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Indianapolis Star
01-08-2025
- Politics
- Indianapolis Star
I'm a PBS Kid at heart. Trump's cuts threaten what made me who I am today.
PBS has had a lasting impression on my life. Growing up, PBS Kids was a consistent part of my childhood. My earliest memory is watching 'Curious George' in the morning as I ate breakfast and waited for the school bus to arrive. I was 7 years old — and I considered myself a little too old for monkey George's antics at the time — but I couldn't deny that it was whimsical and fascinating to see a monkey navigating city life. But now, PBS is at risk because of recent funding cuts by the Trump administration and Indiana state government. Public broadcasting and media have lost $1.1 billion, with Indiana stations and sources losing $13 million. In Indiana, many stations get about 30% of their funding federally. PBS is different from your typical commercial network. These stations are dependent on a few different sources of funding, which include federal grants, state money, donations from viewers and corporate support. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting distributes federal funds to local stations. Jacob Stewart: Defunding public media supports innovation in news When government funding disappears, stations are forced to choose between reducing programming, increasing fundraising appeals to viewers or going dark. Federal funding is especially important for rural communities and smaller markets. Here, government funds are sometimes the difference between staying on air or shutting down. Federal and state funding cuts in Indiana will likely lead to a decrease in public television and radio programming. It's sad to see that the stations that made my childhood fun and exciting have been jeopardized. Ask my parents, aunts or uncles and they'll tell you about the toddler who would always babble about wanting to visit the PBS Kids website. It might sound dramatic, but I don't think I'd be the adult I am today without all the PBS cartoons that were so central to my childhood. The shows were a key part of my routine, and I can't think of a day when I came home from elementary school and didn't watch some combination of 'Cyberchase,' 'Martha Speaks,' or 'Arthur.' Sure, these shows were entertaining for any kid, but they also helped reinforce the information I was already learning in school by illustrating why subjects actually mattered in real life. 'Cyberchase' helped me understand that math went beyond worksheets and was a way to make useful calculations and estimates. 'Martha Speaks' expanded my vocabulary. Opinion: Public media has earned our trust — and government funding 'Arthur' is one cartoon that really stuck with me. In one episode, Arthur corresponds with a pen pal in Turkey. His pen pal is Muslim, and it was one of the first times I saw someone, albeit a cartoon bear, who practiced the same religion as me on television. It was a tiny representation victory. These shows were made possible through public broadcasting, and I hate to think about how all of that is now being threatened. PBS gave children access to television that resonated and taught us how to handle life. It helped generations of kids navigate friendships and school. It's been quite some time since I've had a PBS Kids cartoon marathon, but every now and then a cartoon reference will make its way into a conversation I'm having with my brothers or friends. These cartoons shaped us. I'm a PBS Kid at heart, even as an adult.
Washington Post
12-07-2025
- General
- Washington Post
Book bans don't work. As a kid, I proved it.
When I was 6 years old, my father took me to a small branch library in my hometown of Lorain, Ohio. I'd never been to any library before, nor, I think, had my father been in one since he dropped out of school at age 16. He was distinctly ill at ease and throughout our visit stood in a corner looking idly at the pictures in an illustrated edition of what I later learned was 'Moby-Dick.' Meanwhile, clutching my newly issued children's library card, I had picked out several titles that intrigued my young self when the elderly overseer of this bookish kingdom noticed my selections. 'Oh, no, young man,' she said, or something close to that. 'These books are much too difficult for you.' She wouldn't let me check them out, and I was instead forced to take home, as more age appropriate, two or three titles about the mischievous monkey Curious George. While these were amusing enough, they weren't what I'd wanted. Two weeks later I returned the picture books and never entered that branch library again. So began my lifelong antipathy to book banning and every sort of literary censorship. A second pivotal moment, with a happier outcome, occurred in the sixth grade when I was eager to read Agatha Christie mysteries — and couldn't. To check her books out from the library, you needed an adult borrower's card, which you would be issued only at the start of the seventh grade. My mother possessed such a card, never used but duly assigned to 'Mrs. Michael Dirda.' This designation would prove essential since my scheme to circumvent the system turned on the fact that my father and I shared the same first name. On a beautiful Saturday afternoon I peddled my red Roadmaster bike to the city's newly built main library, selected three whodunits featuring Hercule Poirot and at the