Free Republic

For years, advocates of the gay rights movement have said that their goal is to make the world a more tolerant place for homosexuals. They have just as adamantly claimed that they had no intention of educating young children in the complexities of human sexuality. Not so in Hollywood. Take, for example, the new animated film Boxtrolls, created by studio Laika. The film is a riff on the old Mrs. Doubtfire morality that suggests that all families are created equal, no matter what their composition. “Families come in all shapes and sizes,” the narrator of the preview says. “Even rectangles.”...

..The Ukraine is considering a move to censor several children's shows after a new study from a conservative commission labeled the shows "a real threat" to the country's youth. The Ukraine's National Expert Commission for Protecting Public Morality released the report, which attacks several U.S. and international programs as detrimental to the country. Psychologist Irina Medvédeva is quoted in the study, alleging that children aged 3 to 5 years old, "pull faces and make jokes in front of adults they don't know, laugh out loud and repeat nonsense phrases in a brazen manner," after viewing the shows. The Ukrainian paper...

A woman dressed as Catwoman on Hollywood Boulevard is speaking out Friday after a pepper spray incident. Her name is Lydia and she tells CBS2′s Jeff Nguyen that she unleashed a canister of pepper spray Thursday night when she got into a scuffle with a character dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow. According to Lydia, the Sparrow impersonator and his friend were harassing her for hours. “And they were out of control… drunk out here,” she says. The incident in the 6800 block of Hollywood Boulevard was witnessed by several people. Lydia says the men bumped into her and tourists and...

Sponge Bob is in hot waterr! LAPD quiz man in cartoon outfit for 'fighting two women in Hollywood Boulevard' He lived in a pineapple under the sea, but now he's picking fights with two women on Hollywood Boulevard. A man dressed as Spongebob Squarepants nearly brought the busy Los Angeles street to a standstill on Tuesday. The man was thought to be one of those who dress up as a well-known character and then pose for pictures with tourists. According to police, there have been several run-ins recently where the 'character' has aggressively demanded money after the photo has been...

Pretty funny video. SPONGEBOB FIGHTING TWO WOMEN

CHICAGO (AP) - The cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants is in hot water from a study suggesting that watching just nine minutes of that program can cause short-term attention and learning problems in 4-year-olds. The problems were seen in a study of 60 children randomly assigned to either watch "SpongeBob," or the slower-paced PBS cartoon "Caillou" or assigned to draw pictures. Immediately after these nine-minute assignments, the kids took mental function tests; those who had watched "SpongeBob" did measurably worse than the others.

You can find all the porcini you want in your supermarket, but don't go looking for the mushroom's distant cousin, Spongiforma squarepantsii, because the newly discovered species can only be found in the rain forest of Borneo - so far. Dennis E. Desjardin, a world-roaming mycologist, has just identified, described and named the curious fungal blob that a team of colleagues brought to his laboratory at San Francisco State...

LONG BEACH, N.Y., A New York state 12-year-old saved the life of a friend using the Heimlich maneuver, which she learned from watching "SpongeBob Square Pants." Miriam Starobin, 12, said she used the lesson she learned from the popular Nickelodeon cartoon when her friend Allyson Golden, 12, began choking on a piece of gum Tuesday during a music class at Long Beach Middle School, the New York Post reported Friday. "It was like a flash right in my eyes. I saw in my head Squidward with his clarinet lodged in his throat and then SpongeBob does the Heimlich maneuver and...

There are certain cultural icons whose presence in and influence on the world is so powerful and pervasive, it transforms them into signposts marking the march of history – the world before and after Elvis, the Beatles, JFK and now ... SpongeBob. Nickelodeon, the birthplace of SpongeBob SquarePants, is celebrating the 10th anniversary of the hit animated series with a 50-hour marathon that starts Friday and includes 11 new episodes. Amid all the celebratory hubbub, it can seem strange to remember just how strange SpongeBob and his Bikini Bottom posse seemed when they first appeared way back in 1999.

Tomorrow, Nickelodeon is beginning its celebration of the 10th anniversary of SpongeBob SquarePants -- that absorbent, yellow fellow who lives in a pineapple under the sea -- with "The Ultimate SpongeBob SpongeBash Weekend." As part of that celebration the network has proclaimed tomorrow, July 17th, the first Global Day of Happiness. And it seems that Durham Mayor Bill Bell is on board. He even signed a proclamation urging Durham residents to make special note of this observance. The proclamation reads that a day in honor of happiness is 'most appropriate due to the current affairs within our nation.' It says...

