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'C' not for cookie anymore

Abstract:
Elmo, Oscar the Grouch, Big Bird, Bert and Ernie and the Cookie Monster. These are just a few of the wonderful characters of Sesame Street.

Sesame Street is a show most of us probably grew up with. I am sure most have vividly fond memories of watching the show with friends....

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Jonathan

posted 11/27/07 @ 2:00 AM CST

This seems like an odd complaint.

I'm not sure why this is rocking anybody's world... most people who are watching current episodes are too young to care... most people who remember the old episodes are too old to be watching the new episodes. So, what's the big deal? Is Cookie Monster supposed to be some kind of sacred cultural artifact? And even if he is, you've got thirty years of "classic" material, right?

This change isn't hurting anybody... In fact it could have a real positive impact on a lot of kids.

Yeah, it's sad that American society has lead to such rampant obesity but, call me crazy, I'm not really that upset to hear that Cookie Monster is cutting back.

Anybody else care to comment?
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Ian at College Colosseum

posted 11/27/07 @ 2:01 AM CST

I think this is stupid. The problem with childhood obesity isn't the fault of the TV shows that the children watch or the fact that the characters eat cookies. Its the parents fault that they let the children sit inside for 8 hours watching the show.
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Bob Holness

posted 11/27/07 @ 3:18 AM CST

Exactly, Ian at College Colosseum (is that your real name?), you make a very prescient point. The problem with today's children is that they eat too many cookies because they see their role models (such as furry hand puppets) eating cookies on TV, and naturally assume that these food groups are nutritionally complete.

What we *do* need are furry hand puppets eating celery. Furry hand puppets eating root vegetables. Furry hand puppets, fashioned to the shape of root vegetables, eating fruit. Only then will our children nag us for the fibrous, low carbohydrate, low fat, low caffeine foodstuffs that will adequately serve their mental and physical development.
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Aj -RTP-

posted 11/27/07 @ 1:56 PM CST

Originally posted by

Bob Holness

 Exactly, Ian at College Colosseum (is that your real name?), you make a very prescient point. The problem with today's children is that they eat too many cookies because they see their role models (such as furry hand puppets) eating cookies on TV, and naturally assume that these food groups are nutritionally complete.

What we *do* need are furry hand puppets eating celery. Furry hand puppets eating root vegetables. Furry hand puppets, fashioned to the shape of root vegetables, eating fruit. Only then will our children nag us for the fibrous, low carbohydrate, low fat, low caffeine foodstuffs that will adequately serve their mental and physical development.


It's not the "Cookie Monsters" fault that children eat too many cookies. A furry little hand puppet that eats celery and broccoli may encourage them a little bit, but only a little. If you want your children to not eat cookies all the time, take a more active role in your child's life and stop blaming television and the media and fast food. You are responsible for your child's development, not PBS, Sony, or McDonalds.
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Bob Holness

posted 11/28/07 @ 2:36 AM CST

Originally posted by

Bob Holness

 Exactly, Ian at College Colosseum (is that your real name?), you make a very prescient point. The problem with today's children is that they eat too many cookies because they see their role models (such as furry hand puppets) eating cookies on TV, and naturally assume that these food groups are nutritionally complete.

What we *do* need are furry hand puppets eating celery. Furry hand puppets eating root vegetables. Furry hand puppets, fashioned to the shape of root vegetables, eating fruit. Only then will our children nag us for the fibrous, low carbohydrate, low fat, low caffeine foodstuffs that will adequately serve their mental and physical development.


Exactly my point, my friend. It can never be the "Cookie Moster's" fault because, after all, he is just a hand, albeit a warm one. Who is to blame? It is quite blatantly the hand owners for wiggling their puppets in such a suggestive manner, gallivanting around with cookies and confectionary, and it is this that causes our children to reject the fibrey goodness of celery from their diets and embrace the carbohydrate rich foods that we do not want them to have (but give them the sugar that their muscles need).
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Simon (UK)

posted 11/27/07 @ 3:24 AM CST

Kids like cakes n stuff because of the sugar and fat they have in them and not because they are told to like them.