check-out desk flashed my mother's card with my thumb firmly covering the telltale word 'Mrs.' The librarian glanced at the Christies, paused over the typed signature my thumb was partly concealing, took a long look at me, then smiled and stamped the three mysteries. After that, I was done with children's books. These ancient memories spring to mind because I've been reading Ira Wells's cogent and incisive 'On Book Banning.' A critic and associate professor at the University of Toronto's Victoria College, Wells sees the recent highly politicized attempts to control libraries, especially school libraries, as assaults on knowledge and freedom of expression. To underscore the seriousness of this issue, he reports on the outrageous excesses of both the right and the left, each claiming to protect children and young people from 'harm.' In his opening chapter, Wells writes that in 2022 a librarian at the elementary school his children attend told a group of parents of her wish to throw out all the 'old' books — and by 'old' she meant published before 2008. She contended that they promulgated objectionable stereotypes, reinforced multiple prejudices, and failed to include racially and ethnically diverse characters or to address pressing contemporary issues about sexual identity. Some Canadian libraries actually did strip their shelves of these 'old' books, one of them consigning half its entire holdings to landfill. In direct contrast, continues Wells, conservative activists in Florida (and elsewhere, too) regularly challenge any book that promotes diversity, equity and sexual inclusiveness. Such works are accused of instilling white guilt or grooming children to accept and even adopt LBGTQ+ identities. Note that the targeted titles are associated with the most insulted and injured people in our society. Is it happenstance, writes Wells of earlier attempts at book banning, that in 1930s America, '90 percent of those charged with obscenity were Jewish?' Whether ultra progressive or ultra conservative, these opposing camps both want to cleanse our libraries of books they don't approve of. Yet along with being shrilly ideological, utterly wrongheaded and heartlessly cruel, they are behind the times. Today's young people hardly read any books at all other than those required by their school classes. Instead they spend on average four hours a day interacting with their smartphones. If community activists were truly concerned about children's welfare, says Wells, they'd be focusing their zeal on curbing cellphone use and access to social media. What's more, neither the extreme left nor the extreme right appreciates reading as an aesthetic experience or as a way of growing intellectually. For both, books are merely a form of propaganda and indoctrination. Real reading doesn't work this way. 'Where literature opens conversations,' writes Wells, 'censorship closes them. Where literature provokes questions, censorship insists upon answers. Where literature unsettles us with ambiguity, the realization that the 'meaning' of a text is never final, censorship seeks to comfort us with moral absolutes.' While some books do provide mirrors in which we can see ourselves, most function as portals, entryways to new knowledge and new experiences; others provide welcome escapes from the life around us. When I turned to books as a child and an adolescent, I didn't want my identity affirmed; I wanted to transcend it. In general, it strikes me as misguided that school curriculums now focus so resolutely on works by living authors. This is done in the name of relevance, but aren't contemporary writers and books the ones that young people will investigate on their own, given a well-stocked and well-funded school library? Classrooms could then focus on the time-tested works that energize our creative imaginations. For instance, elementary school reading might emphasize the world's folktales, fairy tales and mythologies, those foundation stones of so much of our literature, art and music. The school library would then provide present-day works of more immediate interest and concern to the students, thus bolstering 'the reading habit.' There should be biographies of sports heroes, Stephen King bestsellers, graphic novels and manga, histories of hip-hop — and books addressing teen angst and sexual confusion. These last must be available for any kid who needs them or simply wants to learn what all the fuss is about. After all, the key societal benefit of wide reading is the development of empathy for others. In the end, banning books never works for long. Censorship crusades are always reprehensible and hurtful from the get-go, but wait a generation and they come to seem either squalid or quaint. The New York Society for the Suppression of Vice was founded in 1873 by Anthony Comstock, author of 'Morals, Not Art or Literature,' a title that says it all. In 1920, this organization took the writer James Branch Cabell to court over his 1919 novel 'Jurgen.' To understand why the book — now a minor classic — was prosecuted as 'obscene, lewd, lascivious and indecent,' I found a copy and read it. Set in the medieval realm of Poictesme, 'Jurgen' is a philosophical fantasy in which its middle-aged pawnbroker hero travels into the past, regains his youth in 'the garden between dawn and sunrise,' enjoys multiple amorous adventures (with, among others, Guinevere before she marries King