The Kids Aren’t Alright

Now for a little trip down memory lane.

If you were a kid without cable in the 90s you’re bound to recognise this. It’s the fabled Ning Nang Nong! Watching this as an adult, it makes absolutely no sense and I’m not entirely sure the creators weren’t on acid (erm cows going bong and dancing mushrooms?) but I love it.

As a kid it was my favourite Playschool video. Whenever it came on i’d be singing along happy as a smurf. Those were the days when kids like me depended on the ABC to provide quality after school entertainment.

I don’t know if it’s because I’m older, but I have the impression that children’s TV isn’t what it used to be, especially on the ABC. I suspect it has to do with the fact that they have a smaller budget and are competing with cable 24-hr children’s channels like Nickelodeon, which have lots of advertising and huge budgets.

The ABC used to have rad shows like TinTin, Captain Planet, the Discworld Series, who could forget Mr Squiggle, Art Attack and T-Bag and the Pearls of Wisdom?

Now they show insipid crap like Zoe 101 (a Nickelodeon show); I’m sorry but just because her sister is Britney Spears doesn’t mean Jamie Lynn has a personality.

Can we stop making children’s TV shows where the kids act 30, wear make-up and go shopping after school? It seems like all these shows do is tell kids they should construct their identity through what they buy, so that a toy manufacturer or a tween fashion magnate can buy another Mercedes; meanwhile they don’t encourage kids’ imaginations. Kids don’t get a chance to be kids.

When I was little I lived in a world of my imagination and I was innocent; the children I meet these days are completely different. I keep seeing kids that look 40. They know so much about the world and loose their innocence at such an early age; by the time they’re 8, they’re already fashion conscious and bona fide consumers. I see little girls wearing high heels and make-up; my little cousin was weight-conscious and dieting at age 9, and she wasn’t even pudgy! They’re growing up too fast.

But it’s not really that suprising when the child stars they see as role models, are doing it too. Jamie Lynn was pregnant at 16, and Miley Syrus, star of Hannah Montana, posed semi-nude nude for Vanity Fair earlier this year, aged 15.

But TV isn’t completely to blame – with parents buying Nikes for toddlers and sending them to early education preschools where they start learning to read at 3, so that their can rave at their next tea party about how little Johnny can already write his ABCs – kids are being taught about the world much earlier and it’s monkey see monkey do. We are living in a world that is less innocent and that is reflected by our children.