Friday, Jan. 28, 2005 | 5:52 a.m.
Susan Snyder's column appears Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursday and Sundays. Reach her at [email protected] or (702) 259-4082.
WEEKEND EDITION
January 29 - 30, 2005
When the Rev. Jerry Falwell outed Tinky-Winky the Teletubby, it was beyond hilarious.
If the Teletubbies are guilty of anything, it's an inability to say anything coherent except, "toast."
As far as we can tell, Tinky-Winky can't even take one in that puffy purple get-up. And somehow he (she ... it ... whatever) has sex in it?
Falwell pointed to the triangle thingy on its head and Tinky's red purse, like they're listed in, "Secret Signs of All Things Homo."
Six years later, the man who publicly questioned the sexual leanings of a giant puppet gave the second inaugural invocation for America's 43rd president. Talk about La-La Land.
Yet, days later more good Christians said their family values have determined that SpongeBob SquarePants promotes a homosexual lifestyle because he's too chummy with a purple starfish.
Read that again and tell me these people don't need a hobby.
SpongeBob SquarePants' biggest crime is having lousy teeth. And just when it seems this wholly unnatural fixation on cartoon characters' private lives can't become more ridiculous, the Values Police attack Buster Baxter the rabbit.
PBS officials yanked an upcoming episode of "Postcards from Buster" because one of the families featured is headed by a lesbian couple. (Gasp! Can she actually say "lesbian" in the newspaper? Quick! Hide this from the kids!)
Buster is best friends with Arthur, an aardvark of whom I am a big fan. Buster's parents are divorced, and his "Postcards" show revolves around him traveling with his dad and sending video postcards to Arthur and friends.
The banned episode is about Buster's visit to Vermont, where he spends time with two families and learns about making maple sugar and syrup.
As is typical of "Postcards," we hear Buster but don't see him. He is behind the video camera while interviewing the humans he profiles. Buster has shown us Mormon, Muslim and fundamentalist Christian families. He has shown us single-parent families and one with five children that shares a trailer in Virginia.
The segments show real kids and validate their real lives. However, if your parents are gay or lesbian, you aren't allowed to be proud of them. The Family Values people want you to hide your family because it is bad.
It's sick -- sicker than trying to figure out how a sponge and a purple starfish might ... well, you know. This time they're attacking actual kids, not cartoons. These children opened their homes and lives to television cameras only to have grownups say, "Oops. Our bad. Your family is too vulgar to show other kids."
It's a wonder the Family Values people haven't attacked the late Charles Schulz's Peppermint Patty, with her Birkenstocks and little gal pal Marcie who calls her "Sir."
Wonder how they view Bugs Bunny when he dresses in drag and befuddles red-state, gun-toting Elmer Fudd. In the "Rabbit of Seville" Bugs even gets Elmer to wear a wedding dress and take vows.
Children can be imperiled by the concepts lurking in twisted minds.
But what's creepier: the puppet that carries a purse, or the grown man who sees something sexual about it?
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