Arthur), is sent to hell then to heaven, and ultimately returns a wiser man to his loving but shrewish wife. Cabell himself was then entering his 40s, with a string of admired and little-read novels behind him, but the media spotlight resulting from the intended suppression of 'Jurgen' — successfully defended by John Quinn, the celebrated collector of James Joyce and other modernists — quickly made him world-famous. Scott Fitzgerald, no less, would beg Cabell to contribute a blurb to 'The Beautiful and Damned.' To my delight, 'Jurgen' surprised me with the beauty of its fastidious and subtly ironic style, even as I was mildly put off by the plethora of sexual double-entendres (lances, clefts) and moved by its pervasive wistfulness about first love and paths not taken. In many ways, it is a great novel of midlife crisis, while also being very funny. The fearsome troll-king Thragnar, who kidnaps Guinevere, leaves a note near his throne that reads: 'Absent upon important affairs. Will be back in an hour.' The Devil confesses that his wife simply doesn't understand him. The stressed-out Creator of the universe, who is Black, works behind a door labeled 'Office of the Manager — Keep Out.' There's even a tour de force sentence consisting of multiple mixed metaphors: 'Indeed, it is a sad thing, Sylvia, to be murdered by the hand which, so to speak, is sworn to keep an eye on your welfare, and which rightfully should serve you on its knees.' Alas, by the late 1930s, Cabell's star began to fade, though 'Jurgen' continues to be admired to this day; in 1976, there was even a lavish Limited Editions Club edition. If you've read Robert A. Heinlein's novel 'Stranger in a Strange Land,' you have, probably unknowingly, experienced a strongly Cabellian blend of fantasy, irony, sex and philosophical inquiry. Overall, as Edward de Grazia made clear in his 1992 study, 'Girls Lean Back Everywhere: The Law of Obscenity and the Assault on Genius,' the books attacked by one generation frequently emerge as classics in the next. (De Grazia's striking title, by the way, derives from a remark by Jane Heap — co-editor of the Little Review — in her defense of the 'Nausicaa' chapter of Joyce's 'Ulysses' against charges of obscenity.) Besides 'Jurgen' and 'Ulysses,' one can point to D.H. Lawrence's 'Lady Chatterley's Lover,' Henry Miller's 'Tropic of Cancer,' Allen Ginsberg's 'Howl,' Vladimir Nabokov's 'Lolita' and many other once-verboten titles now part of the literary canon. Today, John Cleland's 'Fanny Hill' is a Penguin Classic. When, at age 16, I nervously bought the novel at Rusine's Cigar Store, it came from behind the counter, sealed in cellophane. At heart, book censorship, like Comstockery and Prohibition, ultimately aims to make human beings into little saints. Ain't never gonna happen. As H.L. Mencken wrote long ago, 'What ails American literature, fundamentally, is what ails the whole of American culture, politely so called: a delusion of moral duty.' Among the best responses to such Puritan zealotry is to be utterly, shamelessly promiscuous: Read whatever catches your fancy. Michael Dirda is a Pulitzer Prize-winning book critic and a regular contributor to Book World.
Yahoo
10-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
7 Ways To Stay Close With Adult Children Without Being Overbearing
7 Ways To Stay Close With Adult Children Without Being Overbearing originally appeared on Parade. Your child seemingly went from crying over their first birthday smash cake to blowing out 18 candles, flying the coup and perhaps starting a family of their own in the blink of an eye. While it can feel like just yesterday that you were holding their cute, tiny hands as they crossed the street, one mental health expert stresses it's crucial to understand how to navigate a relationship with an adult child without being overbearing. "Understanding how relationships change as your child becomes an adult is key to maintaining a healthy, supportive connection," says Joseph Kivett, a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner with Mindpath Health. "Accepting the natural shift that occurs when your child inevitably becomes an adult helps to prevent conflict, resentment and over-dependence while encouraging your child's growth and autonomy."In that sense, your job as a parent isn't "over," but it has changed. Kivett shares seven ways to maintain your close connection with an adult child—and even improve it—without being "too much."Related: Curiosity isn't just for the titular character in Curious George books you and your adult child once tore through at bedtime."Curiosity shows respect and interest without control, fostering openness in the relationship," Kivett suggests asking questions to understand—but not direct—an adult child's experience."Their world is different from the one you grew up in, and they are navigating it as a separate person with their own values, goals and challenges," he It was hard to watch your toddler walk into a wall, and it can be even more challenging to see an adult child make a choice you think will come back to haunt them, like getting engaged to the "wrong" person or choosing a job you feel is a "dead-end." Kivett suggests zipping your lips."Resist the urge to fix or criticize," he advises. "Allowing your child the space to learn through trial and error supports identity development and resilience. Your acceptance helps them feel