Children's characters on buildabearville.com watch a movie
about manmade climate change in which Santa Claus learns
that the North Pole will be gone in 48 hours. (buildabearville.com)
The debate about manmade climate change has taken new heights, or lows for some parents, when it was discovered that the toy company Build-A-Bear Workshop is resorting to scare tactics to frighten children about the purported dangers of manmade climate change and global warming. Children playing the online game that compliments the company’s toys are warned that "the North Pole will be gone by Christmas."
Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. is a global company founded in 1997 with more than 400 retail stores across the world. Their stores allow kids to build a teddy bear or any number of other animals to the child’s specifications right down to the clothes. They operate a similar web store and an online role playing game community for children at buildabearville.com.
It is on the website built specifically for children that the company has taken to what some are saying is “indoctrination” of children through the use of scare tactics. Children that play the game and take their character on a train to the North Pole to visit Santa’s workshop watch a movie that isn’t as much about science or discussing the issue but about frightening children.
A pengiun's computer determines that the North Pole will be
gone in 48 hours and Mrs. Claus reacts to learning about the
North Pole's fate. (buildabearville.com)
The videos portray a world that will be so ravaged by climate change that the “North Pole will be gone by Christmas.” This is a partial transcript of one segment:
Girl Elf: Santa, it’s gone!
Papa Elf: It’s gone, It’s gone!
Santa: What’s gone?
Girl Elf: Tell them, Dad!
Papa Elf: The North Peak.
Santa: A mountain? A mountain’s gone? How is that possible?
Ella the polar bear: Santa, sir, that’s why I’m here. That’s why we’re here. The ice is melting!
Santa: Yes, my dear, we know, the climate is changing. There’s bound to be a little melting.
Ella: It’s worse than that, Santa, a lot worse! At the rate it’s melting, the North Pole will be gone by Christmas!
Santa: My, my! All of this gone by next Christmas? I don’t think so.
Ella: No sir, not next Christmas, this Christmas! The day after tomorrow!
Two polar bears, a penguin and Mrs. Claus then seek to educate Santa about how a “few degrees can make a big difference” and how fossil fuels are the root of the evil of climate change. Seven videos in all tell the story and by the time the child is done watching them, they will have spent nearly 30 minutes learning about climate change according to Build-A-Bear.
The lesson is far from subtle and not what you would expect at an online game targeting kids of such a young age. Many parents are left wondering if it is necessary to lay the weight of the world’s worries – and debates – on the shoulders of four and five year olds, never mind the fact that the debate about manmade climate change is far from over.
Below are the first three segments of the video courtesy of The Libery Guardian. The segment with what is transcribed above is in the second of the three.
Segment 1
Segment 2
Segment 3
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Comments
Wow! That is just crazy. Amusing too I see that they actually are one of the advertisers on this page!
What a bunch of idiots. Don't they realize they are alienating a significant portion of their repeat customers?
This is what happens when someone takes it upon themselves to "teach" our kids and impose their beliefs. At the age that their products are targeting, kids shouldn't be hit with this kind of thing and parents shouldn't feel like they can't trust the company.
So what? Toy teeth are used to frighten kids into brushing. Conservatives aren't against teaching children about consequences taught by the scientific mainstream, only those consequences at odds with big rightwing financial interests ... or will the next article be a horror story about scary toys against tooth decay?
So what? Toy teeth are used to frighten kids into brushing. Conservatives aren't against teaching children about consequences taught by the scientific mainstream, only those consequences at odds with big rightwing financial interests ... or will the next article be a horror story about scary toys against tooth decay?
Who said anything about politics, Terry? It is about a toymaker using their ability to have a captive audience of children to push their point of view which is wrong no matter what the issue is.
This must be a typical Hollywood "Dream Sequence", but it is missing occasional flashes of the Sun fading (really happened last few years), and the part where they wake up to find the world is freezing despite all the hot air. The colder climate of last year, this year, and the next few years will be very obvious contradictions to the theory that greenhouse gasses are warming the earth. The sun warms the earth, and when it calms down, it gets cool here regardless of the "Greenhouse gasses". Thousands of years of date show that the greenhouse gasses are CAUSED BY global warming, not the other way around. The delay in this cause-and-effect can be hundreds of years! The order of events is very clear. How can anyone who sees the real data agree with the original theory?
Above, Terry H made the point that we use toy teeth to frighten kids into brushing their teeth. Maybe so, but in doing this, we don't blatantly lie to them; we don't tell kids that their teeth will be rotten tomorrow. But the film is telling kids that the North Pole will melt in 48 hours. Absurd. A blatant lie.
Wow, you people are so blind that you believe you don't have control over what your child watches. If you don't like it, don't let them watch. It's simple. By pushing your views, you are doing the same thing you are accusing BAB of doing. What a bunch of idiots you must be to have to let a computer story guide your children instead of teaching them yourselves. I watch and teach but don't feel obligated to have everything that goes against my view deleted. I would rather have things presented so that a discussion can take place.
Build-a-Bear – and everyone is welcome to use my rewritten parable of “The Boy Who Denied Wolf” at theboywhodeniedwolf (dot)com/
Appropriate for children of all ages… the message is that denial is very dangerous and can get us into real trouble.
“Sometimes when we deny, but eventually realize the truth, we learn it too late to say. We will deny once, deny twice — but then perish when we deny our own plight.”
As parents, we trust certain brands to have appropriate content for children that does not have to be policed.
John May...guess you don't realize that advertisement showed up as a result of Google tracking key words. LOL. Not a paid advertiser. Unless you click on it. Go on, you know you wanna.
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