The Fairly Oddparents -Toni C.

The other day my younger cousin was watching the cartoon The Fairly Oddparents. Remembering how I used to like this show I began watching it with him. The first few minutes I didn't really notice anything that stood out to me as being anything unordinary of a kids cartoon but that didn't last long. I had never realized the stereotypes that were presented in this show consistintly. I first noticed it as one of the characters Chester, a white child, began using slang terms such as "yo". He was immediatly stopped by his friend A.J., a black child, who told Chester he needed to stop and that he was making it uncool. This show was clearly implying that urban slang must only be used by a certain race and somehow made speaking that way a part of black culure. This just didn't seem right to me. IIt didn't stop there either. Not even a minute after this a child who was supposed to be very wealthy came into the picture. His last name was Buxaplenty and he drove up in a stretch limo that exceeded any realistic length. As soon as he stepped out with the most stereptypical butler I had ever seen this Buxaplenty child began his stereotypical snob appeal and was rude to the less wealthy children. All I could think about at this point was this show was teaching children to judge people by their appearance and place them into stereotypical categories. Why does the wealthy child have to act as if everyone is lesser than him? Why can't a white child use slang if he chooses? There was no blending of cultures or class that I saw of in this program but instead sticking to preconceived notions of people. It seems to be hegemonic to display different races in this way. As much as our society likes to consider ourselves blended it is obvious through these stereotypes that this is not so.