It's good that some effort is being made to educate kids about eating more healthily but I wonder whether such simplistic strategies will be in any way effective.
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Millie

posted 11/27/07 @ 3:36 AM CST

This is dumb. They take God out of schools. They take the ten commandments from the courthouses. They take the freedom out of "freedom of speech" (Don Imus comments). Now they wanna control the way we eat? Leave the Cookie Monster alone. If anything it should be "C is for Communism" because that's how all the Liberals/hippy/environmentalists are making this country seem.

"C is for celery" pfft try giving a 3 year old celery.
Why can't they just let kids be kids? Before you know it they'll miss out on childhood, be old and think "Man I wish I had cookies when I was a kid but all I was allowed to have were.. celery sticks." Boy! does that sound tastey. Leave the Monster alone and let kids be kids.
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Somone not ammused

posted 11/27/07 @ 12:38 PM CST

Originally posted by

Millie

 (Don Imus comments)


HAHA, there is your biggest mistake. While television may be one of the contributing factors for a child's decisions later in life, it is certainly by far the most controllable aspect for the parent. Ultimately it is the parent themselves as well as school/work and friends that make up the influence of our decisions. If you dont want your child to see how Cookie Monster has changed over to celery, put on the Sesame Street reruns for the past 30 years. Pretty sure thats enough time to keep said child busy with cookies
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Woodinio (UK)

posted 11/27/07 @ 4:01 AM CST

Kids aren't as dumb and impressionable as people think: the fact he is called cookie MONSTER, can pretty much only say the word 'cookie', is completely cross-eyed, and has no meaningful relationship with any of the other characters, would, I would argue, portray him as someone to laugh at, mock, but ultimately not imitate.

All of a sudden making him conscientious might remove what for some kids is the funnest part of the whole show.

Cookie Monster was always my favourite Sesame Street character, purely because while all the others were trying to teach you stuff, like how to count or why you should be nice to people, he was running around like a mad one demonically devouring cookies for seemingly no purpose.
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Tom

posted 11/27/07 @ 4:21 AM CST

Did the author actually watch Sesame Street as a child?

I did - in the late 80s/early 90s - and there were always talking vegetables and skits about healthy food.

In fact there was a sketch that regularly cropped up with vegetables singing "healthy food tastes so good".

Even if such messages were new - where's the harm as long as the show is still entertaining? Kids TV shows are not sacred.

The author here is just spreading FUD - ignore her. Unless you're her journalism professor, in which case you should teach your students that making stuff up to attract attention does not constitute good journalism.
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Intruder vs1400

posted 11/27/07 @ 5:36 AM CST

The reason kids eat junk food is because parents *buy* it for them.

Give cookie monster his cookies!!
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COOKIE MONSTER

posted 11/27/07 @ 6:35 AM CST

C IS FOR COOKIE U INSENSITIVE CLODS
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Loomz

posted 11/27/07 @ 7:19 AM CST

This article is poorly written at best. Seems to go back and forth between thoughts without any clear direction.
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gusev

posted 11/27/07 @ 8:55 AM CST

Well, many kids are now gay because Bert and Ernie lived together and gave off homosexual innuendos.
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leave my cookies alone

posted 11/27/07 @ 9:25 AM CST

wow this is not cool kids shows should be about the kids having fun. education is important but not every kid show has to be educational.my sisters cookie monster doll still sings C is for cookie and thats the way it should be
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Jared

posted 11/27/07 @ 10:10 AM CST

"I find it kind of sad, that at a young age, kids must already start worrying about health issues, their body image and dieting."

I agree with you 100%, that is quite sad. Children indeed should not have to be concerned with their own health issues and body image, because it's their parents' responsibility to look after them! Most parents shirk that responsibility completely, however; parents today are more concerned with being friends with their children than being parents of their children.

