15 ms·
The Repressive, Authoritarian Soul of “Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends”
- Animats 9y agoHave you been Really Useful today?
- int_19h 9y agohttps://i.imgur.com/pA3Yfa9.jpg https://i.imgur.com/pA3Yfa9.jpg
- rjromero 9y agoMy mother didn’t let me watch anything but Thomas and Friends. She said after watching Rugrats or Spongebob i would turn into a disobedient brat, but after watching Thomas I was apparently well mannered and well behaved. I ended up becoming a soft well mannered programmer. Fuck you Thomas!
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- littlegreenb18 9y agoYou’re a really useful engineer
- alexilliamson 9y agoI thought I was the only one who wasn't allowed to watch rugrats! For the same reason!
- peteretep 9y agoWe should stop teaching little boys about dinosaurs too. Those T-Rexs are _terrible_ role models!
- pygy_ 9y agoI don't show Thomas to my kids for that reason (and because of the show's racism)[1], but I can totally see where your mother came from. I avoid showing Fireman Sam to my 4yo son because otherwise he channels Nicholas—the self-centered, boastful troublemaker—so much that he's not manageable. 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15363728 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15363728
- falsedan 9y ago> Nicholas—the self-centered, boastful troublemaker Norman Price? He always gets his comeuppance + a fire safety tip. Maybe have a chat after an episode to talk about what happened to Norman & what about his behaviour got him in trouble.
- pygy_ 9y agoYes, he's Norman in English. I used to watch episodes with my son (and comment immediately when Norman behaves like an idiot), but I can't watch every episode with him, and the fact that Norman gets comeuppance doesn't prevent my son from adopting his worse traits. Also, IIRC even if the situation doesn't turn right for him, the chraracter rarely regrets anything beside getting caught.
- modeless 9y agoI am certain that this story was inspired by the reporter reading this recent reddit thread that pointed out the absurdity of this show: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/6zgpig/what_is_the_darkest_episode_of_a_show_you_have/dmv56zw/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/6zgpig/what_is_t...
- umeshunni 9y agoModern "journalism" is mostly copy pasting content from Reddit. BuzzFeed turns AskReddits into listicles, higher quality publications turn Reddit posts into long form content.
- pulisse 9y agoBuzzFeed's journalism and BuzzFeed's listicle content are entirely different things.
- jcwayne 9y agoThat's a step up from the 2 sentences plus 20 tweets approach.
- mseebach 9y agoHmm, not obviously, IMO. At least the "OMG You will NEVER believe what random insignificant strangers said on Twitter about some shitstorm that we're doing all we can to whip up that an editor would never have allowed anywhere near a vaguely respectable publication except as a "quote" " has correct attribution and doesn't masquerade as actual journalism.
- cat199 9y agoyou forgot the down-spinning of corporate and government press releases to make them seem like legitimate reportage..
- peteretep 9y agoI was bitching in another thread about IBM Watson and had a Reuters journalist email my HN-only address who said he was working on a story about it.
- hitekker 9y agoFor those interested in comedy-horror, I recommend Shed 17: the lost story of the flesh-engines. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=462KBuAhncU https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=462KBuAhncU A hidden gem of YouTube.
- orf 9y agoThis is well worth a watch!
- badcede 9y agoReminds me of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7T8y5EPv6Y8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7T8y5EPv6Y8 in its nefarious bleakness.