safe coming to you, even when things go wrong." Your child has evolved, and it's important to be open to learning new things about them."Holding onto outdated views of who they 'used to be' can feel invalidating," Kivett explains. "Embrace who they are becoming instead of defining them by the past. This allows them to feel seen and respected for their evolving self." Experts, such as pediatricians, often recommend consistency in things like bedtime routines and boundaries. However, the need for consistency doesn't go away when a child becomes an adult."Avoid swinging between over-involvement and absence," Kivett says. "Inconsistency can breed confusion or resentment. Instead, be clear and reliable in the type and amount of support you're comfortable offering. This builds trust and prevents enabling or creating unrealistic expectations."Related: Believe it or not, doing your own thing apart from your role as a parent can bring you closer to an adult child."Now is the time to invest in your own growth—explore hobbies, deepen friendships, nurture your relationship or pursue career goals," Kivett emphasizes. "Not only is this fulfilling for you, but it also models for your child that life is rich and meaningful beyond the parenting role."Related: You don't always have to "zip it." There's a time and a place for speaking up—and a best practice."If you're worried, speak up honestly and respectfully," Kivett says. "Share your concerns without assuming authority or entitlement. This helps you stay connected without crossing boundaries, showing that you trust their ability to make decisions while still being available for support." Kivett shares that adult children need more than sage advice."Your child needs to feel understood first," he says. "Listening deeply builds trust and reduces resistance to input. Advice is more likely to be received if it comes from someone who has made the effort to understand their perspective and validate their feelings."Related: It can be challenging to adjust to your new role as a parent of an adult child. It's essential to recognize the signs that you're being overbearing with your adult children, not to shame yourself, but so you can step back and maintain a close relationship with your family. Kivett reports that common signs parents are being too overbearing with adult children include: Micromanaging decisions Giving unsolicited advice Demanding constant contact "These types of overbearing behaviors can undermine their development," he explains. "True confidence is built when young adults face challenges with support, but not excessive intervention."Instead, he suggests striving to use the tips he provided above, including clear communication, curiosity, openness and developing your life outside of parenthood."This balanced approach nurtures independence and keeps the relationship strong," he adds. Up Next:Joseph Kivett, a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner with Mindpath Health 7 Ways To Stay Close With Adult Children Without Being Overbearing first appeared on Parade on Jun 9, 2025 This story was originally reported by Parade on Jun 9, 2025, where it first appeared.
Buzz Feed
01-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Buzz Feed
36 Childhood Books That Every 2000s Kid Grew Up Reading
There was nothing like the comfort a book could give you as a child, whether it came from the words or the pictures. So here, for your nostalgic pleasure, are some of your childhood favorites. Eloise by Kay Thompson Eloise's adventures at the Plaza Hotel made me dream of visiting New York City as a little girl. The movies starring Sofia Vassilieva are just as cute! Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak Maurice Sendak's imagination knows no bounds. The "wild things" he dreamed up sure look strange, but they come across as friendly rather than fearsome. Curious George by Margaret Rey and H.A. Rey Everyone loves a mischievous little monkey. Looking back, the Man in the Yellow Hat was just as precious. Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed by Eileen Christelow What's better than a mischievous little monkey? Five of them. Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! by Mo Willems Seriously, don't let him! This book had me cracking up at the library. The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister The Rainbow Fish books had the most gorgeous illustrations. Just look at those beautiful blues, greens, and purples. The Arthur Books by Marc Brown It's safe to say that Arthur is everyone's favorite anthropomorphic aardvark. Life wasn't always easy for this bespectacled creature, but with friends like Buster and Francine by his side, he could find his way out of any dilemma. A Bad Case of Stripes by David Shannon Whether or not you loved lima beans like Camilla as a child, this book's message of self-acceptance hit hard. It's no wonder that teachers often use it to teach kids about the importance of staying true to themselves. Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst Even on a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, this book is sure to bring a smile to any reader's face. There's a little bit of Alexander in all of us. Love You Forever by Robert Munsch It's rare to see a children's book that spans several decades — but Love You Forever has a broad scope, showing how a mother's love for her son endures as time passes. The final twist just might make you tear up. The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Eric Carle and Bill Martin Jr No, David! by David Shannon The Mitten by Jan Brett The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn The Berenstain Bears' Books by Stan & Jan Berenstain Stellaluna by Janell Cannon Miss Nelson is Missing! by Harry Allard Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson Corduroy by Don Freeman Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin Jr The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type by Doreen Cronin Llama Llama Red Pajama by Anna Dewdney Skippyjon Jones by Judy Schachner The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss Any book by Robert Munsch There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly by Simms Taback Are You My Mother? by P. D. Eastman The Snowman by Raymond Briggs Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs by Judi Barrett If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Joffe Numeroff And lastly, Biscuit by Alyssa Satin Capucilli
Yahoo
29-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Parents Are Sharing the Most ‘Unhinged' White Lies They've Told Their Toddlers
Who hasn't told their toddler a white lie or two, to cease a tantrum? 'My daughter doesn't like to eat meat, so I tell her that if she takes a bite of her meat, I'll give her a point toward Disney World,' Molly Brandt, the mother of a toddler, tells Brandt, who is taking her daughter to the theme park for her third birthday, adds that 'points' will be used to purchase souvenirs at the theme park. 'She's obsessed with princesses, so I said she could buy a Rapunzel dress,' says Brandt. In a TikTok video, Brandt called for the 'most unhinged white lie you've told your 2-and-a-half year-old toddler because I'm running out of ideas.' Parents dropped the white lies they've told their own children into the comments section: 'Elmo is napping, the park is napping, the pool is napping, everybody is napping. It works for now.' 'I use Google Translate, English to English, and type something like, 'The park is closed today, due to a fire' and then play the little microphone, so Siri says it out loud when I tell my daughter I'm calling the park to see if it's open.' 'You can only watch cartoons in cars. That's why they're called CAR-toons.' 'I let my daughter try black coffee and of course, she hated it. Now, if I don't want to share my food, I tell her it's coffee-flavored.' ''Blippi and Bluey are sleeping and only Curious George and Daniel Tiger are up. Do you want to watch them?' Less stimulating shows.' ''Every person has their own swear word. So, if you hear a grownup say one, it's theirs and you can't use it. You have to make up your own words' (Makes a nonsense word).' 'We can't watch 'Baby Shark' at bedtime/night because of child labor laws.' 'I told my daughter that spinach tortellini was green cheese and she loves it.' 'I told my daughter our family dog went on vacation to the beach and sent back sand as a gift. He actually died and those are his ashes.' 'When the ice cream truck plays music, it means they're out of ice cream.' 'If she sleeps in my room or I sleep in her room, we will both get smaller. We both want to get big and strong, so we have to sleep in our own beds.' 'Taylor Swift is her grandma. It's easier than explaining who her grandma actually is and it's low-key comical.' 'Sometimes, I explain the truth in so much detail, he just gets confused and forgets what's going on.' Brandt tells the points system tames her daughter's picky eating habits. It's also good enough for Brandt, who admits that lying made her uncomfortable in the beginning. She has since justified the light-hearted fib for a greater good. Telling children white lies is generally innocuous until age 3, Dr. Deborah Gilboa, family doctor and resilience expert, tells 'Very few people have really solid memories before age 3 or 4, excluding severe traumatic events,' says Gilboa, adding that in between the ages of 4 and 6, children start to apply reasoning to their lives. Gilboa says white lies can undermine trust between family members and pave rationalization for kids to lie to their parents. 'We don't want kids to ever wonder whether their parents are telling the truth,' says Gilboa. Instead of telling a white lie, Gilboa recommends these responses when kids ask questions that adults don't want to answer directly: 'I am not going to tell you that.' 'It's not yet a perfect time to talk about this.' 'It's none of your business.' 'The other problem with white lies is, they really only work with first children,' says Gilboa, adding that older kids may tell their little siblings, 'Mom and dad lied to you.' According to Gilboa, there are two times when parents shouldn't tell white lies, even when kids are very young. First: The death of a pet, which is traumatic. 'We want kids to count on their parents to talk about hard things,' says Gilboa. 'The more important the issue, the less valuable it is to use a white lie.' Second: Threatening to leave a child in public, for example, when parents say, 'If you don't get in the car, I'm going to leave you at the park.' The outcome of the threat is always negative: parents likely wouldn't leave — and their kids know it — or, kids might believe their parents will abandon them, says Gilboa, adding, 'Neither is OK.' This article was originally published on
