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Now, as a TV critic, I know well that childhood obesity is a serious problem and that TV abets it. I don't forbid my sons TV--my 20-month-old's favorite verb is "Pick!," squealed delightfully when it's his turn to choose a video--but I limit viewing time and choices. There is probably no parent more annoyingly judgmental about TV than one who watches it for a living. (My 4-year-old, though, is unimpressed by my argument that The Doodlebops is a derivative pastiche of the Sid and Marty Krofft shows of the '70s.) We avoid commercials. We also read books, visit museums and go to the park. And I would no sooner put a TV in my child's bedroom than I would buy him a bong for Hanukkah.
But as a grownup, when I sit in front of the tube, I don't want it to improve me. I want it to spoil me. I want it to love me uncritically. I want that generous box, which showered me in my blissful childhood with brain-rotting, violent shows like Speed Racer and Spider-Man, to give and give and expect nothing in return. Let me have my little, guiltless moment of pleasure. I have the rest of my life to be virtuous, and the rest of eternity to be dead.
Honey We're Killing the Kids! is aware of that last fact--as its title confirms--and, to its credit, it wants to help kids live longer. I hope it does, although I have to wonder, as with a crash diet, whether its extreme regimen can stick. In the end, it's easier for me to defend Honey as entertainment, which is what it finally, absorbingly is. I could hardly move during the first episode, watching with rapt attention as Dr. Hark worked her diet-dominatrix magic, while I ate an overstuffed salami and mortadella sandwich with cheese. It was delicious.