Kidult TV

It was the veteran television producer Clifford Warne who coined the term 'Kidult television' in the 1970's. He was referring in a positive way to an emerging style of programming that ostensibly aimed at children, but scooped up adult viewers along the way. Thirty years on and the innocent imagery associated with that emerging genre is now being put to some not-so-innocent purposes.

The Kidult genre isn't that foreign a concept to anyone who is familiar with early evening programming or PG cinema. Films like Shrek turned it into a marketing advantage for parents tired of taking toddlers along to the latest Disney fairy tale. After all, who doubts that when the great green ogre sizes up Lord Farquaad's huge castle by saying, "Do you think he’s maybe compensating for something?" it's a joke meant for the ears of the taller members of the audience? The same mixing of audience groups has been the key to the success of television staples like The Simpsons, Futurama and South Park. Simplistic slap-stick and fairly junior 'bottom' comedy are now being regularly supplanted by ironic one-liners and even the sort of blue humour that would leave night club patrons gasping for air.

Kidult TV's growing emphasis on its older audience has shifted the content of established favourites and led to the production of a whole range of increasingly adult-only cartoons. This seismic shift is nowhere more apparent than in The Simpsons, currently celebrating its 20th anniversary. The series that used to focus on the antics of tear-away Bart - "Eat my shorts!" - is now firmly centred on the life of dysfunctional Homer - "D'oh!" - and regular space is devoted to humorous observations on his employment, marriage and sex-life. Not what you would call traditional childhood territory. The Family Guy ironically laments the loss of ". good, old-fashioned family values," in its opening titles, before launching into invariably selfish, sexually charged storylines centred on father Peter Griffin. Similarly South Park habitually uses the mouths of four young boys - Kyle, Stan, Eric and Kenny - for shocking statements aimed at drawing attention to older issues like racial stereotyping, transgender life-styles and unwanted erections.

Though the content has aged, Kidult's juvenile appearance remains largely unchanged. The Family Guy may show Peter Griffin dancing in bondage gear and South Park may show characters decapitated, eaten alive and impaled, but the frame-work remains a cartoon. This has developed as one of the primary concerns for parents; the attractiveness of the genre to childish viewers. The question is, does the presence of disturbing imagery and adult concepts actually offer any tangible threat?

Defenders of free speech will quite rightly point out that the various examples of Kidult TV listed in this article are heavy users of satire and their deliberately provocative dialogue and imagery are generally marshaled to criticise society's more ridiculous attitudes. How could a Christian disagree? Ned Flanders has done a good job of pointing out to the church how the rest of the world perceives religious people. In any case, if you strip away the shocking material in Kidult cartoons, you often discover support for conservative values. The family is central and important to society, so much so that Lois, Peter Griffin's wife, will continue to blithely care for her baby Stewie, even though the viewer knows he is a homicidal maniac. Homer is forever fighting to preserve his marriage to Marge, and the best sex either of them experience is clearly in the confines of their relationship. And even Eric Cartman, the most morally bankrupt member of the South Park crew, is constantly pilloried for his ridiculous intolerance towards ethnic minorities like Jews and African-Americans. Far from attacking society, Kidult cartoons contribute to its core values on a nightly basis - albeit backhandedly.

And there's the rub.

The problem is, crying 'Satire!' as a defense is only effective so long as the audience is aware of its use, and is capable of decoding the technique - which should get us thinking about young television and internet viewers again. More importantly it is a fallacy to believe that even the educated viewer can 'strip away the shocking material'. As communications theorist Marshall McLuhan put it, ‘The medium is the message’. We cannot separate the manner in which a message is delivered from the message itself. McLuhan was referring to the effects technologies such as television and radio have , but the same applies to communication techniques. The shocking imagery itself has its own effect, quite apart from the satire it is attempting to convey. For example, there are many ways to inspire awe in a person - a dramatic view and a nuclear explosion are just two. However they will have radically different effects on the way their viewers will see the world.

The creators of Internet filtering programs have always recognised that manga pornography is still pornography, even though it is composed of cartoonish sketches rather than photographic imagery. It is just as degrading, addictive and damaging to the psyche as the 'real thing'. Likewise, violence is still violence, even if its purpose is to provide an ironic view on life. The constant exposure to racist slurs, sexual perversity and sadistic acts is likely to shape a viewer's tolerance for this sort of behaviour, particularly this sort of humour in the real world. Already television producers are finding ample cover behind the seemingly bullet-proof shield that excuses almost anything in the name of comedy - The Chaser's recent exploitation of critically ill children should demonstrate that. However the Bible has a very short summation for the person who believes they can separate their production of, and exposure to this sort of humour, from the effect it has on others: