Teeny Manolo

I have a confession to make: there is a soft spot in my heart for the loopy comedy stylings of Ben Stiller, and it’s not just because he smiled at me once in Waterfront Station.

Although some.

One of his finest creations is the fabulously moronic Derek(Dayre-ique?) Zoolander, and one of the best bits of that movie was the hilariously appalling infomercial with which Mugatu brainwashed him. “Governments are interfering with the age-old right of children to work as they please! Now…Kill the Prime Minister of Malaysia!”

Oops! Uh, “Spoiler Alert!” Still, at least I didn’t tell you about the Duchovny surprise, so that’s good.

In any case and in the same vein, here is a lovely news presentation from The Onion, celebrating the new Gap For Kids, By Kids collection!

Gap Unveils New ‘For Kids By Kids’ Clothing Line

You know, I’m wondering exactly when I turned old. When I became the type of person to mutter under my breath, “These kids today!”

I see dresses like the one that unfortunately led to a ruined prom, or ads like these for prom dresses, and all I can think is, the horror! And also perhaps, thank goodness I am not raising a girl! Because I would be sorely tempted to keep her locked in her room with only classic literature and a chess board as her only forms of entertainment.

I understand that teens are all about the shock value. That they love nothing more than to rebel and make people look at them. They enjoy rejecting the values that society at large supposedly holds dear.

I wish I could say that this has been a trend that has been going on for a very long time, but I am inclined to think it has been more prevalent since the Industrial Revolution. Teens who needed to work the field to make sure the crops were harvested didn’t really have the luxury of wondering if getting a belly piercing would help them to establish their independence from Mom and Dad. In most agrarian societies, there was no true “independence” from Mom and Dad. Everyone would live and work together to help their family survive.

And what I am also wondering is, have we failed our children?

Have we allowed false celebrity and overt sex to flourish in our society because we are too afraid to speak out? That we are a “live and let live” sort of place where we think of badly of ourselves if we trample on someone else’s right to utitlize sex and sex appeal to sell everything from cigarettes to hair products ?

Sex obviously sells, and we must be buying into it. Literally. Because if it didn’t work, they would move on to a different strategy, I assure you. It’s ubiquitous. On television, in magazines, on computer ads and billboards along the road. Name me some place that it isn’t. And then we cluck in dismay as teens are flashing as much skin as they can and worrying if they are fat? Do we truly hold the idea of the innocence of children all that dearly?

Or do we just talk a really good game?

Or perhaps soon enough, (because short of public nudity, I’m not sure there is anywhere else to go) the pendulum will swing the other way, and the showing of an anke will become scandalous.

We may have made reference to this guiding principle of parenting in the past. Yes, moms can enjoy a lovely Mother’s Day, full of pancakes in bed, trips to the spa, and salmon salad dinners in fern bars, but there’s no reason in the world for Mom’s fun to end there. All it takes is a little advance planning.

Oh, my. Mrs. Z (the artist formerly known as Beyonce) has a lot to answer for with this:

From PopGumbo via Gawker

George Bush is the greatest president in the history of presidents.

Mission was accomplished.

Toddlers never throw tantrums.

I live in a huge mansion with a cook, a maid, and a butler.

Junk food is good for you and helps you lose weight.

Pamela Anderson is an Oscar-winning actress.

Christian is as straight as a ruler.

The economy is strong.

And Dina Lohan has received a “Top Mom” of the year award.

I am in Bizarro World, aren’t I? 

I think the creators of children’s cartoons get away with murder because they know damn well Mom is in the kitchen finishing her coffee or her gin depending on the kind of day it’s going to be, and not in the living room supervising what her kid sees on tv.

As I may have mentioned, I’m An Old. I remember when black and white cartoons were in black and white because colours hadn’t been invented then. And yet, even I remember how children’s cartoons pushed the envelope (or is that the closet door) with some marvelously camp and butch characters.

How many can you remember? Velma. Peppermint Patty. Bugs Bunny in certain moods. That poor cat Pepe LePew was always chasing. And was there anyone on television, Liberace included, as gay as the Great Gazoo?

Take this quiz and find out which gay childhood icon you are. You can copy the code and post the result in your blog, or just come out in the comments section of this post.

Here is my result, and no surprise: it was either Velma or Peppermint Patty, and there were NO BASEBALL QUESTIONS! This quiz is rigged! Let’s call Scooby and the gang and investigate what’s really going on here…oops, slipping into character.

Seriously, this company should forget about advertising on blogs and just start stuffing their brochures in Oscar and Grammy goodie bags. Thanks to the ever-informative Dr. Boli for this.

There, I said it.

You know, this week started badly, is worsening rapidly, and at this rate I really don’t know if I’ll be able to face Friday without smelling salts. Tell me: Do they make overproof Earl Grey? I’ll have a double.

One doesn’t want to natter on about the Good Old Days before one was born (too much) because they were oppressive and hypocritical and full of ugly, synthetic garments and hostility towards the people who supply the toys for our Happy Meals and our mail order babies.

But.

One is reminded, one is, of the time Mister Walt Disney went to former Mousekateer Annette Funicello and asked her to keep her bellybutton covered during her upcoming beach movie, for the sake of the reputation of the Mickey Mouse Club. Well, she did and they gave her three sequels anyway and as far as we know she’s sitting on a beanbag full of cash, drinking whiskey sours her cabana boy mixed and emailing Perez Hilton corny jokes from the verandah of a swanky retirement villa in Santa Barbara. And good for her.

My, how things have changed. First Miley Cyrus, now this:

From Slate:

After reading of the Cyrus flap, I e-mailed my photo to Disney… How did the company square its position on the Liebowitz photo with its risqué billboard in China?…

Foster said he didn’t know which ad agency prepared the ad, how old the model was, or where the photo shoot took place. But he was sure it was the work of a Disney licensee: Shanghai Zhenxin Garments Co. Ltd… He assured me the billboard would be removed immediately…

It may be a small world, after all, but not everyone shares Burbank’s mores, and you can’t be too careful protecting your brand: You never know when a Chinese licensee, or an American glossy, will deviate from the Disney way.

So to speak.

My dear friends, you’ve no idea how brutal this world can be to an artistic soul. One by one, it eats them alive. Raymond Chandler. Dashiell Hammett. Dorothy Parker. Damon Runyan. Anita Loos. Ernest Hemingway.Mother Goose.

Yes, for is there any soul as fragile and artistic as that of a child’s storyteller? And yet as each tender Easy Reader, picture book, or pop-up manuscript is born, it is ruthlessly wrenched from its creator’s loving embrace and cast upon the heaving black waters of the heartless book market, there to sink or swim as its now-helpless progenitor can only clutch pearls or fedora and gape, wreathed in cigarette smoke and sheer terror (and then write about it on the Oprah forums). Oh! The Humanity!

Here, thanks to Kids in the Hall, perhaps the greatest sketch comedy troupe in history, is archival footage of one such writer’s brutal struggle through the long, dark, teddy bear’s picnic of the soul.

I was going to use their Teddy Bear’s Picnic skit, but that’s too dark even for me.

Friends, it is Monday, I’m fresh out of Merlot, it’s hailing, my new DVD player needs to be returned, my CD drive keeps crashing my computer, I’ve lost ten pounds this weekend via oyster poisoning, and would someone please tell 15-year-old Miley Cyrus to HELLO! KEEP HER BLOODY CLOTHES ON!
< /rant >