- twiss 9y agoThe next episode [1], aired two days later, contains the conclusion of the story, and he gets out of the tunnel. I do agree that 2 days is rather long to leave kids with the conclusion of that first episode though. The final lines are: "Henry doesn't mind the rain now. He knows that the best way to keep his paint nice is not to run into tunnels, but to ask his driver to rub him down when the day's work is over." It might be a bit authoritarian, but it can also just be interpreted as "don't run away from your problems, instead, ask for help and you will be helped", which is not such a bad lesson and much better than the usual version, which is just "don't run away from your problems". [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWtNGzGZTCo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWtNGzGZTCo
- dmlorenzetti 9y agoThe book concludes the same way, with the train, rusty and dirty, finally being allowed out of the tunnel. The tenor is very much that punishment has rendered him meek and docile -- nothing to do with confronting your problems. Similarly, there's a story where one of the trains gets off the tracks in order to smell flowers, or play, or something of that sort. The cure is to hide people in the field, who jump out and scare him back onto the track. Overall, the message of the books is that if you work hard and never question authority, you can avoid punishment. The odd thing about them is that the authority figure (the Fat Controller) is presented as mildly risible. My brother and I used to laugh / shudder at how much our nephews loved these books. I myself never read them until uncle-hood, when I was well past the age when the mere fact that they were written about trains had any appeal.
- timthorn 9y ago> Similarly, there's a story where one of the trains gets off the tracks in order to smell flowers, or play, or something of that sort. The cure is to hide people in the field, who jump out and scare him back onto the track. There is, but it's nothing to do with The Railway Series (Thomas the Tank Engine doesn't appear in the first book) and is by a different author - you're thinking of Tootle.
- viraptor 9y ago
- clouddrover 9y agoHenry gets bricked in: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO6qIM2WO6k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO6qIM2WO6k That's hardcore.
- dllthomas 9y ago"For the love of God, Montresor!"
- paulddraper 9y agoAnd then is unbricked https://youtu.be/dWtNGzGZTCo?t=2m28s https://youtu.be/dWtNGzGZTCo?t=2m28s Which The New Yorker would know if they had watch more than a tiny clip.
- clouddrover 9y agoOnly after his fire had gone out, his spirit had been broken, and he'd been psychologically disintegrated back to docility.
- rdxm 9y agopro-tip for Ms. Tolentino: Get off the island for a bit, it's warping your perception of reality...
- guyzero 9y agoThis is only news to someone who has never watched Thomas. It took me until the second or third Thomas book and I was pretty surprised how authoritarian it all was - and that was circa 2000. But the books are from the 40's and like a lot of things people keep buying them not knowing exactly what they're getting. Also kids love talking trains.
- Animats 9y agoIt's not just authoritarian. It's classiest. Sir Topham Hatt inherited the job. In episode 610, Hatt is unavailable and one of the engines, Hiro, tries to run the railroad in his absence. This is considered grossly improper.
- guyzero 9y agoAny children's literature from 1940's England is going to be classist to some extent, but sure, it's definitely classist as all get out.
- paulddraper 9y agoThomas & Friends is gold. The show is dignified and wholesome. It is always about respect, diligence, and humility. It isn't there for stupid antics and wacky laughs. It doesn't blast color explosions and ADHD-fueled off-the-charts mind-numbing exuburance to capture kids attention. And it's been doing that for decades (pretty much eternity, as far as kids TV goes). Not since Mr. Rogers has there been a better kids TV show. > Fat Controller Better known as Sir Topham Hatt since the 1950s. > Henry must be punished—for life Even in the old non-US version (modern one makes it explicit), it was still evident that he wasn't left in their forever, as he showed up again next time. Blue Mountain Mystery [1] A little green engine hides in the blue hills. Thomas learns that long ago, the engine accidentally caused another engine to roll overboard into the sea. He has been hiding ever since, in guilt and fear and shame. Thomas convinces him to return, and the story shows how silly the little engine's worries were. It's a moral of forgiveness and redemption. (Also, there's a great surprise about who that overboard engine actually is.) This crap makes me mad. I have to stop reading stuff on the internet. Go back to watching Sponge Bob or Family Guy or whatever crap you watch with your kids. [1] http://ttte.wikia.com/wiki/Blue_Mountain_Mystery http://ttte.wikia.com/wiki/Blue_Mountain_Mystery
- NegativeLatency 9y agoAs a kid I also really loved Theodore the Tugboat. Similar kind of show, but with boats. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Tugboat https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Tugboat
- danbolt 9y agoI remember watching that as a little kid too. Did it ever get syndicated outside of Canada? EDIT: I skimmed the Wikipedia article, and discovered it had a pretty wide distribution. I'm impressed!
