Cartoon Mayhem

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What happens when "free speech" is taken too far (again) and bad taste is presented just because it can be? Well, maybe something good.

Here's a column by a liberal writer who has had enough of the degradation of our society- particularly when it comes to horrible internet cartoons that little kids are watching and being influenced by.

[[ The other day I found my 6-year-old son watching an Internet cartoon called "Happy Tree Friends."

Purple daisies danced, high-pitched voices sang and animals with heart-shaped noses waved cheerily. But then the music changed, and a previously merry green bear, wearing dog tags and camouflage, suffered an apparent psychotic breakdown.

Crrrrrack !! went the neck of a purple badger, as the bear snapped off its head. Blood splashed and continued flowing as the bear gleefully garroted a hedgehog, then finished off a whimpering squirrel already impaled on metal spikes by placing a hand grenade in its paw.

Joshua turned to me with a sheepish grin. He clearly had a sense that I wasn't happy about his new friends, but he couldn't have known what I was really thinking. Which was this: I'm a longtime journalist who reveres the First Amendment, and I live in California's liberal bastion of Marin County. Yet I would readily skip my next yoga class to march with right-wing fundamentalists in a cultural war against "Happy Tree Friends." ]]

When she spoke to the producer of the trashy cartoon in question, he was ready to defend his indefensible position with the most used tool in the liberal's toolbox: moral equivelancy.

[[ Evershed, the father of three children, the youngest aged 2, told me during a phone conversation that he wouldn't let them watch "Happy Tree Friends." But then he argued that the cartoon wasn't really harmful. "It's like 'Tom & Jerry,' " he said. "I grew up on 'Tom & Jerry,' and I don't think I'm particularly aggressive."

Aggressive? AGGRESSIVE? Much as I'd like to, I can't fairly speak for Evershed on this point, but I certainly do worry about the impact on my children. As for "Tom & Jerry," I know "Tom & Jerry," and this is no "Tom & Jerry." "Tom & Jerry" never pulled knives or tore heads off or used someone's intestines to strangle a third party, just for starters.

"Tom & Jerry" also had creativity, with surprising plot twists and a richly emotive score. Most importantly, "Tom & Jerry" had a conscience. Routinely, Tom attacks Jerry and is punished for his aggression. In terms of human evolution, the 1940s classic is light-years ahead of "Happy Tree Friends," whose authors, Navarro and Rhode Montijo, have been quoted as saying, "If we are in a room brainstorming episodes and end up laughing at the death scene, then it's all good!" ]]

Outrageous Describes It Well

Yep... it's all good. For them, that is. They are making money hand over fist with this crap. Ugh! It feels like we are living out the "Itchy and Scratchy" syndrome in The Simpsons.

Anyway, I guess I can't prove that this is connected... but something has to account for things like this, which are becoming more and more prevelant:

Nine Year-Old Charged With Death Threat To Teacher

Nope. Nothing abnormal there.

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