Dobson is jumping on the “make little kids cry” bandwagon, with his accusation that Spongebob Squarepants is a big gay activist warping children’s minds.  OK, so I get the appeal of Spongebob to the drug culture, and I get the occasions “shot over the kids heads” at dirty-minded adults who might be forced to watch cartoons with their children…

     …but this is just a late-comer to the field of ultra-conservative pop-culture bashing.  Now, everyone bashes pop-culture.  Don’t get me wrong.  I’ts not just for conservatives.

     Liberals like me don’t like pop culture because it rots your brain by presenting a world full of shallow characters with small problems with pat, easy answers and very little real mental stimulation…leaving the viewer vulnerable to the simplistic, pat-answer fundamentalist morality and jingoism of the far right.

     Conservatives like Dobson don’t like pop culture because it rots you moral fiber by presenting a world where a person can be an unwed mother while not also being a crack-whore who’s child is an unhappy drug-using delinquent,  where not all gay men are feather-boa-wearing promiscuous incubators of HIV, and where mouthy little kids who mock their church-going neighbors can be somewhat charming…leaving the viewer vulnerable to the humanistic moral relativism and permissiveness of the far left that will ultimately result in your eternal damnation.

     So, you see…the stakes are high, and Lord knows, you don’t have a brain of your own, or personal real-life experiences and moments of self-examination and introspection with which to form your own map of how to live a productive, moral and civil existence.  Nope.  You are only the product of what the corporate elite (or counter-culture intellectual elite) ram into your grey matter in between commercial breaks where they tell you that you smell bad, and the people who buy their products have a LOT more sex and fun than you do.

     But like most tactics of the culture wars, the Conservatives do it one better.

     Let me elaborate:

Representative of the morally bankrupt Liberal Humanistic Elite:  “Well, you see, studies show that…”

American public “ZZZZZZZzzzz…uh-huh…studies…zzzzzzzzzzzzz”

Representative of the Godly Moral Bob Jones Conservative Right:  “They’re after your baby’s brains!!!”

American Public “Oh my god!  Just like zombies!  My baby!  Where are the torches?!?”

But I think it’s starting to get a little old.  No matter how deep or productive the well, you can only go back to the same one so many times.

I think that people know that Murphy Brown didn’t get droves of women to abandon their families and try to be a tough New York reporters…or whatever Dan Quayle was afraid of.

Bart Simpson didn’t bring down civilization as we know it…or whatever Barbara Bush thought he was going to do.

As for Falwell and the Telletubbies…little boy toddlers were wearing their mother’s pumps and carrying their purses around long before Tinki Winki made it look like so much fun.

And if “A Fish Tale” is to be condemned for promoting Gayness, then let’s just give up now, because we’re never going to make a movie that appeals to kids that doesn’t have some elements of accepting yourself as different, and learning to deal with the overbearing expectations of your parents and society.

And news to Dobson, millions of non-gay little kids hold hands with their same-sex best friends.  Millions of non-gay little boys skip and sing.  Millions of non-gay little boys have a perpetually happy and optimistic outlook on life…oh wait…that would be a definition of “gay” wouldn’t it…scratch that last one then. 

Anyway, my point is, that the “message” of Spongebob isn’t “be gay, little boys”  it’s “be a good friend, be positive, be expressive, be open and optimistic about the world and your place in it…even if you’re dumb as a seasponge.”

WAIT an minute...Spongebob is a sneaky tool for the far right!  Burn him!  Buuurrrrnnn Hiiiiim! 

grumble.

Sneaky far right, using a non-combustable activist for mindless complacency.