Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?
According to several family values watchdog groups, a homosexual kitchen sponge bent on destroying the traditional family model.
The American Family Association and Focus on the Family have openly criticized a children’s music video featuring SpongeBob Squarepants, the cartoon star of a Nickelodeon show and a feature film, for supposedly encouraging acceptance of homosexuality and same-sex couples. The video, which is the cooperative effort of the Anti-Defamation League, the We Are Family Foundation, television networks and FedEx, was aired March 11 on Nickelodeon and PBS and distributed to over 60,000 schools nationwide. The video also features Miss Piggy, Oscar the Grouch, Jimmy Neutron, and close to 100 other popular cartoon characters singing along to the aptly chosen “We Are Family.”
Ed Vitagliano, the editor of AFA’s monthly journal, charges that the video and the included teaching guide distort the definition of family by incorporating a thinly veiled pro-gay subtext. Mr. Vitagliano and Focus on the Family head Dr. James Dobson maintain this position despite the fact that neither the video nor the teaching guide contain any references to sexual orientation. Truth be told, the teaching guide encourages children to expand beyond the traditional father-mother-sister-brother model, but producers of the video say this is meant to include stepchildren, adoptive parents, elderly family members and the like.
If you find yourself with a lot of free time and a hankering for a disco-themed cartoon medley, you can find the video on the MSNBC website. It is the sort of campy production you would expect from a corporate-sponsored video advocating tolerance. The video is conspicuously absent of sexual references, and SpongeBob appeared for a scant five seconds, during which he made no mention of his supposed homosexuality.
It is a tribute to Mr. Vitagliano and Dr. Dobson’s dogmatic dedication that they could find the “insidious means by which the organization is manipulating and potentially brainwashing kids” in a hodgepodge of two-second clips. Interestingly enough, they make no mention of Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog’s on-screen romance. Interspecies pig-on-frog cartoon love is apparently okay, as long it is heterosexual.
What makes a cartoon sponge gay? After painstaking research on Nickelodeon message boards and fan sites, I found the loveable and porous SpongeBob, who has the stigma of being the new purple teletubby, lives in Bikini Bottom. Most heterosexual men would agree that this is a very admirable destination, and may single-handedly acquit Mr. Squarepants of any homosexual suspicions. He is annoyingly flamboyant, however, but that seems to be a prerequisite for any Nickelodeon cartoon. The most convincing evidence is his tendency to gallivant around hand-in-hand with his starfish buddy, which is most likely why SpongeBob has become both a darling of the gay community and, according to Focus on the Family, a subversive threat to families everywhere.
Mr. Vitagliano and Dr. Dobson both fear the persuasive power of cartoons, which have been propaganda tools for as long as they have been around. I have on my computer a 1940s Looney Toons sketch entitled “Taxes to Fight the Axis” – hardly a subliminal message. But what is lost on Mr. Vitagliano and Dr. Dobson is that the young kids who watch SpongeBob generally will not perceive SpongeBob’s antics as anything other than those belonging to a wacky sponge. They will not accept what they don’t understand, especially since these shows never mention such serious subjects as sexuality. If the kids do not have the ability to connect the traits of their cartoon characters with sexuality, then the worst these cartoons can do is beget tolerance. From Vitagliano and Dobson’s viewpoint, even tolerance might be too much.
Considering the other issues affecting family values — divorce and domestic abuse come to mind — crusading against a sexually ambiguous cartoon character seems misguided at best, and ridiculous by most accounts. Vitagliano and Dobson could have chosen a much safer arena to voice their concerns over same-sex couples and moral values. Fighting cartoon characters is never a good idea, and they will probably discourage potential followers for it.
However, if Mr. Squarepants and his brief appearance in a children’s video do happen to leave you questioning the role a possibly gay kitchen sponge has in today’s family, enlist with the American Family Association or Focus on Family. They are currently looking for soldiers in their laughable war against SpongeBob.