- paulddraper 9y ago> The show premiered in Canada on CBC Television, then went to PBS (Public Broadcasting Service), was on Qubo in the US, and at one time had appeared in eighty different countries. Looks like PBS Kids (the most likely syndication for Americans) ran it to some degree from 1993 to 2002.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- zwieback 9y agoI've always hated this show, in my PBS show rankings it's barely above Caillou, which was totally banned when my kids were little. Sir Topham Hat is such a fascist. I'd pay-per-view the episode where the trains revolt and Sodor burns down.
- CodeKommissar 9y agoLol why was Caillou "totally banned" for your little kids??
- ceejayoz 9y agoWe banned it as well. The character is unrelentingly whiny, and my kids (two years old, at the time) started picking up the mannerisms very, very quickly. For a while, Google's canonical answer to "Why is Caillou bald?" was "Caillou can't grow hair, not because he has cancer or progeria, but because he sucks, and even his own body recognizes that he does not deserve hair or food or love." https://www.sbnation.com/2014/3/26/5549908/arian-foster-caillou-is-awful https://www.sbnation.com/2014/3/26/5549908/arian-foster-cail...
- CodeKommissar 9y agoThat's a pretty funny answer.
- DanBC 9y agoA lot of parents noticed children imitating poor behaviour. Banning Caillou is pretty common.
- CodeKommissar 9y agoThe things you learn when you grow up haha. I remember to have watched Caillou when I was a kid but obviously I never noticed Caillou behaving badly.
- Twirrim 9y agoHe's go to be the most annoying children's show character ever. That's saying a lot, when you consider just how many kids characters have zero redeeming qualities. He whines, about just about everything, everywhere. Relentlessly. https://youtu.be/cGo60pp_9IM?t=6m30s https://youtu.be/cGo60pp_9IM?t=6m30s It got really annoying when my wife and I watched it with some of my nieces (and saw how the show influenced their behaviour) that when we had kids of our own we agreed that we'd never allow them to watch Caillou.
- js2 9y agoIt's hard to imagine George Carlin would associate himself with anything repressive and authoritarian.
- sparrish 9y agoOr anything written by an Anglican minister, Reverend Wilbert Awdry. Surprised me as well.
- defen 9y agoCompared to the original Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales which included such kid-friendly topics as child abuse, incest, murder, and cannibalism this doesn't sound too bad.
- colordrops 9y agoAlmost all the content we've got is representative of "corporate-totalitarian dystopia", because we live in a corporate-totalitarian dystopia. Thomas the Tank Engine isn't some special case.
- krapp 9y agoDid we live in a "corporate-totalitarian dystopia" in the 1940s - 70s? Because that's when the stories this show is based on were written. Simply considering all culture to be propaganda as you appear to be doing is intellectually lazy.
- colordrops 9y agoYes, we did live in a corporate-totalitarian dystopia in the 40s to 70s. And you are being lazy for assuming things that I did not say. I'm not implying that it's propaganda. I'm saying that media reflects the world we live in, as that is the context that we are familiar with, and we tell stories set in our own world.
- krapp 9y ago> Yes, we did live in a corporate-totalitarian dystopia in the 40s to 70s. I understand people like to interpret things through that lens now but like seeing Tolkien's work as an allegory for industrialization or the atomic bombs, it seems to me to be mostly post-hoc revisionism to do so. Reading the Wikipedia page of the author, I don't see any evidence of a "corporate-totalitarian dystopia" which would inform his stories. So you're going to have to define "corporate-totalitarian dystopia" in a way that even makes sense in that context.
