SpongeBob may cause learning difficulties

Post Reply New Topic

I wonder which episodes of the show they put on, because there is a VERY noticeable difference in style between the episodes before the movie, and the episodes after. The show was actually originally intended to end with the movie, with Spongebob in charge of his own Krusty Krab, so even when Nick decided to renew it many of the original writers still left and a whole new group was brought in. Even the creator of the show retired from being the head writer to being the producer. If you look between the two episodes, the older ones have a lot more buildup to the main plot of the story, as well as having more intellectual humor. After the writer switch, many of the episodes are more random in their plots, many of the characters have become more stereotyped, and it is filled with what I call "stupid humor," which is comedy simply based around people acting stupid.

While the newer episodes can be decent and enjoyable, to me the heart of the show ended with the movie as intended. Although this can also go as a good example at how much children shows have changed in format in the past 10-15 years. I was watching The Secret World of Alex Mack recently, and I was extremely surprised at how intelligent the show really was, both in its plots and life lessons, although I never realized it back then. Comparing that to some of the major stuff today makes me somewhat glad my childhood was in the 90s...

Shouldn't the thread title have been written in the passive voice, rather than the active voice?

"SpongeBob may be caused by learning difficulties."

There. That makes more sense to me, now.

I call BS on the results of this 'study' on the basis of these points:
- Chances are, the children involved in this study are going to have go through the indoctrination that is the education system (it sucks for a reason), which will teach them what to think, not how to think. Basically both groups' intellect are f****d anyway.
- Comparing an animated comedy to an educational cartoon is like comparing apples to oranges.
- 4 year olds are a bit outside of SpongeBob's targeted demographic, SpongeBob wasn't meant for kids under 6 or 7 years old.
- Not all kids are smart and clever, Okay. Kids are like any other group of people, a few winners, a whole lot of losers. You can't save them all. Deal with it. You have to stop overprotecting them because you are making them way too soft. Today's kids are way to soft. You can thank today's 'professional' asswipe helicopter and snowplow parents for our soft and imbecilic children.
- The media probably blew this whole story out of proportion. Today, there's this constant neurotic mindless yammering in the media that everything must revolve about children. "Help the children!", "What about the children?", "Save the children!", wanna know what I say? f**k the children! They are getting entirely too much attention in this country. And don't give me this weak s**t: "Well, I love my children.", f**k you! Everybody loves their children. Doesn't make you special. John Wayne Gacy loved his children, kept them out by the garage. With that in mind, anytime ANY study (BS or not) ever hints at any negative impact on children, the media uses it to whip up a propaganda version of Hurricane Katrina and sends it directly towards the Western world, especially the USA. When it gets to the attention of the employees of Fuckwits Inc. a.k.a. helicopter and snowplow parents, their OCD flares up and bye-bye to this fun activity. These parents want to raise perfect children to fulfill a need for satisfaction in themselves. It's really just a complicated form of child abuse.
- I am under the assumption that everybody involved in this 'research' were Americans or resides in the USA. Which means that they are all dumbed down. Just a little bit of fuel for our fascist fire huh?
- And here's a George Carlin quote to back up my statement that says education sucks for a reason:
"There's a reason for this, there's a reason education sucks, and it's the same reason it will never ever ever be fixed. It's never going to get any better. Don't look for it. Be happy with what you've got... because the owners of this country don’t want that. I'm talking about the real owners now... the real owners. The big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don’t. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the state houses, the city halls. They got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies, so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear. They got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying. Lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else, but I’ll tell you what they don’t want. They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. That’s against their interests..."

I think they should have re-tested both groups after one hour. All this study proves is that young children shouldn't watch SpongeBob and then immediately attempt schoolwork. It doesn't prove the cartoon is doing any lasting harm.

This thread is almost FOUR YEARS OLD----they probably have discovered something different, now.

Are they STILL picking on poor Spongebob?

Considering how disgusting and stupid the new Spongebob episodes are, it needs all the bad publicity it can get.

This is quite intriguing, actually. I'm quite interested in the effects of youth pop culture (and television shows) on perception.

Yeah, and school can cause learning difficulties in seconds. Don't need a study to know that.