So, a little bothered

[ellixis]

Caught the tail end of Dora the Explorer as I changed the channel last night. Normally, we don't watch the show; it's badly animated and the voices annoy me. But what surprised and bothered me was this - a little before the end, the show's villian character fell down a small cliff, and landed at the bottom saying "ouch" and rubbing his head. At

Comments

[ellixis]

The thing about that is that at that age, everyone's a role model. Little Small repeats everything and copies everything, because she's still developing her moral and value judgment system. She's still learning right and wrong. Kids are mean, and Boots can be mean, but on a show that's supposed to be educational? I find that pretty disappointing, honestly.

I would have been less bothered about the whole thing if Dora hadn't laughed and accepted the comment without question. It just felt off and raised my hackles as a parent. My kid is pretty good about sharing and empathizing. I don't want to be a helicopter parent, but neither do I really want her to be absorbing offhandedly mean comments as normal.

Augh, sorry to ramble at you. I worry too much.

[mamarabbit]

She'll run into all sorts of things, with or without you. If you're consistent and paying attention when you are with her, she'll learn what you would like her to learn, and since you ARE her world, her safe place, she'll put more weight on that. It's that old "teachable moment". At least, that's the way it's supposed to work in theory. It seems to have worked with you.

[ellixis]

It does indeed! I know I can teach her what's not right, but I am somewhat concerned about the more widespread effect. How much of childrens' TV is unintentionally teaching negative behavior? How many parents are watching with enough alertness to catch and counter these things, or how many just don't see it because it is indeed normal to them? And does this help to explain the surprising lack of empathy that some people seem to have?

My first unthinking impulse was to chuckle at the comment, but then my brain kicked in and said, "Hey, that's pretty mean." I worry that some children aren't learning that automatic conscience, and instead are learning othering and schadenfreude.

tl;dr THE MEDIA IS A MINEFIELD AND PARENTING IS HARD.

[chisotahn]

I've felt the same way about a (VERY FEW) MLP:FiM episodes. Episode 22 (the one with the western ponies and the buffalo) was just... strange all around, and not in a good way. Feeling Pinkie Keen is like that too. The morals in both those episodes are either bizarre or very oddly expressed/taught.

Fortunately, all the rest of the episodes are more than awesome enough to make up for it. And the above two episodes were written by the same guy, so I know to just avoid watching episodes he writes in the future.

[padparadscha]

God, I was subjected to Dora by my host family, and I was disappointed to find out how stupid it was. I had rather hoped it was good, and I would not need to sound like a goddamn Old Fart carrying on about how they just can't do it like Sesame Street anymore. But, well, Sesame still wins the day, despite Kevin Clash having gone mad with power.

I did not see the episode you mention, fortunately (just one about a pirate adventure ALL DAY EVERY DAY FOREVER OH GOD), so the thing that disturbed ME was the weird part where Dora would ask something like "Do you see the ball?" and then the characters just STAND THERE AND BLINK for an uncomfortable moment, presumably to give small viewers the chance to respond, before resuming the action. I would have grown impatient with that even as a small child.

Completely Unrelated Anecdote About Empathy Lessons: One day during recess at the preschool I used to volunteer at, I came across a curious little tableau: two of the kids from our class squatted by the sidewalk, with their teacher hovering

[ellixis]

Sesame Street has gotten lass awesome in the past ten years. The 40 years highlights reel DVD I have showed me that yes, when I was a kid, it really was that gloriously weird and unselfconscious, in a way I recall wistfully. The segments are longer now, there's less nifty for the sake of nifty, and some characters have gone from cute to cutesy. There's also not as much focus on interaction with adult characters. And Elmo gets his own 15-minute segment at the end, far too cutesy and condescending and with the laugh that puts my hackles up. Nevertheless, it's still a good-quality show

[padparadscha]

I am somehow hugely relieved to find out that there are good kids' shows out there now! (Although the thing about Sesame Street is that even when it gets less awesome, it's still significantly more awesome than most other shows. I could do without Elmo's World, agreed, but the rest of the show still seems pretty smart and funny. And yes, that 40-Years highlights reel is AMAZING.)

I'm guessing the teacher had to do some educating between SNAIL SMASH and Poor Snails. At least a lesson came from the horrible deaths of those heroic molluscs.

[ellixis]

It is indeed significantly awesome. Murray the monster running around yelling BRING OUT YER J (in the same inflection as the Monty Python line) just about made me spit my drink once. PBS also has a few other really good kids' shows. I give a lot of the credit for Alice picking up her alphabet early to Word World.

Maybe, maybe not - I've seen small children go from casual cruelty to overwrought sympathy without a blink. At least the sympathy part is there and being practiced, though.