- colordrops 9y agoSo just to be clear I'm mostly talking about the US and western countries. Let's break it down: Corporate: the corporation has been the main organizational unit for most of society at least since the 40s. In fact the vast majority of Americans that have a vocation work under a corporation. Totalitarian: The definition of totalitarianism is "a system of government that is centralized and dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state." Despite noises to the contrary, the US is certainly not a democracy, and I wouldn't even call it a representative republic. A data-driven study [1] confirms the intuitions of many that the US is really an oligarchy of the wealthy corporate class. US politics is driven by corporate interests and there is little evidence that public sentiment has a large effect on material outcomes, despite external appearances. Furthermore it can be argued that the US is a police state, as described by Pulitzer prize winning journalist Chris Hedges [2]. The US government has had countless programs to control discourse and put down opposition since its inception, and anything that threatens the status quo is stomped out with prejudice. Dystopia: In many important factors, American citizens are unhappy with their lives, and this unhappiness can be traced back to the corporate-totalitarian nature of the US. Extremely expensive health care, long work hours without much vacation, economic disparity between classes, lack of affordable housing, complete corruption of the financial sector, regulatory capture, endless warfare, corporate control of the media, etc are all direct results of the structure of our society. [1] https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B# https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-poli... [2] https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-origins-of-our-police-state/ https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-origins-of-our-police-...
- udfalkso 9y agoMy brother’s theory on this show (which my nephew LOVES) is that it’s coal industry propaganda. The worst train is the Diesel, etc.
- DoctorNick 9y agono. stop.
- Stratoscope 9y ago> In 2009, the show went completely C.G.I. As much as I love the New Yorker, my fondest hope is that one day the N.Y.C. media will free themselves from whatever repressive authoritarian soul compels them to put those dots in every single acronym and initialism, when the rest of the country abandoned the dots long ago. They even put them in names that once were initialisms but now are genuine names on their own: they insist on I.B.M. even though the official company name is simply IBM. And F.B.I. even though the FBI's own website calls it the FBI. As an old ham radio operator, the one that really got me was when they wrote about S.O.S. - when in fact SOS never was an initialism at all! No experienced radio operator would ever have sent "S O S" as three separate letters in Morse code: dit dit dit (pause) dah dah dah (pause) dit dit dit ("S" is dit dit dit in Morse, and "O" is "dah dah dah".) SOS has always been a "prosign", that is, a single Morse code unit with no pauses in the middle: dit dit dit dah dah dah dit dit dit In fact, SOS is properly written with an overscore above the letters to indicate that it is sent as a single unit. Of course that is not always possible given the limitations of modern typography, but it is never transmitted as if it were the three separate letters "S O S". Why does the N.Y.C. media follow such an authoritarian rule even when it is factually wrong? It is a mystery to me.
- DavidAdams 9y agoThe New Yorker also insists on typographical affectations such as coöperate and reëlect. Most publications have a "house style." The New Yorker's is particularly eccentric, and I think they like it that way.
- blt 9y agoI used to think this was annoying and snobby, but after seeing the New Yorker deëvolve into a less funny BuzzFeed over the past couple of years, I long for the over-the-top snobbiness of the old New Yorker. At least it was a distinct identity.
- chis 9y agoAre there any magazines that recreate the snobbishness of old New Yorker?
- vacri 9y ago> As one commenter writes, “What moral lesson are kids supposed to learn from this? Do as you’re told or you will be entombed forever in the darkness to die?” Geez, don't let that commentator see a Warner Bros cartoon...
- humanrebar 9y agoOr Tom and Jerry.
- jpatokal 9y agoFor a more modern yet still dystopian talking-train kids program, check out Chuggington. It's also British, but instead of the Fat Controller, there's "Vee", a disembodied GlaDOS-like female voice who orders the trains around via loudspeaker and chastises them when they're naughty. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuggington https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuggington
- dasmoth 9y agoI’m glad that I’m not the only one alarmed by Vee. One thing that I think is true of most current children’s TV, but which struck me particularly during Chuggington is how consistently anti-individualistic it all is: teamwork is always the right answer, and doing something on your own is a recipe for trouble. I don’t remember this being quite so emphatic in the past (but it does align with, e.g., the current crop of “how to be a good software engineer” posts.)
