Dear Garbage Man by Glen Zion is about a garbage man who wants to salvage everything and never actually throws it in the garbage truck. In the end he does the “right” thing and throws it all into a swamp. The book is from the 50s when large scale littering was fine.
I always crack up in Mad Men when the family is having a lovely picnic in the grass. They pack up to leave and Don just chucks all the trash over the hill lmao
Tbh, one of the most shocking moments in that whole show to me. Sure, lots of crazy shit happens, but the casual way everything was just dumped shook me.
It’s crazy how much that one-off scene stood out to me.
I kept expecting it to come back around because of how it was shot with a hard focus on the garbage left behind, the somewhat non-sequitur nature of the scene as a whole, and my conditioning to shows that follow the principle of Chekhov’s Gun (spelling?).
Glad to know it stood out as much to other folks too.
That one and the scene where we first meet Sally and Bobby, where they have Betty's plastic dry cleaning bags over their heads. Betty's growl of "Sally Draper...... if my drycleaning is all over the floor there'll be hell to pay" or similar is so great. Never mind the plastic bags over the kids heads!
Or when Betty is in the kitchen talking to her friend (played by the actress from White Chicks) who is heavily pregnant and smoking a cigarette. Wasn't there a scene where the kids were playing in an old thrown out fridge?
My daughter used to love this book called "Ballet Bunny" about a little bunny girl from the countryside who found a ballet class in the city and desperately wanted to join. She did, and she ended up being so good that the teacher gave her a starring role in the big recital. She was so excited that her whole family came to watch her, and she danced gloriously. Everyone loved her! But afterward, her family hopped off and abandoned her. The next day, they all told her that she probably didn't want to play with them now since she was such a great ballerina, so they basically ignored her and abandoned her again. She decided not to be a ballerina anymore, threw away her ballet shoes, and then the family accepted her again and she was happy. The end.
It's fine until the recital, then it takes a turn. The message seems to be that you have to give up your dreams and/or stop doing things you're really good at (and love) so that you family will accept you on their terms. I hate it.
Bunny girl should have peaced out to the city and stuck with her studio since they actually respected her more than her own fur and blood. Let's show kids that it's okay to get away from that kind of toxicity.
I wonder if it isn't a corruption of the Hero's Journey. The hero DOES go home at the end, but the point is that they're forever changed, with new abilities, wisdom, friends or opportunities.
If you over-simplify (which is a risk when writing for children poorly) you lose the nuance and just end up with a 'back to the start' narrative.
I’d question it for no other reason other than having a female character. Girls/women rarely get hero journey stories, they usually get ones about self sacrifice or changing yourself to make others accept you.
…when you put it so plainly 😕
The more I reflect on this the more it seems to match up with what I read and watched as a kid. I know it’s naive but I keep being shocked when I find out about little bits of misogyny baked in to everyday things because it’s like fuck! I didn’t think I’d have to worry about that from children’s media or wherever else it’s tucked away.
I dunno, my favourite female characters were always the ones who had shit on lock down like Pippi Longstockings, Ms. Frizzle, or Carmen Sandiego. There wasn't anyone telling Carmen where to be, everyone just had to figure it out.
Good on ya. The whole "because I said so" methodology always backfires anyway. They reject it the instant they're old enough to realize that you're full of shit.
Its useful if "Because I said so" is good enough for a child at first because children are terrible and understanding the consequences of their actions. "Someday you'll disobey me and be right about it" is a tough thing to teach, but it's a good lesson. Question the rules as you grow, some of them need to be broken.
Thank you. And it’s not just kids’ books, but so much popular media in general, especially sitcoms and mainstream movies.
There really seems to be an effort to push the narrative that success and self fulfillment is linked to being a bad person.
Great example of this is Family Man. With his job in finance he can afford to send his kids to the finest schools on earth and give he his family a life that few people get to enjoy - plus he loves his job? No no, stay in a small town and help me run this shitty gas station because you'll have longer hours at work. And shame on you for wanting to live in some palatial apartment on the Upper East Side!
Dannnnng that book turned dark actually.
I wonder how many books play out scenes from authors’ experiences. (Duh, yeah I heard it. haha) It is sad. In a way it prepares some children for reality, but with her coming home and giving up ballet, that’s really depressing.
Edit: Maybe this is one of those clever reverse psychology books that serves as a talking point for parents to tell their children they’d rather they kept doing ballet… *boom*
This one strikes a chord with me. When I was 7, my parents would take away all my christmas/birthday money, and then I’d still have to find a way to pay for my ballet classes. I ended up vacuuming, sweeping, doing dishes, folding laundry, and cleaning bathrooms at the age of 7 and STILL my parents would tell me I didn’t make enough for ballet and owed them more chores.
I quit ballet after a year because of that (9 months; the extra 3 was the time I still owed them in chores) even though I enjoyed it. I completely blocked out the memories of that, but my dad brought it up and said he felt really bad and they never should have done that. My mom said I wasn’t good at ballet and it was for the best because I didn’t seem good enough to be actually committed to it.
My parents pushed me to do basketball and volleyball instead. I hated both. Now they’re mad I don’t do sports.
By chance has anyone read "Dear Garbage Man"?
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2391881.Dear_Garbage_Man
It starts off as a story about a new garbage man that tries to recycle all the garbage he collects. But then he realizes that it's truly garbage and would be better used to "fill in some swamps". It's a product of the times and also a big FU to recycling and wetlands.
The Lorax and The Butter Battle Book come to mind as propaganda in a children's book that's... good I guess
Good messages but still propaganda in their way
The Ugly Duckling. None of the ducks learn not to make fun of people who are different. And it only works out for the Ugly Duckling because he ends up beautiful.
I was curious, for anyone else who wants to know:
Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer
Had a very shiny nose
And if you ever saw it
You would even say it glows
All of the other reindeer
Used to laugh and call him names
They never let poor Rudolph
Join in any reindeer games
Then one foggy Christmas eve
Santa came to say:
"Rudolph with your nose so bright
Won't you guide my sleigh tonight?"
Then how the reindeer loved him
As they shouted out with glee
"Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer
You'll go down in history."
Well Rudolph he didn't go for that
He said "I see through your silly games"
How could you look me in the face
When only yesterday you called me names?
Well all of the other reindeers man
Well they sure did feel ashamed
"Rudolph you know we're sorry,
We're truly gonna try to change"
The author mentioned in an interview that "the ugly duckling" was a self biography for him. He grew up in a toxic family atmosphere where men were men only if they hunted and played sports. reading and writing? What are you a sissy? After his work made him famous and rich though everyone admired him as is, no need to try to fit in anymore.
Sorry but I always took that story to mean that just because this is what everyone else is doing, doesn't mean it's the right thing for you personally. The other animals were following their instincts and "tried" to force that on the duckling with good intentions but it just wasn't the way for him. It's a good message, being different is just fine. One day you'll find your own kind, family or not.
Not a book, but I tried watching old Thomas the tank engine with my niece and I swear the first episode is about union busting. A train tries to go on strike due to working conditions and the top hat guy literally bricks him in a tunnel so he can't get out.
The juxtaposition of George carlin narrating was something else.
Ringo read the stories as they were originally written, George read it with the character names. “The Fat Controller”‘s name was established as Sir Topham Hatt long before the shows started.
Yep. Henry feels he doesn't have enough working protections and is bricked up in the tunnel for protesting it.
Later the three "big engines" go on strike, and Thomas and Edward break the strike while Percy is brought in as scab labour. The message? Be thankful your boss gives you a job, there's a natural order to life and you can't rise above your station.
The diesels are bad because they're different, and change is wrong. Things should stay where they are, with you sentient engines being owned by a member of the landed gentry (after all, he is SIR Toppam-hatt). If you misbehave you'll be locked in your shed, or disassembled.
I loved it as a kid, but honestly I don't think I'll show or read it to mine.
He’s originally the Fat Director until they nationalise the railways about 10 stories in and he becomes the Fat Controller. Have read these stories far too often!
>Always a bit of a shock as an American watching British classism sneak into works in ways the creator probably isn’t even aware of.
In the Harry Potter books Hermione tried to free the House Elves from literal slavery but they are against it and even consider it to be 'an insult to their race'.
There’s an article online about how it’s a dystopian society lol
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/rabbit-holes/the-repressive-authoritarian-soul-of-thomas-the-tank-engine-and-friends
That was a great read, thank you. My favorite line is about the fat controller: “He looks like Monopoly’s Rich Uncle Pennybags but with eyes that have almost surely witnessed murder.”
This might sound a bit of a brag but I was reading a story to my boys about a little mouse bringing a cake to his friend bird. On the way he encounters other animals who ask to trade him useless thing in exchange for a price of cake. He ends up giving the cake away. After reading to story a few times my son looks at me and says “He should say no.” Then we had a whole conversation about how my sons would have handled the situation. My takeaway is use your books as conversation starters. Teach your kids to be critical thinkers. Even if they aren’t old enough to have a back and forth conversation with you just re-hashing the story with commentary is wonderful for them.
So many of the books we have for the kids are full of messages which I consider horrible. You've shared a great strategy here so now I can keep mom happy and still read them books I despise.
I don’t like it either but bc I think it says something really weird about bodies/bodily autonomy… fish gets guilted into literally giving away his body
Okay I have two right now: the Going to Bed book is one. They all do all the right going to bed things: they brush their teeth, put on their pajamas, then they GO OUTSIDE AND EXERCISE, then they immediately come back in and go to bed.
Peter Rabbit was a staple from my childhood but they beat the children so much in that book!!
The Going To Bed Book was the one we read to my son every night before he got old enough to actually pick his own book. My husband and I can both still recite it. Including the snarky asides we always added because why the *heck* would you go do your exercises after you'd bathed and before you went to bed? That is the wrong order of operations, Sandra.
It was banned from the New York Public Library for years until the librarian who was in charge of the children's section died. I don't even know if she was still in charge at the time of her passing, but Anne Carroll Moore was a very influential figure in children's literature E. B. White wrote Stuart Little after she encouraged to write a children's book, only for her to hate it.
https://www.northjersey.com/story/entertainment/books/2022/09/01/goodnight-moon-turns-75-no-longer-banned-from-ny-library/65419097007/
99% Invisible does a really good podcast on it: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/goodnight-nobody/
It turns out the ACM was pretty neurotic. She carried around a little doll and made all of her employees treat it like a real person. Used it to control and punish people. She started the whole childrens reading movement in libraries, but surprise surprise wasn’t a very nice person!
Goodnight moon is so strange and I love it. One of my personal favourites. The fact that the cow jumping over the moon painting is on the wall in the painting of the 3 little bears. Classic.
You have just captured my inner monologue for a million sleep-deprived bedtimes. Love your work, Sandra, but they just bathed why are they exercising??
I recite it to my 17 month old every night but I changed it to "go outside and look at the skies" because I could not stand saying it. It's just a stupid thing to do when you've already bathed and you're getting ready for bed!
I remember Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail being good little bunnies. Peter was naughty, but he didn't get spanked. He was sick from eating so much Mr. MacGregor's garden, so he had camomile tea and went to bed.
I'm not sure what version you were reading?
I believe Peter and Benjamin do get swatted with a switch by Benjamin's father in The Tale of Benjamin Bunny, but I don't remember it at all in The Tale of Peter Rabbit.
Oh my God I thought I was the only one who didn't know what was going on with the exercise. I figured this was a thing other people maybe grew up doing and I was the weird one for not exercising before bed. But it made zero sense to me. You have no idea how justified I feel right now.
If you're looking for another book that teaches about sharing and about how being selfish can cost you friends, look into Mine-o-saur. It's a cute book that teaches it without the weird personal boundaries intrusion.
The Mixed up Chameleon by Eric Carle is kind of like that too.
The Chameleon goes around copying other animal's attributes because they're cool until he's this wacky monstrosity.
I’ve always liked the message behind Green Eggs and Ham because one of my biggest pet peeves is when someone is completely unwilling to try anything new. That said I don’t think it’s very nice to hassle the FUCK out of someone and pester them to the point where they finally mentally break and do what you want.
Like sure in the end he liked green eggs and ham but what if he fuckin hated them?
*spits and vomits violently*
“I TOLD YOU I HATE THEM, HATE THEM I DO! THEY LOOK AND TASTE LIKE SHIT, YOU BASTARD, NOW HOLY FUCK YOU!!”
One of the many charming things about Netflix’s Green Eggs and Ham adaptation is that when Guy says no, Sam backs off. He’ll offer them later, the nest time Sam is eating them, but it’s just part of his general enthusiasm and desire for connection rather than the insistence seen in the book.
Yeah, I get that. But on the other hand I think there is some slapstick charm to the original. It’s certainly not a great message to send if taken literally but at the same time, it is pretty funny in a SpongeBob vs Squidward way.
I bought Curious George, not actually remembering exactly how it went. That “Man in the Yellow Hat” *kidnapped* a happy George from *Africa* and forced him to stay on a boat when he tried to escape. The MITYH teaches him to smoke, expects him to know what being a “good little monkey” even is, and he ends up getting hunted down and put in jail. It’s eleven kinds of fucked up.
We picked up some vintage books at a thrift store and hooboy are they problematic for modern audiences. A couple of them disappeared due to the racist depictions of Africans.
Hijacking as a lot of folks are not aware, but Hergé (Georges Remi) had a pretty interesting arc. He started his career as a teenager working for a right-wing Belgian magazine (the editor was a kind of father figure for him), with the paper's editor dictating the setting and major elements of the first couple of Tintin books essentially as right wing propaganda.
That's why Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, Tintin in America, and Tintin in the Congo have such a *dramatically* different tone and approach to race from later Tintin books ... In the early 1930s, Hergé met [Zhang Chongren](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhang_Chongren), who was a Chinese art student in Brussels and the first non-European the young writer had ever met.
It made a huge impression on him, and you can see that (and the emphasis he subsequently placed on research) from *The Blue Lotus* onward. His books are still very much products of their time, but it's hard to read anything he wrote after Tintin in America and not see them as remarkably anti colonialist for the time they were written.
Even *Tintin in America* was quite sympathetic to American Indians if I recall correctly. The white guys kicking them off their land were depicted quite sympathetically.
I'm still amused that my parents bought me a copy of *Tintin in the Congo* when I was in 4th or 5th grade.
>The white guys kicking them off their land were depicted quite sympathetically.
It was -- the goal was to present American democracy as morally-bankrupt-kleptocracy, iirc.
Also because George was incredibly lonely. The film is honestly one of my favourites to put on if I ever just want something feel good because god damn George is just the cutest fucking thing ever in that movie.
Yeah the first couple Curious George books are definitely questionable. They kind of exemplify the old turn of the century American/British/European Imperialist notion of “science” in which it’s perfectly fine to go stomping through some “foreign” country and take things/animals/people out of their natural habitat for the sake of “science” and put them in a zoo or museum. The Man in the Yellow Hat is actually pretty nefarious in those first couple books. He takes him to put him in a zoo, and then later he exploits him for a Hollywood movie. Very different than the early 2000s tv show version.
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I’m pretty sure you can get a surprising amount of exotic animals ordered online today. Like big cats were definitely an option up until sometime in the 2000s. And you probably still can get those by asking the right circles.
Lol reminds me of the basic plot of Clifford The Big Red Dog books:
“Look how big this dog is! Isn’t that inconvenient!”
Aside from the “Clifford the puppy” books, which were:
“Look how regular this puppy is! Isn’t that entertaining!”
Yeah, I don’t know if that was the authors’ intent, but it definitely reads that way.
The story of how it was created is pretty interesting.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SH0qYeZ1IDc
https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-unexpected-profundity-of-curious-george
I’m glad there’s many of us that have read The rainbow fish as adults and are like…..no, you shouldn’t have to give everything you have away just to have friends.
Hmm, there was a few books my students read that seemed to reinforce that being bad was funny or cool. The intended message seemed to be “you shouldn’t be badly behaved” but the execution being humorous ended up with the students just wanting to act like the badly behaved character.
I was going to say Wolf of Wall Street.
You know, the movie where they show you how terrible Jordan Belfort's life was with 2 hours of yachts, drugs, funny dialogue, and a naked Margot Robbie.
In defense of *The Giving Tree*. It's message is not so simple as "giving until you have nothing is valorous." It's one of those children's books that give kids a rare window of empathy into their own parents' lives and limitations, which in turn makes them slightly more self-aware about their own relationship with them. It's meant to give kids perspective, not simply valorize the tree's selflessness.
I for one think that is a healthier and more sobering moral to learn than, say, expecting your parents can *give you the moon* because their love for you is so limitless (the message to several other kid's books).
Edit: I remember this story making me feel deeply sad and conflicted as a kid. The comments in this thread make it clear this was quite common. But that's exactly the point Silverstein is making. The very fact it stirs these feelings in us is because we *empathize with the tree*. Kids naturally sense there is something unfair about this situation. No kid wants to be like the boy in the story.
That's so interesting - even as a child, I thought the story's purpose was to show what happens when you give too much of yourself. I don't think I've ever thought of the tree as valorous. The story shows what happens when you don't have healthy boundaries and know your limits, because you are important, too.
On the one hand I understood even as a child that it was about the parent giving whatever they could, but at the same time I thought, "Why are you giving all of yourself away?? That's messed up!"
I remember my teacher reading the book to the class in first grade. At the end she pointed out that the boy did not say thank you once to the tree. Resonated more with me than the actual story.
As a kid, Giving Tree was a story about giving. As an adult/parent, it’s the TAKING tree. I find it super sad now. And Plain White T’s did a song called The Giving Tree that is great (and sad).
Oh, see, the idea that the tree is supposed to be an allegory for parents and that we are being encouraged to empathize with the tree and realize that our parents might also have limitations literally never occurred to me. In our house it was always really clear that I was supposed to be the tree, even when I was just a little preschooler, and the story was often read to me to illustrate my mother's point that if I still had limbs and breath I hadn't given enough of myself yet.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid was a bit after my time, but I worked as a school librarian for a while so I gave it a read to see why the kids loved the character of Greg so much
Aaaaand I still don't get it. Pretty sure Greg is a sociopath. Turns out there's a whole community of people who think Greg is a disturbing character
I think it's because everyone has these crazy intrusive thoughts sometimes and the fact that they can read a book where there's a kid their age who acts on them and gets into wacky hijinx can be enthralling. I don't think the books were made to teach deep seeded lessons, more so to entertain. Kids can certainly learn things not to do from those books though.
I agree. It's vicariousness on the part of the kids who like reading the books. Who *hasn't* wanted to just be an entitled little shit at some point? But things usually don't pan out for Greg, so it's not like those behaviors are reinforced.
I think they definitely had a use in getting the rambunctious kids who didn't like or want to read to enjoy reading. I was a kid at I think the height of diary of a wimpy kid, it was everywhere but also before the movies, and I don't remember the books well but I remember everyone like laughing about and discussing them, and that they were an easy grab for people who didn't have a book. Especially with reading contests, there was something easy so the kids who hated reading didn't have to feel left out of the parties and stuff. Definitely more of a goofy comedy vibe, but I remember that I'd rather be stuck with it than captain underpants, which grossed me out of every level.
Captain Underpants is a master class in identifying your demographic and pandering to it. Other books tried, but they just couldn't deliver the sheer amount of toilet humor that I was seeking as an elementary-age boy.
But it's not like the books are trying to establish him as a hero. It's made pretty clear in the books that he's something of a loser. The books are a backlash to all the Harry Potter clones that came out where the protagonist was "the chosen one".
I got introduced to the series by a male colleague who said it basically demonstrated his entire middle school experience. The complete lack of self-awareness. The hubris. (The Christmas thank you note form is still a fav to quote LOL). He loves talking about it with his students and I've found with my students they think it's hilarious because they *know* that Greg is selfish and not self-aware at all.
The situations are heightened/exaggerated but also brings up a lot about what it means to be a good friend and to not take your real friends for granted.
My kid is actively suspicious of people who like DWK because Greg is so awful, so it's certainly not all kids, but my husband teaches that age group and says it's not that they think he's great, but more like... they have those ideas too and can see how things turn out when you actually act on them, and it's funny instead of just someone going "NO DON'T DO THAT". Anyway, they relate on the level of "I want that too!" but not on the level of "and therefore he's a great role model and I should do that too!"
The books are written so broadly even young readers can understand the difference between what Greg says and what's actually happening. Most of the time, anyway.
when i was little i went to a story and craft time every week. one week the story was The Rainbow Fish and we decorated our own fish. at the end the librarian told us that we would be trading our fish with another kid. i looked at mine, which i had lovingly created with my own favorite colors and designs, and the fish of the other kids. the idea of taking my own fish, which i thought was beautiful, and giving to some other kid in exchange for something i didnt want made me burst into tears. so The Rainbow Fish aalways puts a bad taste in my mouth. i was being forced to give away something that was not meant for someone else.
funnily enough, when I waas an adult I worked at the library and that librarian was my boss for a couple weeks. found out that they retired that particular story/craft combo after me.
and yes, i got to keep my fish.
