Matt Welch is Not Moderate When it Comes to Mixing Children & Politics

Former Reason intern Jeff Winkler, currently counting days in a work-release program at The Daily Caller, has written an interesting review of much-pooh-poohed Tea Party Coloring Book.

Among the biggest pooh-poohers is none other than Matt Welch of Reason, who managed to talk in bracketed cuss words despite his self-evident anger at everything from infant-sized intafadaists to Girl Scout Cookie punks ruining his trip to the strip club just up the street from the Reason DC HQ:

"I think people who mix overt politics and children's books should be forced to [expletive] in a stall next to [politician's name redacted], rub tanning goo on [another politician's name redacted]'s dewlaps, and then strapped to the chair for 20 consecutive performances by [too embarrassing]. That oughtta do the trick."

Whole story, replete with images, here.

A few years back, Reason took a long look at "the grim 'fun' of highly partisan kids' lit," specifically two tragedies titled Why Mommy is a Democrat and Help! Mom! There are Liberals Under my Bed!

Comments

[affenkopf]

People teach their religious beliefs fo their children. What makes politics different?

[wylie]

Well, since religion is nothing BUT politics...

[?]

It's hard to tell exactly for whom this publication is geared toward.

For derp verit?, the Caller hired a coloring-book copy editor.

Some things are sad beyond alt-text

You lazy bastard!

[waffles]

I call shenanigans. Look at the shading, the crispness of the lines, the uniformity of the letters. This was colored by an adult!

[Geek]

Shopped!

[Dagny T.]

Meh. I just can't get my ire up about this. Parents teach their children all kinds of stupid shit (the baby Jesus wuvs you, don't have sex before marriage/with people of the same gender/evar) that their kids grow up and disregard. Not my business any more than someone feeding their kids happy meals 7 nights a week.

[Pip]

When I was a kid, my family sat around the table 7 nights a week eating happy meals and talking politics.

[Paul]

But we still get to get annoyed and call bullshit.

However, I did give my daughter the speech on violent video games this morning... but only because she aksed.

Other than that, I keep politics out of her upbringing. But even that is a political act, because I think that politics has no place in a clean-living family earning an honest living.

[Episiarch]

Agreed, but in my opinion people who shove politics down kids' throats are fucking scumbags. Kids don't understand politics, and it's grossly manipulative. And it carries the whiff of indoctrination about it. Yes, parents indoctrinate their kids about many things; that doesn't make it any more appealing.

[Paul]

I say again, anyone who breaks out the folk guitar and sings "Teach your children well" should face a firing squad.

[capitol l]

My kid asked me about politics one time.

So I drove him down to the ghetto handed him a rifle and said, "Son, see those brown people, well they want to kill you because your free, so you better start shooting". When he made it home I told him that I was a republican.

He said he didn't want to learn any more about politics, so I said that that was fine, get in the car. Down to the ghetto we went with jr's piggy bank. After smashing it on the ground I bought a bunch of 40ozs and handed them out to the homeless. I told him that I was a democrat.

When we got home I felt bad for the boy so I got him baked and we watched zombie movies. I told him I was a libertarian.

Wait, I don't have any kids. Whose fucking kid was that? Jeeze, I think he still has my gun. Epi, have you seen yer kid?

[Episiarch]

Dude, that was your dog. Why does your dog have a piggy bank?

[capitol l]

My dog is your kid?

Well I am DONE feeding him then.

[Paul]

The bitch said it was yours.

[cynical]

Who says that people that discuss politics with their kids are "shoving"? There's certainly influence there, but youngsters can have their own opinions.

[James Ard]

If you aren't teaching your kids the fact that their future is being stolen from them, then you are doing them a disservice.

[Dagny T.]

Again I say "meh". IMHO, talking politics makes more sense than teaching your kid religion, but no one gets all righteously disgusted when parents give their kids coloring books about that. At least politics is about actual stuff that happens to actual people.

It sort of smacks of the kind of snobbery we like to decry 'round these parts, like freaking out over homeschoolers, or fast food marketing to kids. (Obviously, hugely different in that no gov't force is trying to stop creepy coloring books, but the sentiment of "oh gross, tacky parents are tacky" is similar to me.)

[Paul]

I will defend to the death ones right to pollute a child's mind with totally ghey coloring books depicting Barack Obama.

[Progressive]

As long as they're not coloring in it within 60 days of an election, we're fine with it.

[Dagny T.]

Barf. At least my indoctrination had, like, donkeys and sheep and stuff that is actually fun to color (Sunday school, and let me tell you how well that took). What kid wants to color in old dudes in suits?

[Paul]

I went to a Christian kindergarten... wow, I didn't even remember that until your post.

[Dagny T.]

I think they told us something like "the donkeys have crosses on their backs because they carried Jesus" and even as a five year old, I was all LOLWUT?

I preferred my gender-norm-reinforcing, body-image-destroying Barbie coloring books. (Thanks, Jezebel!) Fuck, kids can't catch a break on the brainwashing front.

[Wind Rider]

Of course Matt wouldn't let his kids near it. He wanted to keep it pristine so he could use it as his office Christmas party gift for the Jacket.

[Kristen]

DCF needs to step in and take away any kids that learn about politics from their parents, of all people! Everyone knows that's the State's job!

