CNN is now declaring children’s television shows like Thomas the Tank Engine and Paw Patrol are fascist TV shows. You just can’t make this stuff up.
| CNN: Thomas the Tank Engine and Paw Patrol are fascist |
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Sa’iyda Shabazz, who is based in Los Angeles, said she has no qualms letting her 4-year-old watch “Thomas,” which is “his favorite thing in the entire world.”
“I think it’s evolved a lot over the years, which is why I don’t really agree with the ‘fascist’ label,” she said. “I think the characters show empathy more, and friendship is a bigger theme. And not for nothing, they’re trains. Order and doing as you’re told is important to running a successful train line.”
Then there are the parents who are OK with the authoritarian elements in children’s media but wish the authorities didn’t always have to be white and male.
“I watched ‘Paw Patrol’ once with my daughter, and on that episode, Skye volunteered for a mission, but then Ryder picked two male pups,” said Rebekah Pajak, a mother of a 2-year-old and a 1-year-old in Chicago. Skye is the only female in the core team of six rescue pups on the show. “I remember thinking, ‘There’s a glass ceiling in this cartoon!’ ”
Like many parents struggling with their children’s media choices, Pajak doesn’t want to get in the way of something her daughter enjoys — and she really enjoys “Paw Patrol.” But the concern about her daughter absorbing patriarchal messages lingers.