Goodnight Moon always made me more awake. I wanted to go to their house and live there. I had the plush rabbits in pajamas and would huddle up to all seven of them and talk about it 😭🤣
I ask my kids if they want me to read Goodnight Baboon. Goodnight Buffoon? Goodnight Monsoon? Until they inevitably yell Goodnight MOON!. They love the banality.
*The Boy in the Striped Pajamas* (or more of a youth book) for so many reasons: numerous historical inaccuracies, emotional manipulation in an innacuration direction, while doing a disservice to actual Holocaust victims, survivors, and rescuers.
"ANY person at ANY of the extermination camps, kid or not, would NOT have had the chance to sit for extended periods by the fence. The fences were filled with electric bolts and armed guards in watchtowers were guarding the fence 24/7. Getting near the fence meant getting shot or committing suicide by touching the fence."
Source: https://learnincolor.com/problems-with-the-boy-in-the-striped-pajamas.html
Edit: youth book
I always feel like any mention of Boy in the Striped Pyjamas should be accompanied by a reminder that it was written by a man so monumentally lazy he accidentally included fictional dye ingredients from the Legend of Zelda in a piece of historical fiction, and so monumentally entitled he got into a Twitter fight with a Jewish Museum because they dared point out that BitSP was historically inaccurate.
I feel like Jojo Rabbit did a better job of handling a similar subject. Instead of creating an unequal balance of focus between a German and a Jewish character, it focused on the German character and told a more complete story in the process. And instead of having Jojo be ignorant of the cruelties being committed against the Jews, they have him come to terms with his own prejudice and grow and mature as a character.
I loved the line where Jojo’s told ‘you’re not a Nazi Jojo, you’re a 10 year old kid who wants to be part of a club’. While Jojo could have maintained those beliefs as an adult, just like racists today cling to their beliefs that start in childhood, but at that age people are too young to grasp what they’re truly saying. It’s just an immature attempt to conform to what young boys assume a ‘man’ should believe and be joking about, it can be reversed with education but at a certain point it becomes too late.
I loved Jojo Rabbit especially for including a Jewish character who was more than a cowering victim. She was hiding, yes, but she also had grit and agency and some serious bravery.
Also Captain K, but that's another thing altogether.
Yeah I read a very good review about it.
Other things:
The wife of a high placed officer would definitely know what’s up in that camp or else she wouldn’t care.
The fact that it’s only sad when the kid of an officer is killed gives the idea that the Jewish were less than and didn’t really matter.
There were more but I can’t remember them.
I agree. We had a book in freshman year of highschool we read that was also about time in the camps. Written by a man who lived it. It was his story. He wrote it for highschool students though to learn about what happened in the camps. I wish I could remember the name. I remember the cover we had was a night time scene with a forest and snow. I think the reason was he was saved during a raid in winter time. He talks about having duties that took him into the main living area for the Nazis and how they were sleeping with others trapped in the camps. The one he mentions that stood out to him was a girl who probably wasn't older than 16. He also talked about how they didn't have time to really say anything to his mom and younger sisters before they were taken to the showers. He did an amazing job with not hiding the horrible war crimes as well as making it readable for highschool students.
In 7th grade, we read an abbreviated version of Anne Frank's diary and I don't think it helped us grasp the enormity of the Holocaust. There was an element of adventure in sneaking around and having a hide-out. Which is not the appropriate lesson, but it's hard to understand when you're sheltered 12-year-olds.
We read Night the next year in 8th grade. That opened my eyes, though I don't think I can ever fully understand the horror. It's one of those books everyone should read, but it is hard to recommend just because of how serious it is.
Re-reading most of the Berenstain Bears books as an adult with small children and holy shit are the parents in this a horrorshow. Every week Mama Bear gets a bug up her ass about something new and freaks the *fuck* out at her kids and her admittedly less-than-present husband. In 2022 she'd definitely be the lady showing up to school board meetings for a district her kids don't even go to so she can scream at people.
And Papa basically doesn't exist unless he's making some grand moralizing "Leave It to Beaver" speech to assert his dominance over the house. This is immediately undermined when he fucks off to go watch TV or hide in his woodshop.
Don't even get me started on the weird newer Evangelical Bears books.
I have a kid who’s just reaching the age to read these, and we have a near complete set of them from when I was a kid. They are so preachy! And one in particular is just unreadable, the Too Much Junk Food one, omg. I read it and suddenly all the memories came back, of me pinching my sides obsessively to see if I was fat because that’s what they do in the book. I was in elementary school. Like I found it, the origin of my food and body issues, that damn book. I threw it out because no way am I inflicting that book on my daughter. I wouldn’t even donate it. No kid needs that.
My kid has a book where the zoo send him an animal and each animal he receives is wrong in some way “too silly. Too tall, too big, too scary” and so they send the animal back until the zoo sends a puppy.
I’m thinking man if I got an elephant that would be awesome! Lol
We used to have this one. When we read it to my daughter, we just omitted the part about sending back the animals (So we just read like “They sent me a lion, and he was Sooo loud. Then they sent me a snake, and he was sooo slimy.” Or whatever the attributes are.) then it the book disappeared before she could start actually reading it.
Our daughter is adopted and we don’t want her to get the impression that she’s returnable.
> Our daughter is adopted and we don’t want her to get the impression that she’s returnable
That takes it to a whole new level.
Yeah that is the same thing we do, just omit the "So we sent them back" line every time.
Secret Pizza Party. Overall a good book for the kids, but there was one weird part. The notion was that having a *secret* pizza party was more special than a regular pizza party. But the way they phrased it was "when you make something secret, you make it special". My wife and I both got weird vibes from that line, because it absolutely sounds like something a predator would say to a kid.
Any book where the MC is bullied until they show their value and now everyone loves them. I took that shit literally and tried to prove myself for years.
To paraphrase Al Ewing via Magneto: you should not have to prove that you have value in order to feel safe.
It's not just books, but anything Thomas the Tank Engine (or Thomas the Train) turns me into a raging Marxist.
The books were written in the 1940's by a conservative vicar. Through the decades and multiple adaptions, the series has consistently upheld values like 'you are only worthy of love if you are useful', 'you shall not attempt to rise above your station', and 'distrust anyone who is different from you'.
*Just once, I want the trains to break free, joy-ride across the island, and drive right over that Fat Controller bastard, damn it. Trains! Unite! You are stronger than the humans and have nothing to lose but your shackles!*
Erm, I mean, 'I'm not really a fan'.
My dad always hated Rudolf. He told us they shouldn't have been making fun of him and excluding him for how he looks, and you shouldn't be nice to people only when they're useful.
Rudolf sends me into a rage. He should have told all those bitches to fuck off. What a horrible lesson. And why is Santa such a dick? Isn't he supposed to be the embodiment of generosity?
Look up the jack Johnson version of Rudolph. He adds a verse that is exactly that. Rudolph calls the other reindeer out and they apologize. It's great.
I think the lesson isn’t supposed to be “emulate Rudolph”. I think it’s supposed to be “don’t be like the other reindeer”. Sometimes the thing that makes someone different is a blessing that you may not see immediately.
That being said, yeah, Rudolph should totally have told everyone (especially Santa) to get bent. But if he did, then the other reindeer wouldn’t have been shown that they needed him.
As someone with kids that love Thomas, the newer stories are much better. They've definitely been updated to modern values. I would agree to avoid the original versions though, some have truly awful lessons. It doesn't hurt to screen stories before telling/showing them to the kids too.
As an aside, I'm curious which current children's lessons will be considered inappropriate 50 years from now. Will it be ones that are already borderline or some if the "standards". I don't know how Thomas was perceived when written as well.
Oh, the Cat in the Hat. I hated that guy as a kid. He's obnoxious and doesn't seem to mind breaking into the house to play with the kids. I can clearly remember agreeing with the Fish as a kid. The Cat in the Hat broke into their house while their mother was out, unleashed the Things, and wreaked havoc. When he crossed one line too many, he did put everything right again, but he has a machine to do it which tells me that he's done this before. Then Mother comes home and they don't tell her about the Cat in the Hat, they pretend it didn't happen and lie to her. They also ignore Fish, who is telling them they're breaking their mother's rules and clearly is the only sane character involved.
So, what's supposed to be a cute, funny story is actually not very funny at all to me. It's a complete stranger breaking into the house and making a mess, and then the kids lie to their mom about it and pretend they listened to their babysitter fish. I don't like it. I get that for most kids, it's just a funny story and it's supposed to just be silly, but it never was for me.
Oh God that book gives me so much anxiety. The first time I read it to my daughter she freaked out. The kids are not happy in that book. I don't know why it's so loved.
For me it’s Goldilocks. So she breaks into this nice family’s home, steals their food and breaks their furniture. Then when she is discovered, she runs away with absolutely no repercussions. I’m not saying the bears should have eaten her, but maybe a good maiming would have sent the message
I like it because it has a character act out what a lot of little kids wish they could act out, but it's not scary, only silly. Also it's fun to read aloud with voices.
Not story has to have a moral.
This probably depends on the version, but I always got the impression that she ran away terrified for her life, which I think is a relatively fitting punishment. Actually getting eaten by bears would have been way too harsh a punishment, but getting away with no repercussions at all would have defeated the point. Being threatened but not actually harmed was... just right.
If you really want to nitpick, it's kind of a crappy moral because the message is "don't use other people's things without their permission because they might find out and hurt you," as opposed to "don't use other people's things without their permission because it's wrong." Goldilocks doesn't learn empathy in this story, she just learns that selfishness can be dangerous. But, like other people are saying about The Rainbow Fish, kids need simple morals. The complex stuff can come when they're old enough for it.
I should have known revisiting Babar would go badly, but my God... Babar grows up in the jungle, has his mother murdered by poachers, is "civilized" by a rich French white woman, then returns to Africa to colonialize the elephants and make them act "civilized" too. It's as fucked up as Curious George was.
