Option Paper. I want to start by being completely honest: I have never liked the TV show on the

Transcription

1 Professor Carolyn Hill College Writing October 2015 Option Paper I want to start by being completely honest: I have never liked the TV show on the Nickelodeon channel, SpongeBob Squarepants. In fact, I generally regard any parent who does like this show and allows their child to watch it with suspicion and derision. But, along my journey of searching for a means of convincing you to ban this god-awful show from your household, I discovered that I needed to let my confirmation bias run free and rely on factual data, cause and effect analysis, and then of course, logic and common sense. Perhaps, being a working mother of three or a stay-at-home parent under the daily pressures and time constraints of caring for a family, you might be hesitant to continue reading, thinking, I don t have time for this! But I implore you to consider what is best for your child s mental growth, and I want to bring to light the importance of making a significant effort in preventing your child from laying eyes on the show SpongeBob Squarepants I assure you, it s worth it. SpongeBob Squarepants should be banned from any household with children because the show decreases the attention span of youth, promotes unhealthy behavior and decisions, fails to stimulate intellect, and stunts the growth of mental well-being. Before I address the most common complaint against my argument, Why pick on SpongeBob? I d like to shed some light upon a real experimentally-controlled study performed by social media and child development professionals on children s attention spans after watching SpongeBob Squarepants. Yes, specifically SpongeBob Squarepants. The researchers behind the

2 study in Pediatrics wanted to see if watching SpongeBob made a difference in the executive functions of pre-schoolers; factors including patience, learning ability and behavior that will be crucial when they get to school were studied. They had 60 children either draw or watch a slower show ( Caillou the kind of show psychology professors like because it is slow and on public television so it must be better than shows kids actually want to watch), and one third watched SpongeBob. Presto, the kids who watched SpongeBob for nine minutes scored worse on tests than the kids who drew or watched the PBS show (Science Codex). What exactly defines a fastpaced show? The psychology expert at University of Virginia s College of Arts and Sciences, who headed this study, Professor Angeline Lillard, defines it to be one in which characters are constantly in motion from one thing to the next, and in extreme fantasy, w here characters do things that make no sense in the real world, and may disrupt the child s ability to concentrate immediately afterward (Lillard). Anyone would agree that a cartoon portraying an obnoxious, talking yellow sponge living in a pineapple on the ocean floor can be safely classified as extreme fantasy, but what is more frightening is the fact that something so innocent may disrupt a child s ability to concentrate. Even if we don t have enough evidence that cartoon shows in general have a negative effect on c hildren s learning ability/mental functioning, we still know for sure that professionals have tested and provided evidence against SpongeBob Squarepants specifically. If that study is not enough to quench your inner argumentative side (not that you would actually sacrifice enough time and effort to refute these points), perhaps this statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) will motivate you to ban SpongeBob Squarepants once and for all. They state, Parents should limit children's total media time (with entertainment media) to no more than 1 to 2 hours of quality programming per day and discourage television

3 viewing for children younger than 2 years. Studies have shown that a few minutes of watching a show such as SpongeBob Squarepants could cause children as young as 4 years old to develop serious short-term attention and learning problems (Media and Children). Now, I am not attempting to persuade you to ban all forms of social media and entertainment from your son or daughter s childhood that would be an entirely separate paper and argument but the fact that the AAP mentions SpongeBob Squarepants specifically as a source of children s developing lear ning problems is perhaps a parent s worst nightmare. For any stay-at-home or working parent alike, it is completely understandable that, sometimes, all you need is a quick distraction or break that will keep the kid quiet to make time for you to take care of other chores and errands one measly episode can t do any damage, right? Wrong. Recall that Professor Lillard s study indicate d that only 9 minutes of SpongeBob can cause a child to perform more poorly on a test than a child who had not watched the show. The shortest episode of SpongeBob is 22 minutes. If professionals and experts provide studies that call out this particular show, it is completely worth it to take the extra 5 seconds to change the channel or hide the remote so that your child is never exposed to the spell-binding, nonsensical sponge. Taking a step back from all the hard numbers, we can quickly skim the premise of SpongeBob Squarepants and logically deduce that the immediate lack of logic of the show is indubitably damaging for the children that we are calling the future. As mentioned before, SpongeBob is a yellow sponge who lives in a pineapple with his snail Gary (who has never once smiled in the duration of the show) and works at the Krusty Krab under the management of a moneymaking glutton, Mr. Krabs. As if SpongeBob s personality and resounding high-pitched laughter resembling the sound of a dying goat are not enough of a terrible influence upon children, Mr. Krabs epitomizes the qualities of greed and disrespect. His obsession with money

