:: Running from the Thought Police ::

:: Tuesday, February 08, 2005 ::

Defending Against Hyper-Reactivity

Our local PBS station, WILL, will be running the controvercial episode of the kid's show Postcards from Buster that, gasp, has a family with two moms and no dad. Oh, the horror! [/sarcasm] Seeing as we live in an enlightened society, I don't understand why a presentation of people with a non-standard family arrangement should be considered bad, especially when there's no value judgement made about it in the program. There are divorced and interracial families on TV all the time, as well as those with physical disabilities, yet I don't hear any squabling about how such presentations are subverting America's youth away from the status quo. By presenting people who are different in a children's show, and not treating them any differently, young children are taught to accept others that aren't exactly like them. How can that be wrong?

On a related note, when this whole thing came out there was a poll on CNN's front page asking if SpongeBob was promoting tolerance or a permutation of "advancing an immoral lifestyle." The popular answer, with over 95%, described SpongeBob simply as "Absorbant, Yellow, and Porous." This squabbling is a non-issue for most Americans, which suggests to me that people who oppose tolerating homosexuals need to move on and find some real concerns.

:: The Squire 3:20 PM :: email this post :: ::
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