Exploit or Empower

Why are critiques of politics and society so prevalent in children’s media? I believe that one reason is that children are the only sincere and innocent people left in our post-modern world.  With a push for moral relativism, there is almost no ground to stand on. These critiques use children to find a place to stand. In Gene Deitch’s “Munro”, by putting a young innocent child into an army, many of its practices are portrayed as absurd and ridiculous.  This would be difficult to do without the child to do it with.  And this was just a cartoon, so it doesn’t hurt any children or put them in real danger.

But sadly some films do. The use of critique through children’s media is often very exploitive of children and diminishes any semblance of empowerment.  Children are used in political arguments a lot because they are very effective at emotional appeal. They are shown as helpless and in need of saving. Adults need to take action for these children. Children become the victims of ideology and society. The clip of “Harvest of Shame” is a perfect example of this. The rich white filmmakers impose themselves on the poor black family. The black family isn’t empowered, but the white guys are because they feel like they have really helped someone and made a difference. Even though they were being just as exploitative as the companies that hire the black migrant workers.

Children just need to be treated correctly because they can be the cause of great and important change.  Like we talked about in experimentation, children don’t have the stiff structure of mind and will that adults have. This means that they can truly think outside the box and imagine the most crazy, but often genius, solutions to different problems. Instead of exploiting them, they should be heard and given power, a voice.

In Princess Mononoke, I believe that the characters Ashitaka and San exemplify more child-like perspectives. San is a very alienated youth and fights against human society with every power she possesses.  Ashitaka is different; he is able to stay aloof and mingle with both the nature spirits and with Irontown.  He is the empowered one who is able to help enact change for the better.  He realizes that both nature and Irontown have a right to exist, and that they can co-exist if they are pressed to.  The character that is used and taken advantage of is Eboshi.  Jigo uses her to get the head of the Forest Spirit. Jigo is the kind of person that can become so focused on a task that no one else matters, and everything can be destroyed as long as his objective has been accomplished. This film critiques this kind of person because what would be the point in eternal life if the only thing you could do is watch the world burn. This film has a lot to say about nature and politics, and that it isn’t clean cut. One is not evil and the other good. They are just shades of gray.