Big and Small

Those of you who are not living in the UK and who don't have small children will probably not have encountered Cbeebies. Cbeebies is a licence payer funded TV channel dedicated to providing programming for the under fives.

For the most part I think the programmes are good. I am very grateful to the people who created Tinga Tinga which has magical tear stopping properties in our household. For the most part the programmes are well thought out, educational and fun.

However I have become increasingly disturbed by a programme called 'Big and Small'. This is a puppet show in which the characters 'Big' a large puppet which vaguely resembles a bear, and 'Small' an orange rodent like creature go about their daily lives.

What bothers me about the programme is that the character Big seems to be portrayed as being wise, articulate and mature whereas small is stupid, uneducated and destructive.

In a recent episode Small was jealous because his friend Big had received a letter. The rest of the episode focused on Big educating Small about where letters come from and how to receive one. Small takes a long time to understand this process and sits by the letter box waiting for a letter as well as trying to flag down a plane which may be delivering airmail.

There is a similar theme in all the episodes I have watched and it bothered me because it appeared to be vaguely heightist. I couldn't understand why the characters had to have names that referenced their height in the first place or why small had to be the character with the negative characteristics.

Then I thought maybe I was being over sensitive and that this wasn't heightism at all and that maybe I was reading too much into It.

To learn more I went to the Cbeebies website. Below is the section which describes the characters.

"From a physical standpoint, Big and Small are so different in size that they literally see and act upon the world in very different ways. Big and Small also have distinct personalities. Even when placed in an identical situation, they act, react and feel differently from one another. Big is gentle, kind and a little dreamy, while Small is loud, exuberant and always in a hurry. He acts first and thinks later. Their differences lead to lots of funny confusion and misunderstandings that will make pre-schoolers hoot with laughter!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/grownups/programme/big-and-small

It is the first sentence that really bothers me. It is saying essentially that height is the major difference that makes these characters personalities different. Their physical height is what shapes their personalities.

To make things worse as Small is the one with the negative character traits it is essentially teaching that shorter=stupid whereas tall=wise.

This depresses me.