A rather pointless and petty rant…
I was laughing my ass off at Teletoon (Canadian animation station)'s adult block (Teletoon Unleashed)which features among other shows, The Oblongs. During the opening of said show (Which I adore.), I noticed a ‘based on’ thing, but couldn’t quite make it out.
So, I came online and looked it up on Google, and noticed a surprising number of hits like this one or this one claiming that The Oblongs is an attack on the disabled. (Note that the claim seems to come entirely from a single person, though others have taken up her baton. And, on the other hand there’s this petition to save The Oblongs because it’s a boon to the disabled community. A petition I can get behind, but, please, the premise is just as silly as the other.)
Now, this is nfbsk’d up, for so many reasons…
a) It’s a CARTOON people!
b) The only characters who’s ‘disabilities’ could really be argued to be such are Bob (No limbs), Milo (ADD), and Chip/Biff Oblong (Conjoined twins) (Well, Helge’s weight becomes a problem when she gets caught in the sewer but please)
c) Even those 4 are far from disabled - Chip and Biff are really no different than any other siblings. Bob’s surprisingly able dispite his complete lack of appendages (he can even hold a paper, and light his pipe!). Milo’s a touch manic (and has one weird set of thought processes - not too different than my own at times, though), but completely functional.
d) As much humour (or more) comes from the vapidity of the (non-deformed) Hill People, and their bigotry towards the Valley Folk as from the Valley Folk’s deformities.
e) I’m going to stop now…
Damn, this is stupid…
Go ahead and dislike the show because you don’t think it’s funny. Hells, go ahead and think it’s an attack on the disabled, despite how completely illogical it is…but…please…
(BTW, Teletoon Unleashed also includes John Callihan’s Quads, a Canada/Australia co-production based on Callihan’s cartoons, which, of course, has a bunch of disabled (REALLY disabled - the standard Callihan disabilities - a ‘Quad’, a blind man, one with no hands, one with no body at all) characters, and gets 90% of its humour out of these disabilities, and the other 10% from making fun of a) the Catholic church, b) rich people, or c) gays. Of course, since Callihan himself is a ‘Quad’, it’ll never get the kind of flack The Oblongs is.)
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