-style father, and I don t maintain illusions about how much I can control what my daughter will like or discover, especially as she gets older. Mostly I try to introduce her to things that fit her interests, while filtering and running interference against some of what I ve discovered to be the Seven Deadly Sins of Kid Culture. As long as we guard against them, we can enjoy our time together and discover cool new things without, one hopes, her turning into a weirdo.
One of the first cultural tests for a parent is realizing that material that agonizes you may be good for your kid. Before my daughter was born, I was shocked to learn that my sister was Barney-tolerant but she pointed out that it s a benign, trustworthy show, and researchers from Yale call it nearly a model for what a preschool program should be. Baby-oriented shows such as Teletubbies seem similarly toothless.
The problem stems not from their sexual preferences, which are clearly nonexistent, but the show s implicit purpose to teach babies to watch TV. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no television or other electronic media for children under the age of 2, yet shows such as Teletubbies or the BabyFirstTV channel seek to train infants to be TV watchers. The concept scares the bejesus out of me, and fortunately my wife showed admirable discipline at turning off the TV.
The Smart Parent s Guide to Kids TV opposes using television as a babysitter (or what we call in our household The Neglect-o-matic ), but defuses some of the knee-jerk alarms against television for kids. Since our daughter was born, we gave up cable TV, keeping her choices (and level of commercial interruptions) to a minimum. It was a revelation to me that even innocuous, insipid shows on PBS Kids might not all be equal, particularly when I compared Clifford the Big Red Dog with Dragon Tales.
At first I preferred Clifford, because I liked the books when I was young, and the late John Ritter voiced the pachyderm-size pooch. More shrill and saccharine is Dragon Tales, the maddeningly inane adventures of human kids in candy-color Dragonland, featuring guests such as Princess Kidoodle of the Doodle Fairies. It slowly dawned on me, however, that a high proportion of the Clifford stories involved characters behaving foolishly and receiving correction, while Dragon Tales emphasized working together to overcome phobia or accomplish a goal.
Clifford seems more interested in shame as a motivation, while Dragon Tales rewarded achievement. Sometimes banality has a purpose, so it s back to Dragonland for us. Recently I introduced my daughter to one of the greatest works of art of the 20th century: the 1953 Looney Tunes cartoon Duck Amuck, in which the animator plays existential pranks on Daffy Duck.
A few mornings later we were sitting on the floor of her room playing with toys, and my daughter smiled. I asked her what was so funny, and she said, Ho, ho, that s rich. Now how about some color, stupid?
quoting Daffy Duck verbatim. Although we weren t terribly worried that she d drop an Acme Co. anvil on somebody s head, we held back on showing her Looney Tunes until fairly recently due to the violent slapstick.
I didn t expect that she d be so amused by invective and name-calling. Such cartoons have educational value and effectively expand her vocabulary for insults. When she was trying to call Mom and Dad names at the dinner table, I explained that what might be funny in a show isn t suitable for real life.
Dad, she replied, we re in a show! Even though I love The Simpsons, at least during the 1990s, I treat the show like poison in our house because I don t want her to be like Bart (though I d be pretty content if she emulated Lisa). On an old Fresh Air interview with Terry Gross, creator Matt Groening all but apologized to America for some of the show s gags, such as the kids incessantly repeating Are-we-there-yet?
Are-we-there-yet? Many beloved tots in kid culture serve as role models for misbehavior. As much as I can appreciate mischievous (for whom Getting bored is not allowed ) and the precocious Calvin and Hobbes ( I hope you suffer a debilitating brain aneurysm, you freak!
), I suspect they re most popular with adults who don t actually have kids of their own. Kids are already disposed to test boundaries and get into trouble; they don t need how-to guides to yell, talk back, draw on walls or break things. It s important to teach kids to enjoy laughing at them, not with them.
Do as we say, not as Bart or Calvin do. -style father, and I don t maintain illusions about how much I can control what my daughter will like or discover, especially as she gets older.
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