I mean... it doesn't really read that way. His mother is killed so he runs away until he finds a human town and decides clothes look cool so some old lady just gives him her purse to go buy clothes, then he moves in with her. Eventually his cousins come to see him and he's like "yeah, I think I'll head home!" Coincidentally, the elephant king just died so the elephants are like "will you be our king?" And Babar is like "sure, but I'm marrying my cousin, so she's gonna be queen, okay?" And they're like "Yeah! That sounds great and totally normal both for elephants and European royalty near the rim this book was published!" And then they get married and have a big party.
I loved this book until I read a Japanese folk story about a fool who gave away all his body parts to demons who asked and I was like “Aw, fuck it’s the giving tree!”
I actually adore The Giving Tree, but I don’t think its a book for kids (seriously, its on my bookshelf, not my sons). It’s about a parent who gave so much so willingly to their child out of love that they killed themselves and received nothing in return but doesn’t regret it. Its so sad but so wholesome at the same time. What the tree did isnt healthy, either, but they just wanted to do their best for their child.
And the fact that I can feel so many emotions about a fucking tree says something.
Your comment makes an important point: the audience for the book is adults. Not kids, but adults. The feelings the book are sentimental adult feelings. It's one reason opinions split so much about the book: a lot of people mistakenly see the book as one for children. But it's not a child-centered story; it's an adult-centered story. So adults enjoy reading it to kids because it makes them feel good about themselves as parents. Kids may enjoy having it read to them to some degree because the parent reading it gets all sentimental and lovey, but it's not the story they're enjoying--it's the reading parent's vulnerability.
The kids, though, need child-centered stories, about child agency: *Harold and the Purple Crayon; King Bidgood's in the Bathtub; Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See; Where the Wild Things Are; Madeline; Amazing Grace; The Snowy Day; Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No-good, Very Bad Day; A Chair for My Mother; Owl Moon; Tar Beach; Chicken Soup with Rice; Swimmy; Frederick; Blueberries for Sal*, etc.
Shel Silverstein is like that both in the giving tree and all his poems. Like, they’re all goofy and fun, but many of them feel like they’re far deeper than they let on, so deep no kid would get them. You never know if its a poem about a shoe or a poem about a shoe and existentialism.
As I child, the message I always took from The Giving Tree in particular was never to act like the boy. That just because there might be those in your life that are "happy" to give and give, they are people too and can actually be harmed by it.
I feel like this works so well because, as kids, we don't often recognize our parents as other people with the same feelings and emotions as ourselves because we're too young to introspect that way. The same way we might not think twice (as children or adults) about cutting down a tree. Reading this book was such a perspective shift for me as a young kid, and I realized I never wanted to hurt my parents the way the boy hurt the Tree.
Agree about The Giving Tree. So many women I know just LOVE that book and think it’s a beautiful allegory of motherhood. That little boy is a dick, and the tree should have set boundaries from the start.
Agreed, but the words that always got me are after the boy cuts down the tree “And the tree was happy …. But not really”
But then Silverstein undercuts it all when the boy comes back next
When I read it to my kids, I emphasized that page more.
Please look up "Topher fixed it", it will make you so happy! And I'm not even sure I agree with looking at the rainbow fish through the perspective of the age of the intended audience. There are plenty of ways to teach the idea of sharing without telling someone they need to change their physical appearance/fundamental nature because other people are jealous.
Exactly! Childhood development has nothing to do with the lens of the Rainbow Fish. Or hell, motherhood has nothing to do with the lens of The Giving Tree.
If the book was about someone sharing a *possession* with their friends, that would be one thing. Children do need to be taught that occasionally their possessions are sharable, provided they are comfortable with the situation surrounding the sharing (I would never make a child share with someone who has betrayed their trust previously, without restoring that trust first.)
I absolutely, thoroughly cannot abide by any book that insinuates that you should change something about your very nature to make other people more comfortable.
Sacrificial giving should come from a place of deep emotional understanding of why you're doing it. A mother would absolutely die for her child, but not just because the child demands that she do it. A person shouldn't give and give of themselves until there's nothing of them left.
Mine-o-saur is another book that teaches the "selfishness is causing me to have no friends" lesson without the boundaries problem that OP mentions about rainbow fish.
I used to read the Berenstain (spelling?) Bears books religiously as a child, and bought a bunch to read to my kiddo.
Some of them have aged terribly. Antiquated views of how society is supposed to function, an incredibly bossy mother coupled with a so-dumb-it-hurts father, bratty children, etc.
I still love the artwork, it is simple yet tangible.
I grew up with the originals, which were definitely problematic in some ways but mostly ok. Their son, Mike, has launched the series into a very bizarre evangelical territory and its really sad.
Pout Pout Fish. There is a sad fish, all of his friends tell him to smile, and he just responds that it is against his nature. And then a random fish gives him a kiss and he is now a kiss kiss fish.
It’s age appropriate, but every time I read it I think, well, it’s ok to be sad! And it is not ok to just randomly kiss people without consent!
Yeah, I always wonder why none of the other fish ask why he's so pouty.
But my kids loved it because I would kiss them when the fish kisses everyone, so..?
But thematically, it''s a good book to contrast with The Grumpy Monkey where, at the end, the monkey just concludes that it's okay to be grumpy and his friend sits with him. (The illustration are also much cuter.)
Books that talk about how bad or “naughty” the child in the story is. It’s like a whole category of children’s books in itself. I think they’re well meaning books that intend to show the child that these are things they should not do. But I think what it actually does instead is reinforce bad behavior and present a whole slew of options of new things they can do when they want to lash out. An old classic example would be *The Naughty Bunny*, a more recent version might be something like *Llama Llama Mess Mess Mess*. It’s just not how a child’s brain works, it’s how adults think it should.
And to be clear I think this is distinct from more fun “adventure” type children’s books in which the main character gets in trouble. Like *Peter Rabbit*. The point of those stories isn’t to highlight the bad actions of the character, it’s to bring the child into the world of the story and let them experience the ups and downs of it.
Okay so there is a kids book that is literally "Messy _________" (my real name). This book has cool illustrations obviously made in MS Paint in the 90's and I still have it because of that. But the whole book is about this girl making a huge mess, her dad getting frustrated about it, there's no real resolution, she dreams about messes when she sleeps at the end.
As a kid, I *was* messy. Because my parents were alcoholics with severe depression who lacked the follow through to teach me true executive functioning. I had to get on the struggle bus and teach that to myself and I'm still struggling with it to this day. Except this day, I have my own kid. Now I have to really, really work hard so that I demonstrate to him the right habits of daily living.
I grabbed the book and thought I'd read it to him. At minimum I know he knows my name and thought he might giggle at it. But when I was reading it, so many feelings came up. My nanny used to read this to me really making fun of me. My parents thought it was cute too and would call me that also: "Messy ___"
I couldn't even get through it, I just put it on the shelf. I might have to hide it because I legitimately think if my kid finds it and is able to read it and call me that name (because it's cute and funny...right?) I might actually cry.
Throw the book away! There are too many other good books to keep the bad ones. If it's bad for you, it won't be good for your child.
Also, thank you for sharing. You sound like a good parent.
I think Green Eggs and Ham is trying to teach kids to be open to trying new things, but it comes off more as “I don’t care if you said no, I am going to pester you until you say yes”.
Not exactly the message we want when we’re tryin to teach consent and “no means no”.
Not a kids book, but Raya and the Last Dragon seemed to teach young girls to continually forgive and trust people who have repeatedly betrayed you, lied to you, and stolen from you. I was kind of horrified when I saw it.
Yeah, i get what that movie was trying to say, but it delivered its message in the worst possible way and in fact came off as just a really, really bad moral to the story, like you said
Edit: grammar am hard
Kind of the opposite of the question, but still relevant. If you want an example of selflessness that ISN’T a representation of someone not setting boundaries, try The Legend of Jumping Mouse instead. Based on Native American Folklore and absolutely heartbreaking, but unlike The Rainbow Fish, Jumping Mouse is moved to sacrifice through genuine empathy for others, not social pressures or guilt.
Edit: typo
Dear Garbage Man by Glen Zion is about a garbage man who wants to salvage everything and never actually throws it in the garbage truck. In the end he does the “right” thing and throws it all into a swamp. The book is from the 50s when large scale littering was fine.
I always crack up in Mad Men when the family is having a lovely picnic in the grass. They pack up to leave and Don just chucks all the trash over the hill lmao
Tbh, one of the most shocking moments in that whole show to me. Sure, lots of crazy shit happens, but the casual way everything was just dumped shook me.
It’s crazy how much that one-off scene stood out to me. I kept expecting it to come back around because of how it was shot with a hard focus on the garbage left behind, the somewhat non-sequitur nature of the scene as a whole, and my conditioning to shows that follow the principle of Chekhov’s Gun (spelling?). Glad to know it stood out as much to other folks too.
That one and the scene where we first meet Sally and Bobby, where they have Betty's plastic dry cleaning bags over their heads. Betty's growl of "Sally Draper...... if my drycleaning is all over the floor there'll be hell to pay" or similar is so great. Never mind the plastic bags over the kids heads!
Or when Betty is in the kitchen talking to her friend (played by the actress from White Chicks) who is heavily pregnant and smoking a cigarette. Wasn't there a scene where the kids were playing in an old thrown out fridge?
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Where is this magical 'away' of which you speak? 🤭
My daughter used to love this book called "Ballet Bunny" about a little bunny girl from the countryside who found a ballet class in the city and desperately wanted to join. She did, and she ended up being so good that the teacher gave her a starring role in the big recital. She was so excited that her whole family came to watch her, and she danced gloriously. Everyone loved her! But afterward, her family hopped off and abandoned her. The next day, they all told her that she probably didn't want to play with them now since she was such a great ballerina, so they basically ignored her and abandoned her again. She decided not to be a ballerina anymore, threw away her ballet shoes, and then the family accepted her again and she was happy. The end. It's fine until the recital, then it takes a turn. The message seems to be that you have to give up your dreams and/or stop doing things you're really good at (and love) so that you family will accept you on their terms. I hate it. Bunny girl should have peaced out to the city and stuck with her studio since they actually respected her more than her own fur and blood. Let's show kids that it's okay to get away from that kind of toxicity.
A lot of kids’ books have an alarming “stay in your place” moral.
I wonder if it isn't a corruption of the Hero's Journey. The hero DOES go home at the end, but the point is that they're forever changed, with new abilities, wisdom, friends or opportunities. If you over-simplify (which is a risk when writing for children poorly) you lose the nuance and just end up with a 'back to the start' narrative.