- fallous 9y agoThe New Yorker turned into Pat Robertson and the 700 Club so quickly I didn't even notice. Robertson divined the nefarious gay-agenda purpose of Teletubbies and now Ms. Tolentino discovers the totalitarianism that is Thomas & Friends. One can only imagine the undisguised communism of Barney & Friends (caring means sharing!) awaiting discovery or the Satanic influences of Lyrick/HIT (owners and distributors of Barney & Friends, Thomas & Friends, Bob the Builder, and a metric shitload of other child-oriented programming) given that the Veggie Tales owners bailed on a distribution agreement with them due to a lack of trust in Lyrick/HIT continuing to support the "Christian values" of that franchise. Joseph McCarthy could not be reached for comment at this time, although George Orwell was heard to mumble "1984 was supposed to be a warning, not a guide."
- cobbzilla 9y agoIn all fairness, Teletubbies had no dialog. With enough creativity, you could read whatever you want into it. When an insubordinate train car is bricked up "for always and always" and the narrator comments "I think he deserved his punishment, don’t you?", well, um, I think it's OK to say there's some seriously old-school moralizing going on.
- fallous 9y agoDepends how "old" the school of morality you're subscribing to is I guess and the strain of philosophy. Considering major Western Philosophies... New Testament circa 33AD not so much, pre-Enlightenment Catholic Church probably, Enlightenment era to pre-Marx, not so much, Marxist/Leninist and Progressive era of say 1900 and beyond then absolutely.
- exabrial 9y agoCompared to ...the political agenda and hidden sexual innuendo in the alternatives?
- c0nducktr 9y agoExamples?
- sparrish 9y ago"Thomas the Tank Engine" was written by Reverend Wilbert Awdry, a minister in the Anglican church. As is the Christian tradition, he understood the ultimate authority of God, the creator, and as is taught in the Bible, the necessity of teaching obedience to children. Since most of the early stories were written to his son, Christopher, it makes sense to me that they were about some of the key themes of his faith and his views for raising children.
- cat199 9y agoin other news, bourgeois-liberal publication takes issue with other media promoting traditionalist collectivism
- thatsethnz 9y agoOnce upon a time, there was an engine called Henry. Henry was asked to help but refused. So Henry was put in time out. Henry didn't enjoy time out and wanted to be let out. So was let out, and learned to be responsible and helpful. The reason you teach a toddler this should be blindingly obvious. Once upon a time, there was a journalist called Jia Tolentino. Jia was a special kind of stupid. Allegory, you see, was entirely lost on Jia. So, being neither helpful nor responsible, she called Henry's boss a fascist.
- dao- 9y ago> The reason you teach a toddler this should be blindingly obvious. Not at all. People should help out others out of altruism, because they understand that society is cooperative, or because they value other people. "Be helpful or be punished" isn't a lesson I'd want to teach my kid.
- thatsethnz 9y agoBut you have to teach altruism, cooperation and the valuing of other people. And you teach it by (gently and respectfully) disincentivizing the opposing behaviors. It's not "be helpful or be punished" it's "don't pour your cereal on your brothers head or you will get time out", "don't wake your brother when he's sleeping or you will get time out" "stop biting your bother or you will get time out", "no you cannot wear your new shoes in the mud and if you don't stop asking and complaining you will get time out". These are the bread-and-butter conversations of parenting. Like it or not, you will be a valid authority in your child's life, and you will need to teach compliance with proper authority, and model how to be one, and that there are consequences to the defiance of proper authority.
- tpxl 9y agoThere is significant difference between punishing absence of good behaviour ("be helpful or be punished" - Henry example) and punishing bad behaviour ("don't pour your cereal on your brothers head or you will get time out" - your child example).
