Thomas the tank engine = Tyranny, Sexism and FEAR!
- Thread starter Quad08
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The research is also somewhat scewed as not everything the guy is presenting as a bad message nessicarly is.
I'm sure people are going to dislike this, but let me be blunt. I think a lot of the education today about "self validation" is a problem. Right now the education system, and most of what it presents psychologically is telling kids "you are special", "you can do anything". You tell kids that often enough and they start to believe it. Everyone goes through childhood with the expectations that they are going to be someone special, have a good job, and that there will be tons of oppertunities.
Of course reality is that you grow up, get a job "to make ends meet", and then wind up in the same rut 20 years later, maybe making middle management if your lucky. That's life, and people who try and hold onto their childhood dreams and attitudes tend to run into a problem. Question authority? On some levels that's a good thing, but keep questioning your boss your going to get canned. Getting "scrapped" because your no longer useful? Well IRL it's called "getting fired" and yeah, if your dead weight that's what happens especially during a recession so making yourself useful is important.
This might sound like a real downer to many people, but if you think about it the exceptional people who are going to "succeed" are usually detected at an early age and pulled aside. Oh sure, there ARE exceptions, but telling everyone that they are an exception can be extremely counter-productive. What's more our society works as a competition (like it or not) so really even a well educated person with a college degree, and a lot of talent, can wind up in a totally dead end job simply if there are better people at that specific time going after the role he wants.
I've read a lot of research on education over the years, and for all the comments about the need for self-validation in the system, it basically comes down to the fact that the majority of people need to wind up at the bottom or in the middle. In our system the absolute best, brightests, most talented, and ruthless people wind up at the top. If someone doesn't have those talents, then typically their success was left to them by someone who was that good (and providing for your children so they don't have to worry as much is part of the payoff of success).
Even when you look at systems like communism it turns out the same way. A lot of people in places like Russia or China fought huge wars to build a "better future" for themselves but in the end they just wound up going back to work doing the same thing before the revolution because in the end that job still needs to be done, and far more people are going to wind up there than on the top, and/or leading a good life. In Russia in paticular things got very nasty on these grounds.
I won't touch on the sexism issue, but to some extent one can argue that even if everything said was true, Thomas is actually teaching valuable life lessons. To some extent a lot can be said about preparing children for a life as worker drones (effectively). I think a lot of problems today are caused by people being discontent with their lot in life, and quite a bit of that probably comes from the way they were educated as children. Being brainwashed to think your special can inflict a lot of pain when someone grows up and finds out they are just a cog in someone else's machine.
Now granted I am not saying it would be NICE if all of the "self validation" stuff could be made true somehow, but it can't be, and children are having their live-long niche determined for them (like it or not) from an increasingly earlier age. It's not exactly fair, but sadly that's still how it is.
Thomas came about after my time watching such programming so I can't judge, but my point is that even if the researcher is correct, is all of what he is saying a bad thing? Excepting things like the accusations of sexism, it does very much seem like a metaphor for what life is actually like.
I'm sure people are going to dislike this, but let me be blunt. I think a lot of the education today about "self validation" is a problem. Right now the education system, and most of what it presents psychologically is telling kids "you are special", "you can do anything". You tell kids that often enough and they start to believe it. Everyone goes through childhood with the expectations that they are going to be someone special, have a good job, and that there will be tons of oppertunities.
Of course reality is that you grow up, get a job "to make ends meet", and then wind up in the same rut 20 years later, maybe making middle management if your lucky. That's life, and people who try and hold onto their childhood dreams and attitudes tend to run into a problem. Question authority? On some levels that's a good thing, but keep questioning your boss your going to get canned. Getting "scrapped" because your no longer useful? Well IRL it's called "getting fired" and yeah, if your dead weight that's what happens especially during a recession so making yourself useful is important.
This might sound like a real downer to many people, but if you think about it the exceptional people who are going to "succeed" are usually detected at an early age and pulled aside. Oh sure, there ARE exceptions, but telling everyone that they are an exception can be extremely counter-productive. What's more our society works as a competition (like it or not) so really even a well educated person with a college degree, and a lot of talent, can wind up in a totally dead end job simply if there are better people at that specific time going after the role he wants.
