Are there any other urban myths about children's TV?

Question

Here are two:-
1. Captain Pugwash. The crew did not actually have any rude names (http://www.redflag.co.uk/pugwash.htm).
2. Rainbow. This spoof recording did not actually get shown as part of children's television. (http://www.veryfunnydownloads.com/funnyvideos/RudeRainbow233.html)

Interesting.

Smurfs & the Seven Deadly Sins.
On this site (http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=736688) someone has argued the case strongly. However he has a vehement detractor. Also his character names don't completely agree with those listed on this BBC page (http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A3073619), though maybe Chef should be Baker and Sleepy should be Dreamy. With over 30 named good Smurfs, it was too likely that some of them could be compared with the deadly sins. I think this myth is busted.

Bert and Ernie on Sesame Street are considered gay.
It looks like the Children's Television Workshop have been denying this for decades (http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/gaymupp.htm). Lawyers acting for Sesame Street have intervened to prevent director Peter Spears releasing his short film, Ernest and Bertram, which depicts the show's puppet stars Bert and Ernie as gay lovers.
Spears' film takes the form of a mockumentary and ends with Ernie committing suicide. The Children's Television Workshop objected to Spears' portrait of their child-like, bickering muppets as angst-ridden homosexuals (http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Exclusive/0,4029,681812,00.html). Finally, the Children's Television Workshop have also denied rumors that Ernie and Bert will become gay, or that Ernie is, or will, become sick with a fatal disease (http://www.who2.com/bertandernie.html).

The Curse of Blue Peter.
The greatest detail that I could find was on this website (http://www.icons.org.uk/nom/nominations/blue-peter) - maybe it is too loved a TV programme for much webspace to be devoted to a morbid theme. According to the webpage, two Blue Peter ex-presenters: Michael Sundin and Caron Keating both died tragically early, while others have variously found themselves the subjects of scandalous exposés and allegations in the tabloids. Even the Blue Peter pets haven’t escaped the "curse": the original Petra, the show's first dog, died after just one appearance, and had to be replaced by a body double.
Hmmm, it makes interesting reading but I don't see that the theory has been proven.
Here are all the presenters over the years (http://tv.cream.org/lookin/bp/). Most have led an uneventful life - so another myth busted.

Spongebob Squarepants is being used by gays to indoctrinate children into their lifestyle.
This Christian website (http://www.jesus-is-savior.com/Evils%20in%20America/Sodomy/spongebob_and_homosexuality.htm) states the case to a sombre, sinister musical accompaniment - we're all doomed! It's so serious it's actually funny.

However in numerous episodes, Spongebob holds hands and skips and prances around the town square with his best friend and neighbour Patrick Star. As a result, novelty shops catering to gay clientele in New York and Atlanta regularly experience stockouts of SpongeBob memorabilia.(http://www.rotten.com/library/culture/spongebob/).

It looks like the Christian Right's fears were based on a real video. Broadcast in 2002 and revised for distribution to schools, it promotes tolerance of diversity, but contains no reference to sex, sexual lifestyle, or sexual identity (http://www.rotten.com/library/culture/spongebob/).

Gay icon or not, this myth is busted.

Steve Burns from Blue's Clues allegedly overdosed on Heroin.
Steve Burns, host of Blue's Clues, the popular television show for preschoolers broadcast on Nickelodeon, is exceedingly healthy and not the slightest bit dead. He's neither been run over by a car nor done himself in by a heroin overdose, the two most popular paths this particular rumor has taken. (Another version claims he was arrested for heroin possession. That too is false, as is the rumor about his being a porn star.) More elaborate versions of the tale claim that he's been replaced on the show by a look-alike (http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/bluesclues.asp).
Looks like a total non-starter

I couldn't find anything on the Barney and Pee Wee Herman

Answer 1

alot of people think that Bert and Ernie on Seasame Street are homosexual...

i just recently heard somewhere that some people think Spongebob is gay...weird

Answer 2

Unfortunately this is a reality in South Africa and has been for the last few years. In some of the rural and uneducated cultures in SA there is a strong belief that sexual intercourse with a virgin will cure them of HIV infection and that the younger the individual the more potent the cure. This is a sad state of affairs and has lead to countless rapings of children as young as 5 months old I read in one account. It is not a myth by any stretch of the imagination and I think there are too many cases to have been accurately documented. I will say that I dont think that these reasons are behind EVERY rape case because there are still poediphiles put there. I pray that there is something that can be done but education just doesnt seem to have the effect anticipated on such deep seeded and twisted beliefs.

Answer 3

There is the curse of Blue Peter on the presenters, Janet Ellis was sacked for being a single mum, Richard Bacon caught doing drugs, Anetha Turner and the "flakegate" thing that got her the sack, one of them died can't remember thei name and loads of ther stuff

Answer 4

Steve Burns from Blues Clues died of a drug overdose, just a myth.

Answer 5

I heard once that the main characters in the smurfs were based on the 7 deadly sins... gluttony, sloth, greed, pride, envy, wrath and lust (expressed in one female smurf for 99 male ones!).

Answer 6

In the early days of "Barney" I heard rumors that it was Pee-Wee Herman inside the costume, doubted then, as now that it was true.

Answer 7

Rainbow.