kicking puppies is bad

I was reading the Wall Street Journal Online, when I came across an editorial blog entitled Blame It on Mr. Rogers: Why Young Adults Feel So Entitled. The basic premise of the article is that Mr. Rogers told an entire generation that they were “special”, just they way they were. He apparently should have been telling them that there was a lot of room for improvement. Now we have a generation of narcissists with entitlement complexes.

This was a vaguely interesting thought, but it got me thinking about other Mr. Rogers Era children’s television icons. Specifically, I started wondering about Slim Goodbody. I’m not exactly sure why he came to mind, but I seemed to remember him also telling kids something about being special. I also remember him having the same sort of creepy vibe that Mr. Rogers had. So, I googled “Slim Goodbody”. As it turns out, he is still around and has a website. In fact, he is currently doing a nationwide tour with 147 shows in 23 states. Unfortunately this tour doesn’t come anywhere close to Rochester — but it just might be worth a roadtrip!?! A grown man has spent 30 years dressing up in spandex and telling kids to “Give yourself a hug. Say, ’I love my body. I’m the best me in the world,’”… And no one sees anything weird about this…

Of course, I really shouldn’t mock him. Given the obesity level of our nation’s children, perhaps “Daily Deskercise” is a good think to incorporate into classrooms. And maybe he isn’t as outdated and creepy as I remember him being. Somewhere it mentioned that he is updated his style so that he would be “hip” and kids would relate to him. He no longer has the 1970′s white-boy-fro that I remember from my childhood. And he raps… We all know that middle aged men in spandex rapping is *exactly* what kids relate to…