[mr simple]

Wait, i want to hear about the girl scout strippers. Where's the link to that story?

[Ska]

It definitely wasn't at Good Guys.

[hmm]

Because kids don't understand politics. Did everyone who writes on this subject skip lunch and recess and remained locked in a closet for their entire grade school experience?

[dotdotdot]

I can fill in the blanks for the expletive and the two redacted politicians. What did Matt say that was considered "too embarrassing"?

[Dagny T.]

My money's on Justin Bieber.

[Matt Welch]

The Capitol Steps. I pray that you aren't familiar with them.

[SugarFree]

The Capitol Steps.

Your prayers fall on deaf ears in my case. [shudder]

[dotdotdot]

I wasn't, but now I am. Drats.

[Zeb]

I never would have guessed that that is what you said. I think that might just be going too far.

[Paul]

When a magazine called Reason utters the name which should never be mentioned...

[Paul]

Matt, if he listens to NPR, he's heard of and heard the Capitol Steps.

[Brian Sorgatz]

You mean you don't like the bit where a guy mixes up the first letters of words as he talks about current events? You're a phucking filistine! Blod guess the American lay of wife!

[Brian Sorgatz]

"Lirty Dies" is their name for that type of segment.

[BakedPenguin]

Of course Wankette is peeing their pants over this. It Takes a Village To Raise a Child, not an evul right-wing coloring book! It's Our Choice to make a better, greener world, not the Tea bag one where baby seals are beaten after being slowed down with oil spills!

[SugarFree]

As if the statist crap they learn in public school can be counter-weighted with a mere coloring book.

[BakedPenguin]

Public schools are essentially indoctrination facilities. C'mon, SF, you've read enough Dewey to know that they were meant to crank out obedient little servants. Education was a secondary goal.

[mad libertarian guy]

Private School FTW!

[Kramer]

if the little bastards knew what debt was they'd go all Children of the Corn on us.

[Hazel Meade]

It's fill-in-the-blanks time!!

"I think people who mix overt politics and children's books should be forced to [Fuck] in a stall next to [Barney Frank], rub tanning goo on [Nancy Pelosi]'s dewlaps, and then strapped to the chair for 20 consecutive performances by [Sarah Palin]. That oughtta do the trick."

[wylie]

20 consecutive performances by [Sarah Palin]

Go on...

[Brian Sorgatz]

Oh boy, it's Matt Welch Mad Libs!

"I think people who mix overt politics and children's books should be forced to [barf] in a stall next to [Winston Churchill], rub tanning goo on [John Quincy Adams]'s dewlaps, and then strapped to the chair for 20 consecutive performances by [Carrot Top]. That oughtta do the trick."

[dave]

"I think people who mix overt politics and children's books should be forced to [shit] in a stall next to [Larry Craig], rub tanning goo on [Barney Frank]'s dewlaps, and then strapped to the chair for 20 consecutive performances by [John Ashcroft]. That oughtta do the trick."

[Paul]

Unfortunately (and correct me if I'm wrong) but my impression is the conservatives have merely copped this from the liberal playbook.

Libs have a long history of breaking out the folk guitar and singing "Teach... your children well"...

[wylie]

The Right People, etc etc

[wayne]

Matt, you will never be elected president with such a potty mouth.

[Paul]

And to be elected president these days, you need to have smoked some weed at some point. That way you've experienced what you're banning.

[Matt Welch]

I *have* smoked weed, dammit! Just not very recently....

[Paul]

You held off for a month before the LA Times drug test?

[BakedPenguin]

That way you've experienced what you're banning.

Paul, if you needed experience with all the drugs that are banned to become president, the only person who could qualify is Keith Richards. And we'd have to find his Hawaiian birth certificate.

[BakedPenguin]

That way you've experienced what you're banning.

Paul, if you needed experience with all the drugs that are banned to become president, the only person who could qualify is Keith Richards. And we'd have to find his Hawaiian birth certificate.

[BakedPenguin]

Oh man, the squirrels are giving me trails...

[Paul]

You can say that again.

[Aresen]

Wait!

You mean The Story of O isn't about the current president?

[SIV]

A quick search reveals:
Message 5: Cascadian
I don't have children, but a libertarian-themed children's book I always thought kids would like is The Adventures of Huxtable Holmes and Sprockett Watson. It's a Sherlockian pastiche where all the characters are teddy bears. In the course of their cases, the two discuss taxation, property rights, and other libertarian issues.

I think I got my copy through Laissez Faire Books.

I like this one better.

[Brian Sorgatz]

Matt, may I ask a devil's-advocate question? Are you equally disgusted by a political children's book with a Reason type of message, like the pro-marijuana picture book It's Just a Plant?

[Tulpa]

There was an ONDCP ad a few years ago which said "If you don't talk to your kids about drugs, who will?" together with an image of a menacing Tim Lincecum-type holding a joint.

The same goes for politics. If you don't talk to your kids about it (not indoctrinate, but at least give them an independent frame of reference to approach topics from) then you can be sure they'll get ideas from someone else. If that someone else happens to be our vaunted public school system, God help you.

[henry]

I am voting for Sarah Palin, and her retard baby prop that she insists on dragging on stage everywhere.

Actually, "Prop" does sound like it could be a name in the Palin household.

[Mr. FIFY]

So, what was wrong with what Matt said, exactly?