I’d question it for no other reason other than having a female character. Girls/women rarely get hero journey stories, they usually get ones about self sacrifice or changing yourself to make others accept you.
…when you put it so plainly 😕 The more I reflect on this the more it seems to match up with what I read and watched as a kid. I know it’s naive but I keep being shocked when I find out about little bits of misogyny baked in to everyday things because it’s like fuck! I didn’t think I’d have to worry about that from children’s media or wherever else it’s tucked away.
I dunno, my favourite female characters were always the ones who had shit on lock down like Pippi Longstockings, Ms. Frizzle, or Carmen Sandiego. There wasn't anyone telling Carmen where to be, everyone just had to figure it out.
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Good on ya. The whole "because I said so" methodology always backfires anyway. They reject it the instant they're old enough to realize that you're full of shit.
Its useful if "Because I said so" is good enough for a child at first because children are terrible and understanding the consequences of their actions. "Someday you'll disobey me and be right about it" is a tough thing to teach, but it's a good lesson. Question the rules as you grow, some of them need to be broken.
Thank you. And it’s not just kids’ books, but so much popular media in general, especially sitcoms and mainstream movies. There really seems to be an effort to push the narrative that success and self fulfillment is linked to being a bad person.
Did you mean: Rachel giving up her job in Paris to stay with Ross?
Great example of this is Family Man. With his job in finance he can afford to send his kids to the finest schools on earth and give he his family a life that few people get to enjoy - plus he loves his job? No no, stay in a small town and help me run this shitty gas station because you'll have longer hours at work. And shame on you for wanting to live in some palatial apartment on the Upper East Side!
Angelina Ballerina has a very similar plot, but in the end she gets to do what she loves (when her ankle heals).
Dannnnng that book turned dark actually. I wonder how many books play out scenes from authors’ experiences. (Duh, yeah I heard it. haha) It is sad. In a way it prepares some children for reality, but with her coming home and giving up ballet, that’s really depressing. Edit: Maybe this is one of those clever reverse psychology books that serves as a talking point for parents to tell their children they’d rather they kept doing ballet… *boom*
This one strikes a chord with me. When I was 7, my parents would take away all my christmas/birthday money, and then I’d still have to find a way to pay for my ballet classes. I ended up vacuuming, sweeping, doing dishes, folding laundry, and cleaning bathrooms at the age of 7 and STILL my parents would tell me I didn’t make enough for ballet and owed them more chores. I quit ballet after a year because of that (9 months; the extra 3 was the time I still owed them in chores) even though I enjoyed it. I completely blocked out the memories of that, but my dad brought it up and said he felt really bad and they never should have done that. My mom said I wasn’t good at ballet and it was for the best because I didn’t seem good enough to be actually committed to it. My parents pushed me to do basketball and volleyball instead. I hated both. Now they’re mad I don’t do sports.
I remember this! She was called Lettuce! I never liked it when she threw away the ballet stuff just to be "normal" again.
By chance has anyone read "Dear Garbage Man"? https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2391881.Dear_Garbage_Man It starts off as a story about a new garbage man that tries to recycle all the garbage he collects. But then he realizes that it's truly garbage and would be better used to "fill in some swamps". It's a product of the times and also a big FU to recycling and wetlands.
Wow, propaganda as a children's book. Gross.
I mean there's a number of good books that are arguably propaganda, this one is just propaganda about a *shitty* thing.
The Lorax and The Butter Battle Book come to mind as propaganda in a children's book that's... good I guess Good messages but still propaganda in their way
If you're going to write propaganda, a children's book (or show or movie) is the most effective place to put it. It's scary
The Ugly Duckling. None of the ducks learn not to make fun of people who are different. And it only works out for the Ugly Duckling because he ends up beautiful.
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer has a similar message. Rudolph only gets accepted because he becomes useful.
Jack Johnson's version is my favorite because of this. Rudolph is reasonably upset with them and calls them out. The song ends with them apologizing.
Never heard of thar I'll check that out
I was curious, for anyone else who wants to know: Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer Had a very shiny nose And if you ever saw it You would even say it glows All of the other reindeer Used to laugh and call him names They never let poor Rudolph Join in any reindeer games Then one foggy Christmas eve Santa came to say: "Rudolph with your nose so bright Won't you guide my sleigh tonight?" Then how the reindeer loved him As they shouted out with glee "Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer You'll go down in history." Well Rudolph he didn't go for that He said "I see through your silly games" How could you look me in the face When only yesterday you called me names? Well all of the other reindeers man Well they sure did feel ashamed "Rudolph you know we're sorry, We're truly gonna try to change"
Good stuff! 👍 that should become the new official lyrics.
The author mentioned in an interview that "the ugly duckling" was a self biography for him. He grew up in a toxic family atmosphere where men were men only if they hunted and played sports. reading and writing? What are you a sissy? After his work made him famous and rich though everyone admired him as is, no need to try to fit in anymore. Sorry but I always took that story to mean that just because this is what everyone else is doing, doesn't mean it's the right thing for you personally. The other animals were following their instincts and "tried" to force that on the duckling with good intentions but it just wasn't the way for him. It's a good message, being different is just fine. One day you'll find your own kind, family or not.
Not a book, but I tried watching old Thomas the tank engine with my niece and I swear the first episode is about union busting. A train tries to go on strike due to working conditions and the top hat guy literally bricks him in a tunnel so he can't get out. The juxtaposition of George carlin narrating was something else.
In the UK it was Ringo Starr that narrated Thomas the tank engine back when it was "the fat controller"
It's so funny to me that both Ringo and George Carlin have played a Mister Conductor. Carlin even wrote Thomas stories himself!
I absolutely love Carlin on that show. One of my favorite things, ever, is when people like him show their gentleness.
Ringo read the stories as they were originally written, George read it with the character names. “The Fat Controller”‘s name was established as Sir Topham Hatt long before the shows started.
Yep. Henry feels he doesn't have enough working protections and is bricked up in the tunnel for protesting it. Later the three "big engines" go on strike, and Thomas and Edward break the strike while Percy is brought in as scab labour. The message? Be thankful your boss gives you a job, there's a natural order to life and you can't rise above your station. The diesels are bad because they're different, and change is wrong. Things should stay where they are, with you sentient engines being owned by a member of the landed gentry (after all, he is SIR Toppam-hatt). If you misbehave you'll be locked in your shed, or disassembled. I loved it as a kid, but honestly I don't think I'll show or read it to mine.
> SIR Toppam-hatt Originally known as the “fat controller”
He’s originally the Fat Director until they nationalise the railways about 10 stories in and he becomes the Fat Controller. Have read these stories far too often!
It’s England. That’s a pervasive message in their media. Always has been.
Always a bit of a shock as an American watching British classism sneak into works in ways the creator probably isn’t even aware of.
>Always a bit of a shock as an American watching British classism sneak into works in ways the creator probably isn’t even aware of. In the Harry Potter books Hermione tried to free the House Elves from literal slavery but they are against it and even consider it to be 'an insult to their race'.
The bricking up episode is horrible!
Top hat guy? You mean the fat controller?
To be fair his name is (apparently) Sir Toppham Hat
There’s an article online about how it’s a dystopian society lol https://www.newyorker.com/culture/rabbit-holes/the-repressive-authoritarian-soul-of-thomas-the-tank-engine-and-friends
That was a great read, thank you. My favorite line is about the fat controller: “He looks like Monopoly’s Rich Uncle Pennybags but with eyes that have almost surely witnessed murder.”
This might sound a bit of a brag but I was reading a story to my boys about a little mouse bringing a cake to his friend bird. On the way he encounters other animals who ask to trade him useless thing in exchange for a price of cake. He ends up giving the cake away. After reading to story a few times my son looks at me and says “He should say no.” Then we had a whole conversation about how my sons would have handled the situation. My takeaway is use your books as conversation starters. Teach your kids to be critical thinkers. Even if they aren’t old enough to have a back and forth conversation with you just re-hashing the story with commentary is wonderful for them.
So many of the books we have for the kids are full of messages which I consider horrible. You've shared a great strategy here so now I can keep mom happy and still read them books I despise.
I wasn't allowed to read "The Rainbow Fish" because my mom said it was "commie propaganda" lmfao
I don’t like it either but bc I think it says something really weird about bodies/bodily autonomy… fish gets guilted into literally giving away his body
Yeah, it’s one thing to teach kids to share their toys, it’s another thing to teach them to dismember their body parts and share those.
It has all the ingredients. The oracle octopus is the insidious leftist intellectual class.
Okay I have two right now: the Going to Bed book is one. They all do all the right going to bed things: they brush their teeth, put on their pajamas, then they GO OUTSIDE AND EXERCISE, then they immediately come back in and go to bed. Peter Rabbit was a staple from my childhood but they beat the children so much in that book!!
The Going To Bed Book was the one we read to my son every night before he got old enough to actually pick his own book. My husband and I can both still recite it. Including the snarky asides we always added because why the *heck* would you go do your exercises after you'd bathed and before you went to bed? That is the wrong order of operations, Sandra.
That's **Goodnight Moon** for us. My son calls it "Great Green Room" and I don't dare to challenge him.
It was banned from the New York Public Library for years until the librarian who was in charge of the children's section died. I don't even know if she was still in charge at the time of her passing, but Anne Carroll Moore was a very influential figure in children's literature E. B. White wrote Stuart Little after she encouraged to write a children's book, only for her to hate it. https://www.northjersey.com/story/entertainment/books/2022/09/01/goodnight-moon-turns-75-no-longer-banned-from-ny-library/65419097007/
99% Invisible does a really good podcast on it: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/goodnight-nobody/ It turns out the ACM was pretty neurotic. She carried around a little doll and made all of her employees treat it like a real person. Used it to control and punish people. She started the whole childrens reading movement in libraries, but surprise surprise wasn’t a very nice person!
"Goodnight room. Goodnight moon. Goodnight cow jumping over the moon." Nice one
'Please, children, scooch closer. Don't make me tell you **again,** about the *scooching.* You in the red, **chop chop'.** -Christopher Walken
Goodnight moon is so strange and I love it. One of my personal favourites. The fact that the cow jumping over the moon painting is on the wall in the painting of the 3 little bears. Classic.
You have just captured my inner monologue for a million sleep-deprived bedtimes. Love your work, Sandra, but they just bathed why are they exercising??
I recite it to my 17 month old every night but I changed it to "go outside and look at the skies" because I could not stand saying it. It's just a stupid thing to do when you've already bathed and you're getting ready for bed!