4 and constant yelling at his workers make him a top notable character in cartoon history in recent polls (Top Ten List). In addition, SpongeBob s best friend, Patrick, is a character known by children for his dim-witted nature and all-around foolishness. His character not only promotes children to mimic his sense of humor, but also sets some subtle implications that indirectly encourage children to laugh at and look down upon real-life individuals with disorders that cause him/her to behave slowly or have slowly-developed intellects. Other characters include Squidward, a drab and rather horrific-looking squid that personifies pessimism and narcissism, and Plankton, the leading antagonist of the show who s only desire for the duration of the show is to steal. The only character that, some would argue, lacks negative qualities and may actually positively influence children, is Sally the Squirrel a ridiculous creature with a thick Southern accent dressed in an astronaut suit. We should not be surprised however; the show s opening theme song contains the wellknown lyrics, If nautical nonsense is something you wish, then drop on the deck and flop like a fish. I suppose, if the theme song warns us of such nonsense, we ought to expect what is coming in the following 22 or more minutes. As concerned citizens, however, it should be of utmost priority to rid our youth of such poison and terminate any risk of our children mimicking the negative behavior and morals of this show, let alone flopping on a deck like a fish. Before I leave you to reflect with your thoughts and think about what action steps to take in light of this information, I would like reveal a personal story about this subject matter of someone very near and dear to my heart. About two years ago, my mother s sister who lives in Taiwan called my mother and asked to speak to me and my brother ab out a very pressing matter regarding a silly American show. She described, in a frantic voice of frustration, that her youngest daughter of 5 years old was persistently singing SpongeBob Squarepants, mimicking

5 the laughter of the sponge character in his token goat-like guffaw, and attempting to copy the unintelligible speech of the dim-witted character Patrick the Star. The news initially caused my brother and I to laugh so hard that our stomachs ached, but upon further speculation, we were told that our niece would be diagnosed with Attention-Deficit-Hyperactive Disorder something that my aunt and her poor husband did not have the energy to keep up with. Whether or not the disorder was triggered by the show, we will never know, but the influence of the silly yellow sponge became very evident in the behavior and personality of my poor niece and of so many other children exposed to SpongeBob Squarepants. Any show from PBS with children s education as a primary goal, or perhaps a slower-paced cartoon from Disney Channel that promotes interactive learning would serve as a much more appropriate substitute to the passive watching of SpongeBob Squarepants and the negative impacts on mental health that it threatens. When we ultimately step back and evaluate the costs and gains of banning SpongeBob from our childrens lives, we realize that there are no costs! Take action, even if it s not much, and think about your child s future for the long run.

6 Works Cited Lillard, Angeline PhD, Jennifer Peterson, BA S., PhD, and Jennifer Peterson, BA. "The Immediate Impact of Different Types of Television on Young Children's Executive Function." Pediatrics (2011): n. pag. (doi: /peds ). Web. Oct "Media and Children." Media and Children. American Academy of Pediatrics, n.d. Web. 13 Oct < ""SpongeBob SquarePants" May Compromise Learning, Behavior of Young Children Science Codex." Shows like "SpongeBob SquarePants" May Compromise Learning, Behavior of Young Children Science Codex. Science Codex, n.d. Web. Oct "Study: Some Cartoons Are Bad for Children's Brains." The Chart RSS. CNN, n.d. Web. Oct < "Worst Cartoon Characters." - Top Ten List. N.p., n.d. Web. Oct <

7 Critical Information Sheet for Free Draft 1. Intent Statement: SpongeBob Squarepants should be banned from any household with children because SpongBob Squarepants decreases the attention span of youth, promotes unhealthy behavior and decisions, fails to stimulate intellect, and stunts the growth of mental well-being. 2. Audience Description: My audience would consist of parents and relatives of young children who may never have given a second thought about what they show to their children on television, or who allow their children to watch SpongeBob Squarepants on the Nickelodeon Channel. My reader may agree that Spongebob Squarepants has a negative impact upon their children, especially after being presented with solid data and studies. They may be skeptical of why I am targeting Spongebob Squarepants specifically, but engagement in this interesting topic can facilitate their acceptance of my argument, as well as the very clear experimental evidence I have to offer. If the audience is opposed to my intent statement, they may be opposed to the theory that children mimic the behavior of the characters in the show, but I believe that they will decrease the showing of this show in his/her household nonetheless. 3. Strategy Explanation: I want to use persuasive diction and solid evidence and data to support my points. I believe that diction is essential to captivating the attention of the reader and fully delivering a rich argument without forcing the reader to work for it. I believe that a strategic structure is also a necessary implementation because it allows the reader to flow with the argument and connect with the logical sequence of ideas. In this free draft, I used the strategy of starting with well-known characters and pointing out

8 well-known attributes about them, as well as presenting data from a study in a way that makes sense for an audience who is unfamiliar with this type of scientific interpretation. 4. Writer s Reflection: As a writer, it was hard for me to construct a solid organization of my free draft as well as to develop an effective introduction and conclusion. I discovered, however, that I was able to quickly get my ideas on the draft without hindrance, due to the free-draft nature of this assignment. My writing process has not changed significantly, but I was able to utilize a more structured form of organization catered to my specific type of argument. This exercise of free-draft playing allowed me to generate a long flow of ideas without stopping, and consolidate a mass of ideas that can be used to further solidify my argument.