Toto

I'm surprized no one has linked to the <a href="http://www.landoverbaptist.org/news1002/veggie.html" target="_blank">Landover Baptist</a> review. (Not to lower the moral tone any more.)

American Agnostic

I ,fortunatly, haven't seen them so I can't make statements as to their quality but to try to lure kids into religion with such an appealing theme is sick. Teaching kids a sectarian view of religion IS brainwashing. It's the exact same situation as when someone ,say a POW, is brainwashed. The person is rendered into a state where they are highly susceptable to suggestion and then they are told what to think. A young child is already in the state (it's the phase of our lives that evoled so that we could learn how to survive in the world, so we soak up what we are told with little to no critical thinking). Repeatedly teliing kids that some religion is the absolute truth (fundamentalism) gets the religion wedged in their mind and people seldom manage to get it out. It's just plain wrong!

cydonia

I remember maybe three christmases ago my mom and sisters and brother in law just falling over themselves over these hilarious nutritious critters. "Aren't they great? That's so cute haw haw" but the only reason they even had them is my family is a fundy family. I couldn't look past the propaganda, i kept imagining how easy it would be if i were a little kid again to get sucked into this stuff and accept mental rape. It's just deceptive, like WW2 -era nazi propaganda parading as romantic comedies or whatever. It's disturbing when you see a tool to destroy children being praised by everyone but you.

My sister recently had a baby, her first, and she's already demanding he watch veggie tales. Poor kid. When i saw this preview the most disturbing part was it was afraid to admit what it was, it didn't mention the bible at all. Be honest about what your motives are and then succeed or fail based on that, not by deceit.

[/ramble]

Bree

I'm a sucker. I find The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything absolutely hilarious.

Vorkosigan

My son loves them and brings them home from the missionary school all the time. At first I thought they were just harmlessly stupid, but became quite alarmed when the one on the Rumor Weeds advised that "god wants you to say nice things even if its not true." After hearing that, I began to listen to them more closely, and found much that was morally objectionable about them. All in all, cute, but dangerous.

Vorkosigan

HelenM

I still maintain that it's unwise to 'trust' any source of 'information' that your child is receiving.

However, a lot of it probably goes in one of their ears and straight out the other.

If you talk to your child you can find out what they've picked up from other places - people, TV, movies - and then you can address it.

I can't think of any other way you can help your child understand your own values. You simply can't shield them from receiving any information except from you...

If you find something particularly objectionable, then, of course, you have the option to remove your child from that source, in many cases. But it's unrealistic to assume that anything which is not overtly Christian or overtly theist is therefore 'harmless' or 'safe'.

I don't remember that line from a Rumor Weed video but I haven't seen those, that much. Nevertheless I can imagine lots of non-theists saying that we should say nice things to others even when they aren't true. It's one of those statements that needs to be carefully defined. I expect you'd want your child to be polite when receiving birthday presents, for example, even if they don't like them much, which could be considered 'saying something nice to others even when it's not true'. But of course, there's a difference between being tactful and getting in the habit of lying, because one is afraid to tell the truth when one really ought to, for example.

Any attempts to explain such things as being tactful to children may seem painfully simplistic to us and may need revisiting as they grow up and are able to understand social nuances better. But meanwhile, unfortunately, we might have to deal with family situations, say, including adults who aren't prepared to handle a brutally honest child (even though, I find it disappointing that adults are that touchy!)

take care
Helen

edited to add: I was being hypothetical about 'family situations', not thinking of any in particular...

[ October 10, 2002: Message edited by: HelenM ]</p>

Jimmy Higgins

Veggie Tales is pretty good. I loved the one with the Bunny Song. "I LUVE the bunny!"

There was another scene when Joshua, who was being played by Larry the Cucumber saw an angel of god and fell to the ground, and started offering praise, but seeing he is a cucumber, he had no knees to fall on, so he was talking right into the sand. I thought that was clever and exactly how I would have done it, being surprised they went there with it.

I think Veggie Tales greatly simplifies the stories, which is fine, but it leads to the kids growing up not properly understanding what was actually happening. I was also offended by the Bunny guy, because he was playing us infidels, and he was going to kill the tomato, brocoli, and cucumber if they didn't sign praise to the bunny. I feel that he was made to look evil because he didn't believe in god, and only when god came to him did he become good. This of course, is a dangerous message. People's morality is to be judged by actions and not faith.

To this extent, I think Veggie Tales is a danger, however, to people of our age, it isn't too bad.

lpetrich

I wonder if the Veggie Tales include the story of Noah accidentally exposing himself and getting mad at his son Ham for being a Peeping Tom.

HelenM

They haven't done that yet but they did do David and Bathsheba. They allegorized it somewhat, i.e. the King already had a lot of ducks in his bath but he looked out of the window and saw the one duck of a poor subject of his Kingdom and insisted on having that one also. The King should probably have been away at battle instead of in his bath. Then this would never have happened . The moral of it was about not being greedy/selfish. Which really is part of the moral of the story, imo...

take care
Helen

Kosh

Right. Next time you want semething that's not yours, go kill something instead.

Good message!