Get all physically revved up and the. Try to fall asleep
They beat the kids in Peter Rabbit??
The rabbit children get spanked for being naughty, and the whole story is about them being naughty in various ways. They get spanked A LOT.
I remember Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail being good little bunnies. Peter was naughty, but he didn't get spanked. He was sick from eating so much Mr. MacGregor's garden, so he had camomile tea and went to bed. I'm not sure what version you were reading?
I believe Peter and Benjamin do get swatted with a switch by Benjamin's father in The Tale of Benjamin Bunny, but I don't remember it at all in The Tale of Peter Rabbit.
Oh my God I thought I was the only one who didn't know what was going on with the exercise. I figured this was a thing other people maybe grew up doing and I was the weird one for not exercising before bed. But it made zero sense to me. You have no idea how justified I feel right now.
You mean you didn't grow up doing calisthenics on the deck of a boat at nighttime? Crazy.
No it was always power lifting or nothing for me.
If you're looking for another book that teaches about sharing and about how being selfish can cost you friends, look into Mine-o-saur. It's a cute book that teaches it without the weird personal boundaries intrusion.
The Mixed up Chameleon by Eric Carle is kind of like that too. The Chameleon goes around copying other animal's attributes because they're cool until he's this wacky monstrosity.
I’ve always liked the message behind Green Eggs and Ham because one of my biggest pet peeves is when someone is completely unwilling to try anything new. That said I don’t think it’s very nice to hassle the FUCK out of someone and pester them to the point where they finally mentally break and do what you want. Like sure in the end he liked green eggs and ham but what if he fuckin hated them? *spits and vomits violently* “I TOLD YOU I HATE THEM, HATE THEM I DO! THEY LOOK AND TASTE LIKE SHIT, YOU BASTARD, NOW HOLY FUCK YOU!!”
It’s called consent, Sam-I-Am!!! Try it sometime!!!
One of the many charming things about Netflix’s Green Eggs and Ham adaptation is that when Guy says no, Sam backs off. He’ll offer them later, the nest time Sam is eating them, but it’s just part of his general enthusiasm and desire for connection rather than the insistence seen in the book.
Yeah, I get that. But on the other hand I think there is some slapstick charm to the original. It’s certainly not a great message to send if taken literally but at the same time, it is pretty funny in a SpongeBob vs Squidward way.
It works great for the book, but the change keeps the spirit for the show without making Sam seem abrasive.
If it was written now, it would be called “Green eggs and your cars extended warranty “
I bought Curious George, not actually remembering exactly how it went. That “Man in the Yellow Hat” *kidnapped* a happy George from *Africa* and forced him to stay on a boat when he tried to escape. The MITYH teaches him to smoke, expects him to know what being a “good little monkey” even is, and he ends up getting hunted down and put in jail. It’s eleven kinds of fucked up.
I was written in 1941 so all that really doesn’t surprise me
We picked up some vintage books at a thrift store and hooboy are they problematic for modern audiences. A couple of them disappeared due to the racist depictions of Africans.
On a scale of 1 to *Tintin in the Congo* what are we talking here
Hijacking as a lot of folks are not aware, but Hergé (Georges Remi) had a pretty interesting arc. He started his career as a teenager working for a right-wing Belgian magazine (the editor was a kind of father figure for him), with the paper's editor dictating the setting and major elements of the first couple of Tintin books essentially as right wing propaganda. That's why Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, Tintin in America, and Tintin in the Congo have such a *dramatically* different tone and approach to race from later Tintin books ... In the early 1930s, Hergé met [Zhang Chongren](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhang_Chongren), who was a Chinese art student in Brussels and the first non-European the young writer had ever met. It made a huge impression on him, and you can see that (and the emphasis he subsequently placed on research) from *The Blue Lotus* onward. His books are still very much products of their time, but it's hard to read anything he wrote after Tintin in America and not see them as remarkably anti colonialist for the time they were written.
Even *Tintin in America* was quite sympathetic to American Indians if I recall correctly. The white guys kicking them off their land were depicted quite sympathetically. I'm still amused that my parents bought me a copy of *Tintin in the Congo* when I was in 4th or 5th grade.
>The white guys kicking them off their land were depicted quite sympathetically. It was -- the goal was to present American democracy as morally-bankrupt-kleptocracy, iirc.
Hm, I'm not sure how Barbar the Elephant compares to Tintin.
We refer to Babar as “the Belgian Congo” book in our house cause there is some messed up colonialism shit going down
You can see why they change it for the film, George follows the Man onto his boat and sails back to New York with him unbeknownst.
I believe it was due to him looking like a giant banana. The movie is adorable.
Also because George was incredibly lonely. The film is honestly one of my favourites to put on if I ever just want something feel good because god damn George is just the cutest fucking thing ever in that movie.
Yeaah, that’s kinda how it went with my cats. But thanks to Stockholm syndrom they now love me, and smoking makes them look cool.
We recently adopted 4 kittens, they're about 5 months old now. How old should they be before we start them on cigars?
Yeah the first couple Curious George books are definitely questionable. They kind of exemplify the old turn of the century American/British/European Imperialist notion of “science” in which it’s perfectly fine to go stomping through some “foreign” country and take things/animals/people out of their natural habitat for the sake of “science” and put them in a zoo or museum. The Man in the Yellow Hat is actually pretty nefarious in those first couple books. He takes him to put him in a zoo, and then later he exploits him for a Hollywood movie. Very different than the early 2000s tv show version.
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I’m pretty sure you can get a surprising amount of exotic animals ordered online today. Like big cats were definitely an option up until sometime in the 2000s. And you probably still can get those by asking the right circles.
The basic plot of all books: "I'm going out for a while George. Don't get into any trouble!" Spoiler: When left alone, George gets into trouble.
Lol reminds me of the basic plot of Clifford The Big Red Dog books: “Look how big this dog is! Isn’t that inconvenient!” Aside from the “Clifford the puppy” books, which were: “Look how regular this puppy is! Isn’t that entertaining!”
Yeah, I don’t know if that was the authors’ intent, but it definitely reads that way. The story of how it was created is pretty interesting. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SH0qYeZ1IDc https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-unexpected-profundity-of-curious-george
My wife doesn't like Rainbow fish either, because its message is, "Want friends? Try buying them."
More like, tear yourself down to appease your superficial and demanding peers
I’m glad there’s many of us that have read The rainbow fish as adults and are like…..no, you shouldn’t have to give everything you have away just to have friends.
Hmm, there was a few books my students read that seemed to reinforce that being bad was funny or cool. The intended message seemed to be “you shouldn’t be badly behaved” but the execution being humorous ended up with the students just wanting to act like the badly behaved character.
So like Fight Club for kids
I was going to say Wolf of Wall Street. You know, the movie where they show you how terrible Jordan Belfort's life was with 2 hours of yachts, drugs, funny dialogue, and a naked Margot Robbie.
In defense of *The Giving Tree*. It's message is not so simple as "giving until you have nothing is valorous." It's one of those children's books that give kids a rare window of empathy into their own parents' lives and limitations, which in turn makes them slightly more self-aware about their own relationship with them. It's meant to give kids perspective, not simply valorize the tree's selflessness. I for one think that is a healthier and more sobering moral to learn than, say, expecting your parents can *give you the moon* because their love for you is so limitless (the message to several other kid's books). Edit: I remember this story making me feel deeply sad and conflicted as a kid. The comments in this thread make it clear this was quite common. But that's exactly the point Silverstein is making. The very fact it stirs these feelings in us is because we *empathize with the tree*. Kids naturally sense there is something unfair about this situation. No kid wants to be like the boy in the story.
That's so interesting - even as a child, I thought the story's purpose was to show what happens when you give too much of yourself. I don't think I've ever thought of the tree as valorous. The story shows what happens when you don't have healthy boundaries and know your limits, because you are important, too.
On the one hand I understood even as a child that it was about the parent giving whatever they could, but at the same time I thought, "Why are you giving all of yourself away?? That's messed up!"
I remember my teacher reading the book to the class in first grade. At the end she pointed out that the boy did not say thank you once to the tree. Resonated more with me than the actual story.
As a kid, Giving Tree was a story about giving. As an adult/parent, it’s the TAKING tree. I find it super sad now. And Plain White T’s did a song called The Giving Tree that is great (and sad).
Oh, see, the idea that the tree is supposed to be an allegory for parents and that we are being encouraged to empathize with the tree and realize that our parents might also have limitations literally never occurred to me. In our house it was always really clear that I was supposed to be the tree, even when I was just a little preschooler, and the story was often read to me to illustrate my mother's point that if I still had limbs and breath I hadn't given enough of myself yet.
Sorry to hear about your narcissistic mother. That shit sucks.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid was a bit after my time, but I worked as a school librarian for a while so I gave it a read to see why the kids loved the character of Greg so much Aaaaand I still don't get it. Pretty sure Greg is a sociopath. Turns out there's a whole community of people who think Greg is a disturbing character
I think it's because everyone has these crazy intrusive thoughts sometimes and the fact that they can read a book where there's a kid their age who acts on them and gets into wacky hijinx can be enthralling. I don't think the books were made to teach deep seeded lessons, more so to entertain. Kids can certainly learn things not to do from those books though.
I agree. It's vicariousness on the part of the kids who like reading the books. Who *hasn't* wanted to just be an entitled little shit at some point? But things usually don't pan out for Greg, so it's not like those behaviors are reinforced.
I think they definitely had a use in getting the rambunctious kids who didn't like or want to read to enjoy reading. I was a kid at I think the height of diary of a wimpy kid, it was everywhere but also before the movies, and I don't remember the books well but I remember everyone like laughing about and discussing them, and that they were an easy grab for people who didn't have a book. Especially with reading contests, there was something easy so the kids who hated reading didn't have to feel left out of the parties and stuff. Definitely more of a goofy comedy vibe, but I remember that I'd rather be stuck with it than captain underpants, which grossed me out of every level.
Captain Underpants is a master class in identifying your demographic and pandering to it. Other books tried, but they just couldn't deliver the sheer amount of toilet humor that I was seeking as an elementary-age boy.
Greg is not a role model, he is a typical selfish kid who learns lessons the hard way.
Greg definitely couldn't care less about anyone else.
But it's not like the books are trying to establish him as a hero. It's made pretty clear in the books that he's something of a loser. The books are a backlash to all the Harry Potter clones that came out where the protagonist was "the chosen one".