- 9y ago
- santaclaus 9y agoThe world needs more childerns’ television like Ren and Stimpy. Those reruns are pure gold.
- teekert 9y agoWell, probably still beats growing up with fairy tails where giants eat children or where 2 children eat from a candy house and 1 ends up feeding the other until he is fat enough to be eaten by the witch. Or that nice one I heard at school where a woman turns into a salt pillar because god told her not to look backwards at the collapsing Sodom en Gomorra. And afterwards the two children that did survive get their dad drunk and have sex. Ok, I only heard that last part later. You know, children hear stories from a wide variety of sources and they have parents to help interpret them and give them a place in their world view. Children ask questions to tweak this view and I don't think we should be to whiny about stories that don't seem to hit the exact educational, politically correct, wholesome, inclusive tone that you had in mind when your kid was born.
- scandox 9y agoI definitely found the Henry episode weird when my daughter first saw it. She, being a kid, thought it was fine. They have a very punishment-centric worldview.
- pygy_ 9y agoBeside specific stories, there are two things in the general set up of Thomas that makes it IMO a toxic show. - The trains, who have children's minds, are unquestionably servile. They obey a pompous and capricious elite (humans) and the narrator goes along for the ride. Obeying is very important for Thomas (who's physically constrained to spend his life on rails). He'll do whatever is needed to stay in his master's good graces. It is the perfect show to condition child slaves into compliance. - The trains are racist, and it is normal and acceptable. Steam and Diesel engines loath one another. The show is presented from the steam team point of view, without an ounce of distance. The Diesels have inherent character flaws because of their engines. I just found a recent episode [1] where they kind of address that, but it is AFAICT a recent development. 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1YUoBOEsB4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1YUoBOEsB4
- falsedan 9y ago> The trains, who have children's minds, are unquestionably servile The trains, who have children's minds, are constantly breaking rules, forming petty cliques, tormenting each other, and ultimately getting some comeuppance. How could they be used to teach obedience if they never showed the folly of not following instructions??
- pygy_ 9y agoI didn't watch it as a kid, and only sampled a few episodes. From what I've seen, while they may break rules, they do so in order to comply with an order coming from the humans (or to fall into their good graces).
- falsedan 9y agoThat's not the case at all, Thomas is always doing things he shouldn't for fun, like disturbing sleeping trains (Gordon), winding up trains with remarks (also Gordon), passing warning boards in mines, and falling into subsiding mines[0]. Then there's not being nice to trucks, refusing to pull trucks, panicking from a near-collision and running away, ignoring advice from more-experiences engines and losing a head of steam, deliberately causing passengers to get wet, … The ones where they do as they're asked to are the minority… I don't recall any instances when an engine was directed to ignore a rule by a driver or the Fat Controller. 0: http://ttte.wikia.com/wiki/Down_the_Mine http://ttte.wikia.com/wiki/Down_the_Mine
- scardine 9y agoThomas is a strangely common "special interest" for kids in the spectrum, I wonder if the author himself could be a high functioning autist.
- rmchugh 9y agoWhile this might be true of the old series, the CGI series is almost anarchic by contrast. The Fat Controller is uniquely accident prone and regularly humiliated by his mother, his wife and his own mistakes. The Steam > Diesel caste system is less entrenched with very many sympathetic diesel engines (Mavis, Den & Dart, Salty) and the gender problems are also less evident with some good female engines (Caitlin, Emily, Mavis). I don't think the author has seen much of the CGI series or the recent movies.
- jasonmaydie 9y agoMy son has a book with a bunch of stories in them, 3 little pigs, Goldilocks etc but I stumbled on one story about "The wolf and seven sheep". At the end of the story, the mama sheep cuts open the wolf's stomach and fills it with stones and then tosses the wolf into a river. I was stunned.. but that's what stories are, they aren't always nice little things to make your kids live in some fantasy world. What a bullspit article.