Fred Rogers is rolling in his grave over how people are treating children's entertainers. Everything he did for kids is being torn apart.

a reminder that this is par for the course for The Guardian https://dialecticaldispatches.substack.com/p/the-guardians-two-hundred-year-record

Putting toddlers in front of a TV yikes

The controversial Fred Rogers? The controversial Jesus F Christ is rolling in his cave.

Mr. Rogers had multiple episodes that saw limited airing or were removed entirely because they implied communication and diplomacy were better tools for resolving political tention than simply building up a stockpile of weapons and agitating your citizenry into conflict.

In the Neighborhood of Make-Believe, a mysterious package is delivered to Carney the beaver, who is the leader of neighboring Southwood. King Friday hears the contents are parts for "things" that are being built for Southwood. Prince Tuesday comes home from school, where he has learned about countries and wars, and tells his father what he has learned. This sparks King Friday to assume the worst: Southwood is making bombs. The king orders his people to start building bombs as well. As a result, all the kingdom's finances are routed into stockpiling weapons, and the high priority of the initiative means there is no money left over for programs, like "music for the children." The misunderstandings, assumptions, diplomacy, and paranoia escalate the situation, until King Friday learns that Southwood is making a bridge, and the packages are supplies for doing so. Crisis averted.

He had a few episodes that sent US reactionaries into hysterics

The series wasn't the first time Rogers toyed with controversy. Four years after the 1964 Civil Rights Act was passed, Rogers cast African-American actor François Clemmons as Officer Clemmons on his show, marking the first time a Black actor was given a recurring role on a children's show. As if that wasn't bold enough, the following year Rogers had a scene in the show where he was resting his feet in a kiddie pool, and invited Clemmons to do the same. It was a strong statement against racism, made even stronger when Rogers dried Clemmons feet with a towel on screen, a humbling act that Jesus himself did for his disciples in John 13:1-17.

In 1981, Rogers took on the subject of divorce on the show, making it clear to the children watching that they were not to blame for their parents' struggles, and that even adults aren't comfortable with the topic. That same year he invited 10-year-old Jeffrey Erlanger, a quadriplegic, to appear on Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. Erlanger showed Rogers the bells and whistles of his electric wheelchair, and was given the time to explain how he had come to be paralyzed in his arms and legs, having had a spinal tumor when he was younger. It was successful in giving those with disabilities a real person that children could relate to.

Rogers was also outspokenly in defense of federal funding for public broadcasting. A thing that would have almost certainly made him a target for harassment and denigration among the modern-day DOGE advocates, even setting aside his "Woke" politics.

What's most curious is in how a prior administration notorious for being full of likeminded shitty assholes ended up embracing Fred Rogers rather than ousting him.

Rogers's testimony was "considered one of the most powerful pieces of testimony ever offered before Congress, and one of the most powerful pieces of video presentation ever filmed", and has been studied by public relations experts and academics. Congressional funding for PBS increased from $9 million to $22 million soon after Rogers's testimony. In 1970, Nixon appointed Rogers to the chair of the White House Conference on Children and Youth.

Criticizing other people's parenting techniques is easy. Entertaining a toddler for an entire weekend without a break is less easy.

I have no idea how anyone gets laundry done or dinner made without Ms Rachael as a distraction.

Yea, but I wouldn't call Jesus a children's entertainer.

No media use controversial to inject opinions on the topic as if it is ok to agree or disagree about objectively morally good positions

the controversial part is that she considers brown children to be humans

God forbid a parent needs a break and puts something on that's actually educational.

Olympic levels of mental gymnastics on display. You'd be right at home with people arguing that nazis were socialists actually.

They make video games about zombies all the time though

He gave us an entire class of people very interested in entertaining children.

They might not be injecting it directly , but they certainly surface it by omission/language choice.

Like saying the UK "commandeered" or "retrieved" a boat or transport , but would say "hijacked", "stole" or "pirated" for a demographics they didn't particularly favour at that time.

You should be paying attention to the omissions and the choice of language overall, because that's where the bias is (usually).

This shit is wayyyy more based than the bs that he was super soldier

To be fair, that is controversial in the Epstein Axis.

Probably i dont get the nuance not right, but controversial is a neutral word, right? So the author just wanted to make clear, there is a discussuon regarding to the person. I wouldnt know a better fitting word for a short headline, without losing a professional tone.
But English is not my first language, so probably idk

🤡

Yes but it also accepts that narrative as reasonable by not rejecting the premise. It creates space for the idea that it's a perfectly reasonable take to be pro genocide. So yes it's not explicitly negative, but it's still disingenuous. It's like giving equal airtime to a doctor and an antivaxer and treating them as equal.

That's like saying

The human effect on climate change is controversial

Sure, you can argue that, technically

But at the same time, giving it any time in the spotlight is a choice

Given that one of the sides in that debate is objectively wrong and the point of the guardian is having journalists employed there presumably

What the hell are you on about? Kiwifarms? Listen to yourself talk.

Wow! Stupid and smug!

"Weekly world news said she has a demon living in her pussy, so obviously she's controversial"

With "nation" and "rogue" being subject to the perspective(ethical, moral, fiscal etc) of the reporting body.

It's worth looking but I think you'd be surprised by how much subjective leniency Russia gets depending on the politics of the time.

Edit : I wasnt trying to point out a particular bias, just that the guardian is a tabloid rag with delusions of respectability.

They aren't totally inept, nor are they a bastion of unbiased premium journalism

This is a thought that is better kept to yourself.

Everything you've said is incorrect, lmfao. That's what I meant when I called you stupid. Hope this clears up your confusion!

Maybe if everything were subjective, but it isn't. I'm sorry but I'm going to trust experts over randos everytime, even if the experts are outnumbered. Once upon a time it was the duty of the media to do some of this digging/screening for the general public (though there always was and always will be a bias).

And it isn't value-free. They could have used any number of adjectives to describe her - award winning, popular, beloved, or no description at all - but they wanted you to know she's controversial. They decided that that was the most important thing for you to know about her. Even if you agree that she is, that's still speaks to how they want the story told.

I think you're projecting your own sense of neutrality on others. These individuals have an agenda, and the way they tell stories supports that agenda. That's not even to say I agree/disagree with them, just that we need to be aware that that's how they operate.

Go read the kiwifarms thread on her

you're a fucking weirdo to talk about Kiwifarms this seriously here

Go read the kiwifarms thread on her

Kiwi Farms is neonazi shit, dumbass.

I clicked on a Lemmy link this morning that led to the Guardian's website and it prompted me to disable my adblocker. Fuck that shit.