Parents should not be relying upon the television to instill dieting values in their children, they should be relying on a stern look and the word "No." when their child's chubby little hand reaches into the cookie jar. It's the parent that prepares the meals, that makes the choices of what foods come into the house, and it's the parent that should be teaching the child about which foods are "sometimes" and which are "always" -- And it isn't necessarily about body image at that point. For example, sugar causes cavities and children often don't enjoy brushing their teeth, so instilling the infrequent-sugar-consumption value is worthwhile in my opinion.
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Muskegon Critic

posted 11/27/07 @ 11:50 AM CST

Come gather 'round gen y-ers
wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
around you have grown
And you'd better start swimmin'
or you'll sink like a stone
for the times they are a-changin'
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noobz

posted 11/27/07 @ 12:13 PM CST

this article was back in 2005
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Tahonga

posted 11/27/07 @ 12:22 PM CST

Oscar is not a grouch, he's bipolar.
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PENIX

posted 11/27/07 @ 12:46 PM CST

Celery Monster is an absurd idea. Celery is not fun or entertaining. No kid is going to ever going to take celery over a cookie no matter what a he watches on TV. It is hard coded into your genetics to like cookies more than celery and Sesame Street can't change that.

Sesame Street is not an excuse for parenting. A kid eats what his parents feed him. If your child is fat, it's because he is being fed crap, not because he watched a blue puppet eat a cookie.
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saurabh

posted 11/27/07 @ 1:53 PM CST

It's absurd to suggest that Cookie Monster is to blame for cookie consumption. Kids don't need to learn how to be eating well, because kids don't make those decisions for themselves anyway. Yeah, sure, kids need to learn good nutrition practices in general, but what's more at issue is that the ADULTS don't know good nutrition practices. Or, apparently, good parenting skills. Stop feeding your kids junk and this wouldn't be a problem.
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Bert & Ernie

posted 11/27/07 @ 2:46 PM CST

Stop being so PC & Liberal...people are messing up the world trying to make it "better"..go hug a tree and worry about something else..
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ruby

posted 11/27/07 @ 6:36 PM CST

Body image? Where do you even get that? Does any child find Cookie Monster glamorous and sexy and therefore eat like him to look like him? Does Cookie Monster say "eat apples to stay thin and gorgeous"? Ridiculous. They are addressing a health problem. Not an appearance problem. Ultimately, the people behind Sesame Street don't want responsibility for childhood obesity - and not just in an ethical sense, but in a financial sense. Someone out there is probably blaming their health problems on the cookie monster diet they were "brainwashed into as a child" and firing up yet another stupid lawsuit. Anyway, that whole let kids be kids thing would be cute except that cookies these days are not the same cookies grandma grew up on and metabolized properly. High fructose corn syrup anyone?
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Ty

posted 11/27/07 @ 8:06 PM CST

When are parents going to take responsibility for their kids, and not blame everything on television? Just like the public is letting the media educate them, they are letting the media educate their children with taking limited responsibility.
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novabeatnik

posted 11/28/07 @ 6:21 AM CST

This is the most asinine thing ever. Ok well not ever, the release of the first season of Sesame Street that is labeled as not for children is also idiotic. The problem with children's programming these days is that they are so condescending. I mean give kids some credit and let them learn the pabulum served up now is why youth are so weak intellectually inferior and pathetic.
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Alex

posted 12/18/07 @ 4:37 PM CST

This is the most stupidest thing i ever heard of Sesame Street is a very old show and if they just all of a sudden change it will never be the same.
Cookie Monster was made to eat cookies, and if there going to change it why not name him veggie monster instead, and "A cookie is a sometimes food." That doesn't even go with the tune try it yourself.
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EveryoneSing With Me

posted 12/24/07 @ 5:09 AM CST

P is for PARENTS, that should be raising their own kids.

T is for T.V., that should not be raising kids.

R is for responsibility, that parents should be taking.
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Shopping Cart Software

posted 3/07/08 @ 12:00 AM CST

Cookie Monster would get upset if he read this LOL>
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Lipitor

posted 3/31/08 @ 6:07 AM CST

I don't know where are we heading with this... we are talking about our kids, about their health and about their future. I recently saw a reportage about parents who give their children fast foods and fat deserts... the only motivation these parents had was that kids love the junk food and they cannot be refused. I think we need to educate some parents first, it's outrageous!
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akoo

posted 4/14/08 @ 5:43 AM CST

kids naturally like cookies..

eh, why a??
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Katherine Scarpa

posted 4/16/09 @ 4:40 AM CST

Nice review! Thanks!
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