I've read a lot of research on education over the years, and for all the comments about the need for self-validation in the system, it basically comes down to the fact that the majority of people need to wind up at the bottom or in the middle. In our system the absolute best, brightests, most talented, and ruthless people wind up at the top. If someone doesn't have those talents, then typically their success was left to them by someone who was that good (and providing for your children so they don't have to worry as much is part of the payoff of success).
Even when you look at systems like communism it turns out the same way. A lot of people in places like Russia or China fought huge wars to build a "better future" for themselves but in the end they just wound up going back to work doing the same thing before the revolution because in the end that job still needs to be done, and far more people are going to wind up there than on the top, and/or leading a good life. In Russia in paticular things got very nasty on these grounds.
I won't touch on the sexism issue, but to some extent one can argue that even if everything said was true, Thomas is actually teaching valuable life lessons. To some extent a lot can be said about preparing children for a life as worker drones (effectively). I think a lot of problems today are caused by people being discontent with their lot in life, and quite a bit of that probably comes from the way they were educated as children. Being brainwashed to think your special can inflict a lot of pain when someone grows up and finds out they are just a cog in someone else's machine.
Now granted I am not saying it would be NICE if all of the "self validation" stuff could be made true somehow, but it can't be, and children are having their live-long niche determined for them (like it or not) from an increasingly earlier age. It's not exactly fair, but sadly that's still how it is.
Thomas came about after my time watching such programming so I can't judge, but my point is that even if the researcher is correct, is all of what he is saying a bad thing? Excepting things like the accusations of sexism, it does very much seem like a metaphor for what life is actually like.
Well, that was... erm, an utter waste of research money, time and so on.
Did the researcher ever stop and think that its a kid's show, aimed at kids?
I'm pretty sure that children watching it won't think too deeply about the metaphysical aspects of a bunch of talking trains... I know I didn't.
Did the researcher ever stop and think that its a kid's show, aimed at kids?
I'm pretty sure that children watching it won't think too deeply about the metaphysical aspects of a bunch of talking trains... I know I didn't.
Tyranny? Oh, because the Fat Controller SOOOO resembles Hitler!
Sexism? They're steam engines. Gender-neutral. Sure most of them have masculine names but... well, you all know the appropriate Shakespeare quote.
Fear? ...Actually, that's a fair point. There was the odd one or two dark moments, but nothing mind-scarring, at least.
But seriously, how did this debate come up? What, it's not cool to bash Spongebob and He-Man anymore?
Sexism? They're steam engines. Gender-neutral. Sure most of them have masculine names but... well, you all know the appropriate Shakespeare quote.
Fear? ...Actually, that's a fair point. There was the odd one or two dark moments, but nothing mind-scarring, at least.
But seriously, how did this debate come up? What, it's not cool to bash Spongebob and He-Man anymore?
Why.cuddly_tomato said:
OT: You know, if you look hard enough, you can find unfortunate implications in anything. It's like a sort of apophenia.
I'm pretty sure that's what's happening here.
Actually as myself and many other escapists have pointed out, when we watched it as kids we saw it as a show about trains and not about the apparent psychological undertones. The point of these arguments is the effect that they'll have on kids, when none of noticed.Sodoff said:
Isn't that a counter itself?
I read it, how can women be both "bossy and controlling" yet "subordinate"?Quad08 said:
In any case, we are back to symbolism again. People can make what they wish out of absolutely anything (I did this piece on Snakes on a Plane last month [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/18.153187.3697174].) This is just more of the same.
Thomas the Tank Engine was my favourite TV show when I was a kid. Nowadays, I believe in the equality of all people and that dictatorships are generally a very bad idea.
People are being ridiculous about this. I am flabbergasted at that article, I mean [i/]really[/i].
People are being ridiculous about this. I am flabbergasted at that article, I mean [i/]really[/i].
Correction, too much money in the wrong reserach grants (seriously, there are better uses for it).Quad08 said:
I never really liked Thomas the Tank engine as a kid but I don't believe that it was any form of propaganda either, I believe that this is simmilar to the accusation that metal albums contained subliminal messages (in other words, while there isn't anything there you could still find something if you put your mind to it).
Same, i used to watch Thomas the Tank engine all the time, it was by far one of my favourite shows as a young child. I don't think it would have effected me, children don't look into shows that deeply and i don't think they have the mental power to think conceptually until around the ages of 8-10.bernthalbob616 said:
