Too Hot For Sesame Street ?
Apparently, Katy Perry's dress was deemed too revealing for public television.
A planned appearance by Katy Perry on Sesame Street has been canceled after the video for the appearance turned out to be too risque for some eyes:
Katy Perry’s appearance on the long-running PBS children’s show has been pulled after parents complained about the singer’s cleavage-baring dress…
[A] Sesame Street spokesperson issued a statement to UsMagazine.com early Thursday morning, deciding to side with the angry viewers:
“Sesame Street has a long history of working with celebrities across all genres, including athletes, actors, musicians and artists. Sesame Street has always been written on two levels, for the child and adult. We use parodies and celebrity segments to interest adults in the show because we know that a child learns best when co-viewing with a parent or care-giver. We also value our viewer’s opinions and particularly those of parents. In light of the feedback we’ve received on the Katy Perry music video which was released on You Tube only, we have decided we will not air the segment on the television broadcast of Sesame Street, which is aimed at preschoolers. Katy Perry fans will still be able to view the video on You Tube.”
And, indeed, here is the video:
Apparently, it’s the dress that’s the problem.
But I’ve got to wonder if the adults watching this are forgetting what they see, and what the kids watching the show will get out of it, are two entirely different things.
This one strikes me as just a little ridiculous. The other thought that strikes me is that, had they run the video, Sesame Street would’ve had it’s highest male demographics in decades.
A lot of the time complaints like this don’t come from parents, but from full-time, professional ass-hats like Common Sense Media. But yes, more often than not, some parent.
A point I make from time to time when talking (as I do in my job) to kids, parents, teachers: the approach to this kind of thing is perfectly backwards. Little kids don’t care about breasts. Big kids (boys usually) care quite a bit about breasts. So what do we do? Shield indifferent young eyes and allow the avid older watcher to sneak a peek.
I mean if the point here is to keep people from getting aroused by boobs — and God only knows why that’s a rational goal to obsess over, but whatever — then allowing more boobage with age is exactly backward.
Ranting on just a bit more. I write scary books for the young adult readership. Adults sometimes wonder if they are “too dark” for teenagers. The assumption being that adults handle fear better.
The truth is exactly the opposite: it’s all but impossible to scare a 14 year-old. They’re immortal!
But it’s easy to scare a grown-up. I can do it with a single word: malignant.
The process of aging is in part the process of learning fear. We learn fear and are only comforted by our love of boobs.
The last paragraph should get comment of the day.
<blockquote>We learn fear and are only comforted by our love of boobs.</blockquote>
…well that explains the success of Barry and Joe…
Maybe I am just getting old and crotchety, but my reaction to Ms. Perry’s outfit was that it was so entirely unnecessary to anything, unless she believes she’s unrecognizable without a significant amount of cleavage on display. The complaint was easy to foresee and this is now a waste of an otherwise perfectly good Sesame Street segment.
Yeah, well said Michael. My two kids get to see Mom’s boobies every day since she whips them out to feed our infant. The idea that this video is some kind of threat to them is crazy.
It’s got everything! Furries and a hot girl. (j/k)
Would I have noticed if I hadn’t already been told to look at the boobs? Most likely. Would my 6-year-old? Not a chance.
But I think Sesame Street’s target demographic is under 6, no? We hardly ever watch it in our household, but it seems like it’s aimed at maybe 3- or 4-year-olds, who are definitely way too young to care.
Ah, I see that Rodney Dull cannot let an opportunity go by, no matter how OT.
They worry about this but not the family portrait in every Elmo video where the little red guy’s third leg is swinging low. Don’t believe me, go look.
Ah,, Republicans, the only people on earth who are more terrified of women and female bodies than the Taliban…
It’s not the boobs, it’s the possibilities. Slap a couple of straps from the peak of the cups on the dress and you have a sundress. But without them, there is concern for the integrity of the containment. Alas, for all the suspected dangers, the engineering seems to be solid. Science, no one trusts it anymore.
wr: Where do you get Republicans from in this post? Republicans don’t let their kids watch PBS. It’s FOX, 24/7.
Well, I am old and I am crotchety, but I see nothing wrong with that dress, other than that it perhaps covers too much.
My son, when he was of the Seseame Street-watching age, wouldn’t have noticed it either. Kids that age are really more interested in faces that boobs.
It takes a village harlot?