Kids' Choice?

Saturday evening Nickelodeon held its annual award show, The Kids' Choice Awards. I've watched the show a few times and decided to share my thoughts about this annual ceremony (if you can call it that considering the incessant roar of hundreds of screaming kids).

Billed as "the network for kids", Nickelodeon has consistently provided cutting-edge cartoon entertainment for children. Spongebob Squarepants is one of the top-rated shows on cable television and has helped boost Nickelodeon's status as the maven of youth entertainment interests. But the fact that Nickelodeon is a subsidiary of Viacom and the MTV networks belies the "kid-friendly" facade Nickelodeon works so hard to cultivate. Nickelodeon does offer some quality programming but mixed in with the good programming is more subversive communiqué of which parents should be wary.

My main concern regarding Nickelodeon it's inability to understand that children's innocence should be protected and valued. It seems that the programming Nickelodeon provides seeks to push children at younger and younger ages towards the more mature programming on MTV, thus ushering children out of childhood and into the highly-sexualized world of teenage entertainment. Instead of offering entertainment that protects the innocence of children, Nickelodeon promotes movies, music and television shows that are, in my opinion, too mature for young eyes and ears.

A perfect example of this push to truncate childhood innocence is the Kids Choice Awards (KCA). This year the KCA were hosted by Cameron Diez and Mike Meyers. Granted, both actors were stars of the hit movie "Shrek", but promoting these stars to children is ludicrous. I can't even think of more than one or two movies Diez or Meyers have made that anyone under the age of 16 should be allowed to see. Meyers is famous for his crude humor in the Austin Powers movies and Diez is hardly a role model for young women. In years past, Rosie O'Donnell was the host of the KCA before she "came out of the closet". Although she was not openly gay, executives at Nickelodeon and MTV were certainly aware that she was a lesbian. Asking her to host such an award show for children was a calculation aimed at winning the affection of children for homosexuals, or treating the homosexual lifestyle as "normal". Nickelodeon's choice of hosts for the KCA alone indicates their true intentions in directing the opinions of the next generation of voters and leaders.

During the 2004 KCA, there were several performances by popular music groups and musicians. Two performances included the group Outkast, a rap duo. Now some of Outkast's music is fun and harmless but many of their songs and music videos include sexually explicit messages and profanity. In fact, during one performance, the television censors had to "bleep out" profane lyrics in the song. Should such a group be asked to entertain 10-12 year old children? And should they be promoted as "cool" to children who haven't yet received their sex ed?

Even more telling than the entertainment was the wide array of presenters who paraded across the stage. Many of the presenters were movie or television stars whose movies or tv shows are way too mature for children to watch. But probably the most appalling and saddening element of the show was the list of nominees for the various awards. Movies stars such as Halle Berry, Aston Kutcher, and Ellen DeGeneres were all nominated for awards for their acting. I'm hard pressed to think of any movie Berry or Kutcher have made that children could view without a great deal of editing. And DeGeneres is an openly-gay actress (she is very funny but yet again homosexuality is being pushed on children).

Music groups/singers honored included Good Charlotte, Nelly, Outkast and Beyonce Knowles. While some of their music is harmless, many of the music videos and lyrics of these groups/performers are not appropriate for children to view or hear.

For Nickelodeon, adult programming is treated as healthy and normal for all age groups, thus making children more "sophisticated" at too early an age. It saddens me that the children of America can no longer enjoy carefree childhoods. I hope that parents across the country will take care to guard what their children watch and use insidious programming such as the KCA to teach their children right from wrong.