BEIJING, July 16 (Xinhuanet) -- SpongeBob SquarePants, the fictional character of Nickolodeon's animated television series, is 10 years old. Designed by marine biologist and animator Stephen Hillengurg, SpongeBob first hit television screens in May 1999. The character, a naive and goofy sea sponge who lives in the fictitious underwater town of Bikini Bottom, has been a favorite for both adults and children alike. Voiced by actor and comedian Tom Kenny, the character has also courted controversy and been seen by some as promoting homosexuality. In the cartoon series SpongeBob is often seen holding hands with his friend Patrick, something which...

A new advertising campaign from Burger King that marries SpongeBob and women with square buts hasn’t been well received in all quarters. The ad campaign sees The Burger King “King” singing “I love square butts” surrounded by women shaking their square butts in an effort to promote a Burger King Kids Meal that comes with a SpongeBob SquarePants toy. Lyrics include the line “I wanna git wit’cha, cause you’re makin’ me richer.”

Giant clams two feet long might have helped feed prehistoric humans as they first migrated out of Africa, new research reveals. < > Fossil evidence that the researchers uncovered suggests the stocks of these giant clams began crashing some 125,000 years ago, during the last interval between glacial periods. During that time, scientists think modern humans first emerged out of Africa, Richter said. < >

Spoof on Sponge Bob living in China: YouTube Link

Lead Concerns Cited For Chinese-Produced Toys WASHINGTON -- More children's items made in China have been recalled because they contain high levels of lead. The largest recall affects about 250,000 SpongeBob SquarePants address books and journals, manufactured in China and imported by Martin Designs. They have been recalled because paint on the metal spiral bindings can contain high levels of lead. The books feature the SpongeBob SquarePants character on the front cover and a black metal spiral binding. The UPC numbers (80773007505 for the address book and 80773002260, 80773075501 and 80773007551 for the journal) are printed on the back covers....

PRINCETON, NJ - May 30, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – American Gallup Poll results, released this morning, indicate that tolerance of homosexuality within the United States has reached a record high. According to the Poll, since 1977 public support of legalization of “homosexual relations between consenting adults” has risen from 43% to a record-breaking 59%. According to Gallup, the general trend is an increased support for homosexuality. Notably, the observed increase in acceptance of homosexuality has occurred concurrent with a nationwide promotion of homosexuality in the American public elementary school system. LifeSiteNews.com covered a video-clip entitled “It’s Elementary” that shows a Gay...

SpongeBob on Brit Hume's Target List The steady creep to the top for Brit Hume's nightly Special Report on Fox--not just the No.1 Washington-originated cable show but also the fourth in all basic cable at 6 p.m.--has the host eyeing the next victim. "We've been having a series of meetings here about how we can beat Nickelodeon," he says. "We just hope that they don't put SpongeBob SquarePants up against us." Fun aside, Hume's hourlong mix of news and debate now reaches 1.5 million nightly while dominating the key 25-to-54 age demographic. And it happened in a very un-Fox-like way:...

Food Police Indict SpongeBob Thursday, January 19, 2006 By Steven Milloy Who would ever think that loveable cartoon characters, such as SpongeBob SquarePants, threaten public health? Well the “food police” apparently do, and this week they announced a lawsuit against Viacom and Kellogg to stop the companies from marketing snack and fun foods to kids.

CHICAGO, Dec. 9 (UPI) -- You're sitting on the metro, heading home from work, bored and exhausted. You used to have to wait until you arrived at home to watch some entertaining TV, but not anymore. Telecom carriers are now introducing content, like hot TV shows, including "CSI" and "The Late Show With David Letterman," and "Entertainment Tonight," as well as famous comic strips, that you can view from your mobile phone, wherever you please, experts tell United Press International's Wireless World. At the intersection of the mobile phone and the television lies tremendous programming," said Cyriac Roeding, vice president...

SpongeBob And His Ilk Urged To Help Fight Childhood Obesity The marketing weight of SpongeBob SquarePants and other "spokescharacters" should be used to encourage children to eat a healthy, nutritious diet instead of sugary, greasy junk food, a new report by an Institute of Medicine committee said yesterday. If there isn't a shift to promoting healthier foods in the next two years, Congress should consider mandating changes in both broadcast and cable television, said Dr. J. Michael McGinnis, committee chairman and a senior scholar at the institute, which advises the government about health concerns. It's hard to curb children from...