Warning to parents: ‘These are not the cartoons you grew up with’

Warning to parents: ‘These are not the cartoons you grew up with’

 

 

Russ Jones  

Caution: This article describes media content that is extremely offensive

The Parents Television Council has issued an urgent warning to parents and advertisers concerning the explicit content of an animated programming block that just launched.

What do you find most alarming about the popularity of smut-filled cartoons? (Poll Closed)

 Tweet to @ThePTC

That anyone would find it ‘entertaining’ or ‘funny’ 24.09%  (1,148 votes)

That FOX - or any credible media outlet - would invest in it 43.98%  (2,096 votes) 

That it’s so easily accessible to children on the Internet 31.93%  (1,522 votes) 

Total Votes: 4,766

“Just when you think network standards couldn’t get any lower, they do,” begins PTC’s online alert about a new animated programming block on the FOX television network that debuted last Saturday. It is the latest attempt by FOX to enter the late night fray similar to the Cartoon Network's "Adult Swim" programming block.

While the shows may appear innocent, Dan Isett, director of public policy for the Parents Television Council (PTC), warns they are ultra-violent, sexually explicit, and profanity-laden cartoons.

“There’s an entire section of this thing that’s all about ‘sexting’ – the taking of [explicit] photographic images of young men and distributing them through the whole school,” he tells OneNewsNow. “There’s references to group sex and all sorts of things that I frankly can’t describe very well.”

According to Isett, FOX has quietly built an audience for the programming via the Internet by showing explicit animations on the program's website – which has no parental controls. “Any eight-year-old could simply click and watch selections from a collection of three-minute cartoons that are more explicit than anything we’ve seen on broadcast television to-date,” says PTC.

Examples of X-rated animations that FOX has already made available online – and eventually may air on broadcast television – include nude, anatomically correct characters; dead, decomposing corpses that are disrobed; lesbianism; and fondling of women.

“The really key thing for parents to understand is that this is not the cartoons that you grew up with,” Isett urges. “[And] to not trust FOX in this instance, because they’ve taken things that sort of look like classic cartoon fare and turned it into something really raunchy and offensive and damaging to your children.”

PTC urges parents and grandparents to call their local Fox affiliates and ask that this programming block be preempted in their community.

Editor's note: So as not to drive additional traffic to the website, OneNewsNow has purposely chosen NOT to identify by name the FOX animated programming block discussed in this story.

- See more at: http://www.onenewsnow.com/media/2013/07/31/warning-to-parents-%E2%80%98these-are-not-the-cartoons-you-grew-up-with%E2%80%99#.UgArSmSjc5Q