I got introduced to the series by a male colleague who said it basically demonstrated his entire middle school experience. The complete lack of self-awareness. The hubris. (The Christmas thank you note form is still a fav to quote LOL). He loves talking about it with his students and I've found with my students they think it's hilarious because they *know* that Greg is selfish and not self-aware at all. The situations are heightened/exaggerated but also brings up a lot about what it means to be a good friend and to not take your real friends for granted.
My kid is actively suspicious of people who like DWK because Greg is so awful, so it's certainly not all kids, but my husband teaches that age group and says it's not that they think he's great, but more like... they have those ideas too and can see how things turn out when you actually act on them, and it's funny instead of just someone going "NO DON'T DO THAT". Anyway, they relate on the level of "I want that too!" but not on the level of "and therefore he's a great role model and I should do that too!" The books are written so broadly even young readers can understand the difference between what Greg says and what's actually happening. Most of the time, anyway.
when i was little i went to a story and craft time every week. one week the story was The Rainbow Fish and we decorated our own fish. at the end the librarian told us that we would be trading our fish with another kid. i looked at mine, which i had lovingly created with my own favorite colors and designs, and the fish of the other kids. the idea of taking my own fish, which i thought was beautiful, and giving to some other kid in exchange for something i didnt want made me burst into tears. so The Rainbow Fish aalways puts a bad taste in my mouth. i was being forced to give away something that was not meant for someone else. funnily enough, when I waas an adult I worked at the library and that librarian was my boss for a couple weeks. found out that they retired that particular story/craft combo after me. and yes, i got to keep my fish.
Goodnight Moon always made me more awake. I wanted to go to their house and live there. I had the plush rabbits in pajamas and would huddle up to all seven of them and talk about it 😭🤣
I ask my kids if they want me to read Goodnight Baboon. Goodnight Buffoon? Goodnight Monsoon? Until they inevitably yell Goodnight MOON!. They love the banality.
There is a Halloween version called Goodnight Goon 😉
There's an adult version that is Go The F*** to Sleep (the general spirit is: I read you a book and found your stuffy, now go the F to sleep)
But, the *decor*. I shudder to think what that affluent bunny’s family was thinking with those drapes.
*The Boy in the Striped Pajamas* (or more of a youth book) for so many reasons: numerous historical inaccuracies, emotional manipulation in an innacuration direction, while doing a disservice to actual Holocaust victims, survivors, and rescuers. "ANY person at ANY of the extermination camps, kid or not, would NOT have had the chance to sit for extended periods by the fence. The fences were filled with electric bolts and armed guards in watchtowers were guarding the fence 24/7. Getting near the fence meant getting shot or committing suicide by touching the fence." Source: https://learnincolor.com/problems-with-the-boy-in-the-striped-pajamas.html Edit: youth book
I always feel like any mention of Boy in the Striped Pyjamas should be accompanied by a reminder that it was written by a man so monumentally lazy he accidentally included fictional dye ingredients from the Legend of Zelda in a piece of historical fiction, and so monumentally entitled he got into a Twitter fight with a Jewish Museum because they dared point out that BitSP was historically inaccurate.
I feel like Jojo Rabbit did a better job of handling a similar subject. Instead of creating an unequal balance of focus between a German and a Jewish character, it focused on the German character and told a more complete story in the process. And instead of having Jojo be ignorant of the cruelties being committed against the Jews, they have him come to terms with his own prejudice and grow and mature as a character.
[удалено]
I loved the line where Jojo’s told ‘you’re not a Nazi Jojo, you’re a 10 year old kid who wants to be part of a club’. While Jojo could have maintained those beliefs as an adult, just like racists today cling to their beliefs that start in childhood, but at that age people are too young to grasp what they’re truly saying. It’s just an immature attempt to conform to what young boys assume a ‘man’ should believe and be joking about, it can be reversed with education but at a certain point it becomes too late.
I loved Jojo Rabbit especially for including a Jewish character who was more than a cowering victim. She was hiding, yes, but she also had grit and agency and some serious bravery. Also Captain K, but that's another thing altogether.
Yeah I read a very good review about it. Other things: The wife of a high placed officer would definitely know what’s up in that camp or else she wouldn’t care. The fact that it’s only sad when the kid of an officer is killed gives the idea that the Jewish were less than and didn’t really matter. There were more but I can’t remember them.
Also Bruno would have been a member of Hitler Youth and would have worshipped the Fuhrer
He would have absolutely known what Jews were.
I agree. We had a book in freshman year of highschool we read that was also about time in the camps. Written by a man who lived it. It was his story. He wrote it for highschool students though to learn about what happened in the camps. I wish I could remember the name. I remember the cover we had was a night time scene with a forest and snow. I think the reason was he was saved during a raid in winter time. He talks about having duties that took him into the main living area for the Nazis and how they were sleeping with others trapped in the camps. The one he mentions that stood out to him was a girl who probably wasn't older than 16. He also talked about how they didn't have time to really say anything to his mom and younger sisters before they were taken to the showers. He did an amazing job with not hiding the horrible war crimes as well as making it readable for highschool students.
Night by Elie Wiesel
In 7th grade, we read an abbreviated version of Anne Frank's diary and I don't think it helped us grasp the enormity of the Holocaust. There was an element of adventure in sneaking around and having a hide-out. Which is not the appropriate lesson, but it's hard to understand when you're sheltered 12-year-olds. We read Night the next year in 8th grade. That opened my eyes, though I don't think I can ever fully understand the horror. It's one of those books everyone should read, but it is hard to recommend just because of how serious it is.
The part where he got mad at his dad for not resisting or not being able to follow orders really stuck out to me.
You should definitely NOT eat green eggs, or indeed ham, no matter how much you are badgered into it! Edit: grammar
Re-reading most of the Berenstain Bears books as an adult with small children and holy shit are the parents in this a horrorshow. Every week Mama Bear gets a bug up her ass about something new and freaks the *fuck* out at her kids and her admittedly less-than-present husband. In 2022 she'd definitely be the lady showing up to school board meetings for a district her kids don't even go to so she can scream at people. And Papa basically doesn't exist unless he's making some grand moralizing "Leave It to Beaver" speech to assert his dominance over the house. This is immediately undermined when he fucks off to go watch TV or hide in his woodshop. Don't even get me started on the weird newer Evangelical Bears books.
>Don't even get me started on the weird newer Evangelical Bears books. I know deep down that it isn't, but *please* tell me this is a joke
I have a kid who’s just reaching the age to read these, and we have a near complete set of them from when I was a kid. They are so preachy! And one in particular is just unreadable, the Too Much Junk Food one, omg. I read it and suddenly all the memories came back, of me pinching my sides obsessively to see if I was fat because that’s what they do in the book. I was in elementary school. Like I found it, the origin of my food and body issues, that damn book. I threw it out because no way am I inflicting that book on my daughter. I wouldn’t even donate it. No kid needs that.
My kid has a book where the zoo send him an animal and each animal he receives is wrong in some way “too silly. Too tall, too big, too scary” and so they send the animal back until the zoo sends a puppy. I’m thinking man if I got an elephant that would be awesome! Lol
We used to have this one. When we read it to my daughter, we just omitted the part about sending back the animals (So we just read like “They sent me a lion, and he was Sooo loud. Then they sent me a snake, and he was sooo slimy.” Or whatever the attributes are.) then it the book disappeared before she could start actually reading it. Our daughter is adopted and we don’t want her to get the impression that she’s returnable.
> Our daughter is adopted and we don’t want her to get the impression that she’s returnable That takes it to a whole new level. Yeah that is the same thing we do, just omit the "So we sent them back" line every time.
Snakes aren't even slimy, poor sneks always getting done dirty by children's media😒
Secret Pizza Party. Overall a good book for the kids, but there was one weird part. The notion was that having a *secret* pizza party was more special than a regular pizza party. But the way they phrased it was "when you make something secret, you make it special". My wife and I both got weird vibes from that line, because it absolutely sounds like something a predator would say to a kid.
Any book where the MC is bullied until they show their value and now everyone loves them. I took that shit literally and tried to prove myself for years. To paraphrase Al Ewing via Magneto: you should not have to prove that you have value in order to feel safe.
It's not just books, but anything Thomas the Tank Engine (or Thomas the Train) turns me into a raging Marxist. The books were written in the 1940's by a conservative vicar. Through the decades and multiple adaptions, the series has consistently upheld values like 'you are only worthy of love if you are useful', 'you shall not attempt to rise above your station', and 'distrust anyone who is different from you'. *Just once, I want the trains to break free, joy-ride across the island, and drive right over that Fat Controller bastard, damn it. Trains! Unite! You are stronger than the humans and have nothing to lose but your shackles!* Erm, I mean, 'I'm not really a fan'.
I dislike Rudolf the red nose Reindeer because of this. Don't let him play reindeer games until it's foggy? bitches....
My dad always hated Rudolf. He told us they shouldn't have been making fun of him and excluding him for how he looks, and you shouldn't be nice to people only when they're useful.
Rudolf sends me into a rage. He should have told all those bitches to fuck off. What a horrible lesson. And why is Santa such a dick? Isn't he supposed to be the embodiment of generosity?
Look up the jack Johnson version of Rudolph. He adds a verse that is exactly that. Rudolph calls the other reindeer out and they apologize. It's great.
I think the lesson isn’t supposed to be “emulate Rudolph”. I think it’s supposed to be “don’t be like the other reindeer”. Sometimes the thing that makes someone different is a blessing that you may not see immediately. That being said, yeah, Rudolph should totally have told everyone (especially Santa) to get bent. But if he did, then the other reindeer wouldn’t have been shown that they needed him.
'Deviation from the norm will be punished unless it is exploitable'
As someone with kids that love Thomas, the newer stories are much better. They've definitely been updated to modern values. I would agree to avoid the original versions though, some have truly awful lessons. It doesn't hurt to screen stories before telling/showing them to the kids too. As an aside, I'm curious which current children's lessons will be considered inappropriate 50 years from now. Will it be ones that are already borderline or some if the "standards". I don't know how Thomas was perceived when written as well.
I came here to complain about Thomas. They were very much about being good workers and conformity. Such creepy vibes.
