11.14.05
Beware Cheeko — The Environmental Propoganda Mascot For Kids on PBS
My five-year-old daughter found a new area of the PBS Kids web site about a week or so ago. She seems pretty excited about it, and wanted me to play it with her. She said it was a place where you could build creatures and make them live in a world, and you get points. That’s all she said about it to me, but I could tell she thought it was pretty fun.
It was on the PBS Kids web site, so I didn’t think anything of it. That evening, we sat down at the computer and she showed me Eekoworld, and I was an unsuspecting sap in for a big shock. The site’s narrator was a character named “Cheeko” — a flying monkey-headed creature with an irritating voice.
The home page seemed kid-friendly enough. Bright colors, animals, big kids faces smiling at you. Tara clicked on “Build Your Own Creature” and I built my creature. It’s kind of a Mr. Potato Head approach: pick a head, legs, tail and body from an assortment of different animal. I picked a lions’ head, frog legs, snake body — you get the picture. Then I got to place the animal in my world. I thought it was pretty cool, too. Like a kid’s version of an early Sim City.
Then it happened. An oil rig popped in the middle of the ocean with a note: “Something’s happening here!” I clicked and it said: “People want to drill for oil here, even though it is a wildlife preserve. What is your vote?”
“What!?” I thought to myself. “My five year old doesn’t even know what a wildlife preserve is. She doesn’t know what oil is used for.” I clicked “Yes” and it said: “Here’s a better choice: Oil keeps our homes comfortable and provides us with electricity, but removing oil from a wildlife preserve can hurt the land plants and animals.” And I lost points in the game.
I clicked around some more in “my world” — where I got to choose whether not fishermen got to overfish, cows got to graze on endangered grass, or whether people should carpool or dump chemical waste into the ocean. They were all loaded questions.
I took a “field trip to the future” where the beaches were full of trash and dead fish, and the forests have been clear cut, landfills are full, and cities are full of pollution. Scary stuff to an impressionable five-year-old. And that’s exactly why it’s there. One of the submitted comments on the site was:
I think people should stop cutting down forests because if they don’t we will probally die from to little oxygen — sbb94, Age 11
This children’s web site is a blatantly political web site designed to indoctrinate — not educate — children about a particular point of view — environmentalism. It is obvious propaganda, and should not be on a web site aimed at young children. Eekoworld is not meant to teach children about environmental issues, it is meant to train the next generation of environmentalists.
I’m very disappointed in PBS for putting this on its site. Trash like this does not deserve to be along side good shows like Arthur and Cyberchase.
I’m not alone. If you google “eekoworld” you’ll find that Mac Johnson, a writer for Human Events, tells of a similar experience with his child in a piece titled, “PBS Peddles New Online Leftist Indoctrination to Children.” Mr. Johnson was also interiewed on a radio show about the subject. You can listen to it here. (about 20 minutes long). The interview includes a number of audio clips from the game.
