[Inkie]

Oh, for crying out loud. Can't we let kids have any innocence at all? Why do pre-schoolers have to have their faces shoved in this stuff? They are being cheated out of their childhood!

[Behind Liberal Lines]

Oh, for crying out loud. Can't we let kids have any innocence at all? Why do pre-schoolers have to have their faces shoved in this stuff? They are being cheated out of their childhood!

I agree 100%.

But sometimes you have to take the cheap and obvious joke.

[I still care]

I homeschooled in NY for several years. The best argument I ever had against letting the state in on your curriculum was the NY state requirements. Besides basic curriculum, PE, music and such, they were:

• Fire Safety Education
• Traffic Safety Education
• AIDS Education - Kindergarten and up.

I remember thinking, how and why can I and should I educate my 1st grader on AIDS? The people that let that one through must have been braindead, or so totally sexually corrupt and diseased that logic escaped them. But that was the law, and I had to certify I did it or I would not have been allowed to homeschool.

[RonF]

Your point may well be taken in America. However ....

Note that this character is originating in South Africa. South Africa is undergoing an epidemic of AIDS. Enormous numbers of people have the disease. An incredible number of kids are being orphaned because of this disease, and many more know a friend or acquaintance or schoolmate whose parents have the disease or have died of it. In this case, life is shoving these kids faces in this stuff.

You are quite correct. These kids are being cheated out of their childhoods. But, not by this TV show.

Now, whether it's appropriate to bring this to America is another question. But where it's starting off, they need it.