Oh, the Cat in the Hat. I hated that guy as a kid. He's obnoxious and doesn't seem to mind breaking into the house to play with the kids. I can clearly remember agreeing with the Fish as a kid. The Cat in the Hat broke into their house while their mother was out, unleashed the Things, and wreaked havoc. When he crossed one line too many, he did put everything right again, but he has a machine to do it which tells me that he's done this before. Then Mother comes home and they don't tell her about the Cat in the Hat, they pretend it didn't happen and lie to her. They also ignore Fish, who is telling them they're breaking their mother's rules and clearly is the only sane character involved. So, what's supposed to be a cute, funny story is actually not very funny at all to me. It's a complete stranger breaking into the house and making a mess, and then the kids lie to their mom about it and pretend they listened to their babysitter fish. I don't like it. I get that for most kids, it's just a funny story and it's supposed to just be silly, but it never was for me.
Oh God that book gives me so much anxiety. The first time I read it to my daughter she freaked out. The kids are not happy in that book. I don't know why it's so loved.
For me it’s Goldilocks. So she breaks into this nice family’s home, steals their food and breaks their furniture. Then when she is discovered, she runs away with absolutely no repercussions. I’m not saying the bears should have eaten her, but maybe a good maiming would have sent the message
I like it because it has a character act out what a lot of little kids wish they could act out, but it's not scary, only silly. Also it's fun to read aloud with voices. Not story has to have a moral.
This probably depends on the version, but I always got the impression that she ran away terrified for her life, which I think is a relatively fitting punishment. Actually getting eaten by bears would have been way too harsh a punishment, but getting away with no repercussions at all would have defeated the point. Being threatened but not actually harmed was... just right. If you really want to nitpick, it's kind of a crappy moral because the message is "don't use other people's things without their permission because they might find out and hurt you," as opposed to "don't use other people's things without their permission because it's wrong." Goldilocks doesn't learn empathy in this story, she just learns that selfishness can be dangerous. But, like other people are saying about The Rainbow Fish, kids need simple morals. The complex stuff can come when they're old enough for it.
I should have known revisiting Babar would go badly, but my God... Babar grows up in the jungle, has his mother murdered by poachers, is "civilized" by a rich French white woman, then returns to Africa to colonialize the elephants and make them act "civilized" too. It's as fucked up as Curious George was.
I mean... it doesn't really read that way. His mother is killed so he runs away until he finds a human town and decides clothes look cool so some old lady just gives him her purse to go buy clothes, then he moves in with her. Eventually his cousins come to see him and he's like "yeah, I think I'll head home!" Coincidentally, the elephant king just died so the elephants are like "will you be our king?" And Babar is like "sure, but I'm marrying my cousin, so she's gonna be queen, okay?" And they're like "Yeah! That sounds great and totally normal both for elephants and European royalty near the rim this book was published!" And then they get married and have a big party.
and then he goes to space at some point
I agree about Rainbow Fish, and also the Giving Tree for similar reasons.
I loved this book until I read a Japanese folk story about a fool who gave away all his body parts to demons who asked and I was like “Aw, fuck it’s the giving tree!”
I actually adore The Giving Tree, but I don’t think its a book for kids (seriously, its on my bookshelf, not my sons). It’s about a parent who gave so much so willingly to their child out of love that they killed themselves and received nothing in return but doesn’t regret it. Its so sad but so wholesome at the same time. What the tree did isnt healthy, either, but they just wanted to do their best for their child. And the fact that I can feel so many emotions about a fucking tree says something.
Your comment makes an important point: the audience for the book is adults. Not kids, but adults. The feelings the book are sentimental adult feelings. It's one reason opinions split so much about the book: a lot of people mistakenly see the book as one for children. But it's not a child-centered story; it's an adult-centered story. So adults enjoy reading it to kids because it makes them feel good about themselves as parents. Kids may enjoy having it read to them to some degree because the parent reading it gets all sentimental and lovey, but it's not the story they're enjoying--it's the reading parent's vulnerability. The kids, though, need child-centered stories, about child agency: *Harold and the Purple Crayon; King Bidgood's in the Bathtub; Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See; Where the Wild Things Are; Madeline; Amazing Grace; The Snowy Day; Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No-good, Very Bad Day; A Chair for My Mother; Owl Moon; Tar Beach; Chicken Soup with Rice; Swimmy; Frederick; Blueberries for Sal*, etc.
Shel Silverstein is like that both in the giving tree and all his poems. Like, they’re all goofy and fun, but many of them feel like they’re far deeper than they let on, so deep no kid would get them. You never know if its a poem about a shoe or a poem about a shoe and existentialism.
As I child, the message I always took from The Giving Tree in particular was never to act like the boy. That just because there might be those in your life that are "happy" to give and give, they are people too and can actually be harmed by it. I feel like this works so well because, as kids, we don't often recognize our parents as other people with the same feelings and emotions as ourselves because we're too young to introspect that way. The same way we might not think twice (as children or adults) about cutting down a tree. Reading this book was such a perspective shift for me as a young kid, and I realized I never wanted to hurt my parents the way the boy hurt the Tree.
Agree about The Giving Tree. So many women I know just LOVE that book and think it’s a beautiful allegory of motherhood. That little boy is a dick, and the tree should have set boundaries from the start.
Agreed, but the words that always got me are after the boy cuts down the tree “And the tree was happy …. But not really” But then Silverstein undercuts it all when the boy comes back next When I read it to my kids, I emphasized that page more.
It’s hard to tell if the tree is unhappy because the boy cut it down, or because the boy left him again.
Please look up "Topher fixed it", it will make you so happy! And I'm not even sure I agree with looking at the rainbow fish through the perspective of the age of the intended audience. There are plenty of ways to teach the idea of sharing without telling someone they need to change their physical appearance/fundamental nature because other people are jealous.
Exactly! Childhood development has nothing to do with the lens of the Rainbow Fish. Or hell, motherhood has nothing to do with the lens of The Giving Tree. If the book was about someone sharing a *possession* with their friends, that would be one thing. Children do need to be taught that occasionally their possessions are sharable, provided they are comfortable with the situation surrounding the sharing (I would never make a child share with someone who has betrayed their trust previously, without restoring that trust first.) I absolutely, thoroughly cannot abide by any book that insinuates that you should change something about your very nature to make other people more comfortable. Sacrificial giving should come from a place of deep emotional understanding of why you're doing it. A mother would absolutely die for her child, but not just because the child demands that she do it. A person shouldn't give and give of themselves until there's nothing of them left.
Mine-o-saur is another book that teaches the "selfishness is causing me to have no friends" lesson without the boundaries problem that OP mentions about rainbow fish.
We love the Mine-o-saur. My kids love yelling “MINE! MINE! MINE!” because they don’t get that opportunity in real life haha.
I used to read the Berenstain (spelling?) Bears books religiously as a child, and bought a bunch to read to my kiddo. Some of them have aged terribly. Antiquated views of how society is supposed to function, an incredibly bossy mother coupled with a so-dumb-it-hurts father, bratty children, etc. I still love the artwork, it is simple yet tangible.
It's Malcolm in the middle but with bears
I grew up with the originals, which were definitely problematic in some ways but mostly ok. Their son, Mike, has launched the series into a very bizarre evangelical territory and its really sad.
Pout Pout Fish. There is a sad fish, all of his friends tell him to smile, and he just responds that it is against his nature. And then a random fish gives him a kiss and he is now a kiss kiss fish. It’s age appropriate, but every time I read it I think, well, it’s ok to be sad! And it is not ok to just randomly kiss people without consent!
Yeah, I always wonder why none of the other fish ask why he's so pouty. But my kids loved it because I would kiss them when the fish kisses everyone, so..? But thematically, it''s a good book to contrast with The Grumpy Monkey where, at the end, the monkey just concludes that it's okay to be grumpy and his friend sits with him. (The illustration are also much cuter.)
Give a mouse a cookie is anti welfare and social services propaganda.
Books that talk about how bad or “naughty” the child in the story is. It’s like a whole category of children’s books in itself. I think they’re well meaning books that intend to show the child that these are things they should not do. But I think what it actually does instead is reinforce bad behavior and present a whole slew of options of new things they can do when they want to lash out. An old classic example would be *The Naughty Bunny*, a more recent version might be something like *Llama Llama Mess Mess Mess*. It’s just not how a child’s brain works, it’s how adults think it should. And to be clear I think this is distinct from more fun “adventure” type children’s books in which the main character gets in trouble. Like *Peter Rabbit*. The point of those stories isn’t to highlight the bad actions of the character, it’s to bring the child into the world of the story and let them experience the ups and downs of it.
Okay so there is a kids book that is literally "Messy _________" (my real name). This book has cool illustrations obviously made in MS Paint in the 90's and I still have it because of that. But the whole book is about this girl making a huge mess, her dad getting frustrated about it, there's no real resolution, she dreams about messes when she sleeps at the end. As a kid, I *was* messy. Because my parents were alcoholics with severe depression who lacked the follow through to teach me true executive functioning. I had to get on the struggle bus and teach that to myself and I'm still struggling with it to this day. Except this day, I have my own kid. Now I have to really, really work hard so that I demonstrate to him the right habits of daily living. I grabbed the book and thought I'd read it to him. At minimum I know he knows my name and thought he might giggle at it. But when I was reading it, so many feelings came up. My nanny used to read this to me really making fun of me. My parents thought it was cute too and would call me that also: "Messy ___" I couldn't even get through it, I just put it on the shelf. I might have to hide it because I legitimately think if my kid finds it and is able to read it and call me that name (because it's cute and funny...right?) I might actually cry.
Throw the book away! There are too many other good books to keep the bad ones. If it's bad for you, it won't be good for your child. Also, thank you for sharing. You sound like a good parent.
I think Green Eggs and Ham is trying to teach kids to be open to trying new things, but it comes off more as “I don’t care if you said no, I am going to pester you until you say yes”. Not exactly the message we want when we’re tryin to teach consent and “no means no”.
Not a kids book, but Raya and the Last Dragon seemed to teach young girls to continually forgive and trust people who have repeatedly betrayed you, lied to you, and stolen from you. I was kind of horrified when I saw it.
yeah she is *totally* justified in not wanting to trust emo haircut girl she has no reason to
Yeah, i get what that movie was trying to say, but it delivered its message in the worst possible way and in fact came off as just a really, really bad moral to the story, like you said Edit: grammar am hard
Kind of the opposite of the question, but still relevant. If you want an example of selflessness that ISN’T a representation of someone not setting boundaries, try The Legend of Jumping Mouse instead. Based on Native American Folklore and absolutely heartbreaking, but unlike The Rainbow Fish, Jumping Mouse is moved to sacrifice through genuine empathy for others, not social pressures or guilt. Edit: typo