 |
|
|
Rated C!
|
|
By David Williams
Editor, The Letter
To most of us, if we even bother to think about it, Pokemon is just another game like Battleship, something to help stretch children's imaginations and encourage them to think for themselves. Maybe that's why the fundies are so worried: heaven forbid their children should be taught to imagine a world where they can think independently! But it's more complicated than that. According to David Baird, a guest columnist for Southeast Christian Church's newspaper, Outlook (the "t" is in the form of a cross on the masthead), Pokemon contains eery references to such evil beliefs as Buddhist Mysticism, Hinduism, the Tao, Wicca, ghosts, psychic phenomena, and that evil of all evils, the Egyptian Book of the Dead. Pokemon, he decrees--blue nose firmly up--is "not innocent of evil."
I remember when I was ten and the Roman Catholic Church's Legion of Decency told us we couldn't see Godzilla. They gave it a B rating, for "Bad," which meant you could go see it but you'd better get to confession real fast. The movie didn't have much blood and of course there was no sex. The Legion was simply upset that those evil Orientals had dared to use the name of God in vain. Every Sunday I scanned its list at the back of the church to find out what I could see and what I dared not even read the name of. Of course, my eyes would occasionally wander down the list to the C's--the Condemned--which consisted mainly of European imports or obscure American art house flicks. Anything with Bridget Bardot in it shot to the top of the C's immediately. After And God Created Woman came out, every kid in the school knew who she was. The List was the Catholic answer to Know-Nothingism, but all us kids knew what was what.
I think of that small but formative episode in my life whenever I see modern-day fundies trying to deprive their kids of things that everybody else in the neighborhood is enjoying. Sooner or later those kids are going to notice that God isn't striking the other kids dead, and they're going to see what fun such things as Pokemon and Halloween really is. And then they're going to start imagining what it's like to think differently from their parents. When that happens--oh say, by the year 2010--we're going to see a 60s-style rebellion that no parent or church is going to be able to stop. I hope we have an archconservative Republican like George W. in the White House when that happens: just the kind of president Godzilla might enjoy taking a chomp out of. David Williams is Editor of The Letter, Kentucky's GLBT newspaper, and Ever the Rebellious Hippie |
Pikachu and Pokemon: The Samson and Delilah of today? 
More kids recognize Ash Ketchum (above) than Noah or John the Baptist, a point that does not sit well with Christian fundamentalists 
© 1997-99 BEI