Carsey/Tom Werner team. Her philosophy sounds eerily like that of the Sesame Street folks. “We are here to accept kids, to help them feel good about themselves,” she explained. Her mission was “to connect with kids, and to connect kids with their world through entertainment.”35
In true MTV style, Nick’s goal of catering to kids wasn’t in conflict with Nick’s attempts to achieve ratings in any way possible. That marriage of convenience and liberal sensibility cleared the way for the most vulgar cartoon ever aired on television up to that time: The Ren & Stimpy Show. Ren was a Chihuahua; Stimpy was a cat. The show gloried in snot, farts, and excrement, as well as sexual innuendo. It was hardly educational, unless you call a trip to the public park urinal educational.
The creator of the show was John Kricfalusi, a wild man by all accounts. Vanessa Coffey, vice president of animation production at Nickelodeon, recalled Kricfalusi’s pitch for Ren & Stimpy to the Nickelodeon leadership: “I thought he was out of his f--- mind—but I was interested in his stuff.” Kricfalusi’s philosophy was simple: Outgross the competitors. “We’re making this for kids,” he told Allan Neuwirth. “They love gross stuff. So let’s give ’em boogers and farts!”36 Terry Thoren of animation company Klasky Csupo (responsible for Rugrats and Aaahh!!! Real Monsters), said the show “tapped into an audience that was a lot hipper than anybody thought. [Kricfalusi] went where no man wanted to go before—the caca, booger humor.”37 Ren & Stimpy eventually vulgarized its way off Nickelodeon entirely and onto MTV, then onto Spike TV, where new episodes featured a gay relationship between Ren and Stimpy.
Ren & Stimpy was indicative of the politics of the network, which quickly became the number-one cable channel in the country; Kricfalusi, who would leave the show after a couple of years, ended up changing the direction of Cartoon Network, as well. Nickelodeon was constantly pushing the envelope. They created a Saturday night block of programming complete with a Saturday Night Live for kids entitled All That, as well as a horror show, Are You Afraid of the Dark? This clearly wasn’t Sesame Street.
Every so often, the politics of the network would break through. The main vehicle for open politics was Linda Ellerbee’s Nick News, a show that featured kids talking about hot topics ranging from war to homelessness, and invariably taking the leftist position. The episode that drew the most ire came in 2002, when Ellerbee ran a special that clearly stumped for acceptance of gay rights. Titled “My Family’s Different,” it featured militant gay activist Rosie O’Donnell as co-host. The episode featured children talking about hate crimes, the comments of a gay school principal, and a profile of a gay firefighter with three adopted kids.
Ellerbee, who formerly worked at CNN and NBC, is a liberal. She framed the show as “about tolerance. . . . It is not about sex. It does not tell you what to think.” But naturally, it did, as most “tolerance of all behavior” messaging does. The section of the show about hate crimes was particularly effective. “It is never wrong to talk about hate,” said Ellerbee. “That’s all our show is about. It is not in any way about the homosexual lifestyle.”38
Another controversial episode of Nick News featured Ellerbee praising World Can’t Wait, a communist front group, protesting prisoner treatment at Guantánamo Bay, wearing orange jumpsuits and shouting “We are not okay with people being tortured by American soldiers!” That installment also followed a teenager who created an anti-Iraq War video depicting wounded Iraqi kids.39
Nickelodeon also takes a blasé view about teen sex. After Jamie Lynn Spears, star of the hit series Zoey 101, got pregnant at age sixteen, the network considered running a special—hosted by Ellerbee, of course—regarding sex and love, despite the fact that the chief audience for Spears’s show was aged nine to fourteen.40 Nickelodeon even puts sex talk tips on its website for parents, as well as the usual patter about “respect”: “6 to 10 million children have lesbian, gay, and bisexual parents. Everybody—kids, teachers and parents—should avoid generalizations about people based on their sexual orientation, or any other characteristic.”41
When it comes to President Obama, Nickelodeon is on the same page as MSNBC: It’s entirely fine with being utilized as a propaganda tool. In March 2009, shortly after Obama took office, Nick Jr., the portion of Nick’s programming aimed at the youngest audiences, broadcast a cartoon homage to Obama. “Nickelodeon celebrates President Barack Obama and some of his favorite things,” the cartoon proclaimed. “Barack Obama is the first African-American to be President. That is what’s called a historic event. . . . For more about President Barack Obama, go to parents.nickjr.com.” Needless to say, Nick did nothing of the sort about President Bush.42
Lately, Nickelodeon has been programming more explicitly toward older audiences. Glenn Martin, DDS is often rated TV-14 (i.e., appropriate only for audiences aged fourteen-plus), an odd designation on a channel that targets children aged six to twelve. The show is not for kids—it’s full of double entendres and features controversial characters and subject matter. One recent episode featured a female character taking off her shirt, a male character lying on top of her, and the female character casually stating, “Makeup sex is the best.” The show has also joked about a pornographic car GPS system that directs drivers to “Moorehead, Minnesota” and “Climax, Florida.” Characters have also watched pornography while babysitting. Cyra Zarghami, president of the network, admitted that the line between younger Nick audiences and older ones would “start to be a little blurrier.”43 “It is really an adult show,” Michael Eisner, creator of the show, admitted. “Children may be naturally attracted to animation . . . , but it is not a children’s show any more than any prime time comedy is aimed at children.”44
More and more, it’s becoming clear that Nickelodeon is aimed at feeding its viewers to MTV. Visitors to the Nickelodeon website can visit AddictingGames.com (owned by parent company Viacom), which is linked directly from Nick and which carries the Nick imprimatur, where they can play games like Naughty Park, in which players attempt to get joggers naked, or Perry the Perv, in which players help Perry get glimpses of big-bosomed women without getting caught.45 Nick frequently shows commercials for MTV products. The symbiosis between the two channels is obvious. “We are managing this company for one thing and one thing only,” said an unapologetic Sumner Redstone, chairman and CEO of Viacom, which owns both MTV and Nick. “To build shareholder wealth. You can count on us to exploit every opportunity to grow revenues.”46 Zarghami was clearer: “MTV Networks goes from cradle to grave.”47
DISNEY CHANNEL: MANUFACTURING STARS
Disney children’s television has always been at least partially about the creation of stars. The original Mickey Mouse Club featured future movie personalities like Annette Funicello, who would go on to star in all of the Beach Party movies with Frankie Avalon. The Mickey Mouse Club remained a font for future stars until its cancellation in 1996—Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears, and Justin Timberlake were among the most famous.
The success of The Mickey Mouse Club in creating future mainstream crossover stars eventually took over the channel. No longer would Disney Channel be the repository of clean and innocent children’s television; now it would appeal to “tweens”—preteens who were to be treated as teenagers. That transformation truly began to accelerate after Anne Sweeney, a former executive at Nickelodeon and the former CEO of the adults-only FX Network, took the helm. “We found there was this huge demo that was too old for Nickelodeon and too young for MTV,” she said. “We realized this was an opportunity for Disney to establish itself in the lives of these kids.” With Sweeney’s marketing genius, Disney quickly became one of the biggest profit makers in the Disney pantheon. Disney started programming specials starring Aguilera, the Backstreet Boys, ’N Sync, and Spears. When those acts went too raunchy, Disney began creating fresh ones. “We’re not naïve or coy about saying that we knew if we could do it for others, we could do it for ourselves,” said Rich Ross, president of Disney Channels Worldwide at the time. That meant creating teen sensations like Hilary Duff and Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana, as well as franchises like High School Musical.
This is all relatively mild stuff, of course. Until, that is, the teen stars of these programs go adult. “It keeps me up at night,” Gary Marsh, then Disney Channel’s president of entertainment, told Portfolio.com. “Our job is to make sure none of this stuff gets out of control.”48 And yet Disney Channel seems utterly unconcerned about its stars’ consistent attempts to sex things up. Miley Cyrus, Disney’s most successful star, is only the latest to follow this path. After pole-dancing at the 2009 Teen Choice Awards, then touring the world while simulating lesbian kisses, Cyrus is due to star in LOL: Laughing Out Loud, a movie in which she will reportedly smoke pot, get drunk, lose her virginity, display her waxed vagina, and make out with two other girls.49 Disney Channel isn’t responsible for its stars after they leave, of course, but it’s worth noting that Hilary Duff has now appeared in Gossip Girl, where she participated in a threesome; Spears’s and Aguilera’s controversial hijinks are well known; Vanessa Hudgens has posed nude; Lindsay Lohan, another Disney kid (The Parent Trap), is the poster child for tween queen to quasi porn star.