Using Children as Props
We may never know what we need to know about Trayvon Martin. But whatever really happened that day, it's clear that this is getting ugly.
It always does when people use children as props. Look, if the entire sick Trayvon Martin affair turns out to be a lot more murky than the left wants -- and indications are that it will -- it doesn't negate the tragedy of a kid's death. He was only a kid.
What is it about the institutional left that uses kids as props? Here, half a world away, the most cynical video I've seen in a long time. (And I'm in show business.) The SCAF, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces in Egypt -- in other words, the ruling junta -- wants you to know that it's all about the children.
And then right below it, my own editorial juxtaposition. So many similarities.
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Comments:
Feb '12
Re: Using Children as Props
It's all part of the Obama passing cabaret parade with elements of Tomorrow belongs to me .. It does get a little creepy and scary. The One.
Mar '11
Re: Using Children as Props
Just a kid?Sort of. Less than a year later he would have been old enough to vote and to serve in the military. Why infantilize 6'2" tattooed young men?
Apr '11
Re: Using Children as Props
The Egyptian video was far less creepy to me (maybe because I could not understand what the kids were singing). The Egyptian kids were cute; their song was musically catchy; their choreography pleasing to the eye; they looked like they were having a lot of fun. The American kids scored far worse in all categories. Their only advantage was their super-goofy song leader who looked beside herself with joy throughout their entire lame song.
Maybe the message in the Egyptian video was better, somehow, too. At least, I got this: It's a great thing to be a kid in Egypt today; we get to do lots of cool military training; we get to spend time looking in microscopes; we even have time for clapping games with our buds. Truthfully, my 9 y.o. daughter would probably want to join them in Egypt, if she saw that video. The American video was depressing because it pinned a bunch of vague, platitudinal hopes to the person of a pathetically silly politician. Far more empowered were the Egyptian children -- and that is the saddest thing of all.
Edited on March 27, 2012 at 3:06amMay '11
Re: Using Children as Props
Both videos make a similar point, although without translation, I am guessing about the Egyptian one. In every despotic third world country I have visited, and I have been to many, the military is populated by children, trying to look grown up and official, proud of their uniforms and large guns.
Dec '10
Re: Using Children as Props
Rob,
Chairman Mao, Comrade Stalin, and Der Fuhrer are all smiling up at us from HELL!!! They know what we seem to have forgotten. Staged shallow feel good nonesense is dangerous. Anybody can do it. Monsters can make you think they're cute and lovable.
We have lost the ability to judge. We are in big trouble.
Regards,
Jim
May '10
Re: Using Children as Props
My youngest son joined the Army on his 17th birthday. My oldest joined the Air Force when he was 17 1/2.
May '10
Re: Using Children as Props
Everyone wants to be seen as the protector of the most vulnerable and children fit that bill... At least the ones OUTSIDE the womb do...
Apr '11
Re: Using Children as Props
Justine Olawsky:
Maybe the message in the Egyptian video was better, somehow, too. At least, I got this: It's a great thing to be a kid in Egypt today; we get to do lots of cool military training; we get to spend time looking in microscopes; we even have time for clapping games with our buds. Truthfully, my 9 y.o. daughter would probably want to join them in Egypt, if she saw that video. The American video was depressing because it pinned a bunch of vague, platitudinal hopes to the person of a pathetically silly politician. Far more empowered were the Egyptian children -- and that is the saddest thing of all. ยท 12 minutes ago
Edited 11 minutes ago
I agree; I got the impression that it was a sort of broad patriotism, possibly linked with a particular party or faction, but generally positive. The kids were clearly functioning as actors in a highly professional production, and I don't have a problem with child actors. The Obama kids were, so far as I know, just random schoolchildren. If their parents had signed them up for an Obama commercial, I'd have no problem, but that wasn't it.
Nov '11
Re: Using Children as Props
That Obama video reminds me of this scene from Jesus Camp.
May '11
Re: Using Children as Props
One is creepier than the next. The American kids bothered me the most, though, I'm sure because we're much closer in time and space to the fatherly "O", benevolent source of goodness and well being.
Not sure whether I need a hot shower or a Scotch right now.
Oct '10
Re: Using Children as Props
Rob. . .what is going on? Is the left trying to energize blacks, in the theory that anything that energizes them is good for 2012, no matter what that may be? Why the sudden, intense, racialist messaging campaign? Why the attempt to force all 200 million Americans of European descent to take responsibility for the action of one lone murderer? Why can't people be happy that the Feds and the state are investigating the matter, and leave it at that?
May '10
Re: Using Children as Props
I think using kids in ads is illegal in France.
Feb '12
Re: Using Children as Props
Anyone with Soviet experience who looks at this and several other kids' videos praising Dear Leader Barack Hussein Obama finds it eerily familiar. Here is just one of thousands that were made over the decades. The usual contents - "how good it is to live in the Soviet Union". Probably the same as the Egyptian song...
Feb '11
Re: Using Children as Props
I went in the US Navy when I was 17 and a half. Looking back, I suppose I was just a kid by some definitions- but I was doing adult things, and I felt like it. I bet Trayvon Martin felt the same way.
And- for what it's worth- I don't find this situation particularly murky. The left was looking for an incident to beat the racism drum, and they found it. The time lag between when this happened and when it became a cause celebre was the time it took for them to get the grievance machinery all revved up and ready to go.
Too bad for them that they never quite got around to shutting down the internet so no one could find out the truth. Too bad.
Edited on March 27, 2012 at 11:57pmNov '10
Re: Using Children as Props
Somebody, at least, has a classy take on the Trayvon Martin affair: http://dailycaller.com/2012/03/26/former-naacp-leader-accuses-sharpton-and-jackson-of-exploiting-trayvon-martin/
Feb '12
Re: Using Children as Props
My BS detector goes off every time a kid is featured in a commercial for some cause. The tell is that they read lines that they couldn't have written. Ten year olds never use phrases like "devastating effects."
About half of all PSA feature kids making the case for clean air, recycling and educational access. The tactic is all about "what kind of monster would argue with an engaged, aware child?" If your argument is cogent, it doesn't need props. And if it does, its more propaganda than substantive.