Sesame Street DVD is for adults only
The Powers that be have decided that the early versions of the kids' show Sesame Street are too racy for kids of today.
The earliest episodes, bought you by the number 2 and the letter E, were installed onto DVD last week. But horror of horrors Mr Cooper, it is rated adults only.
According to the publisher, early Sesame Street episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of todays preschool child.
Having grown up on never-ending episodes of Sesame Street, one has to wonder what it was that was so terrible that we saw, that kids of today can't cope with.
In those days it was ok to for Cookie monster's eating disorder to go untreated, for Sally to take a stranger's hand and go to his home, for Oscar the Grouch to be denied prozac, and for blokes living together, Ernie and Bert, to engage in domestic violence.
But Executive producer Carol-Lynn Parente told the New York Times that the main reason for the censorship was nothing to do with anything we could come up with.
It was to do with a famous scene, often repeated, called Alistair Cookie and the parody Monsterpiece Theater. Alistair Cookie, played by Cookie Monster, had a pipe which he later ate.
Modern producers felt that modelled the wrong behaviour. It encouraged smoking and eating pipes. Initially they re-shot the scenes and later it was dropped.
Another reason was that when Snuffleupagus first appeared, he was invisble to all but Big Bird. But later producers decided it was a little creepy to have the giant canary wandering around claiming he was not hallucinating all the time.
The Powers that be have decided that the early versions of the kids' show Sesame Street are too racy for kids of today.
The earliest episodes, bought you by the number 2 and the letter E, were installed onto DVD last week. But horror of horrors Mr Cooper, it is rated adults only.
According to the publisher, early Sesame Street episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of todays preschool child.
Having grown up on never-ending episodes of Sesame Street, one has to wonder what it was that was so terrible that we saw, that kids of today can't cope with.
In those days it was ok to for Cookie monster's eating disorder to go untreated, for Sally to take a stranger's hand and go to his home, for Oscar the Grouch to be denied prozac, and for blokes living together, Ernie and Bert, to engage in domestic violence.
But Executive producer Carol-Lynn Parente told the New York Times that the main reason for the censorship was nothing to do with anything we could come up with.
It was to do with a famous scene, often repeated, called Alistair Cookie and the parody Monsterpiece Theater. Alistair Cookie, played by Cookie Monster, had a pipe which he later ate.
Modern producers felt that modelled the wrong behaviour. It encouraged smoking and eating pipes. Initially they re-shot the scenes and later it was dropped.
Another reason was that when Snuffleupagus first appeared, he was invisble to all but Big Bird. But later producers decided it was a little creepy to have the giant canary wandering around claiming he was not hallucinating all the time.
