SpongeBob was only the beginning

News flash: PBS has decided to pull an episode of the animation-and-live-action series Postcards from Buster after U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings objected to the episode's featuring lesbian characters.

An AP story in the Houston Chronicle reports that [t]he not-yet-aired episode . . . shows the title character, an animated bunny named Buster, on a trip to Vermont — a state known for recognizing same-sex civil unions. The episode features two lesbian couples, although the focus is on farm life and maple sugaring.

Now, we're not talking about a fictional story in which the writers just up and decided to include a lesbian plotline. Nope, Postcards from Buster shows the "animated bunny" visiting filmed real-life locations, and interacting with real-life, three-dimensional humans. And that's where the show ran into trouble: by acknowledging that real-life, three-dimensional lesbians actually exist.

According to the show's website, the allegedly-offensive episode, titled "Sugartime," shows Buster searching for the perfect Mother's Day gift for his mom. Buster gets help from new friends Emma and Lily, the site explains, and finds the perfect Vermont gifts: cheese from a dairy and maple candy from a sugar shack. Before leaving town, Buster says goodbye to winter and hello to spring with the girls' families at their annual Christmas tree bonfire.

Each episode of the series shows Buster visiting kids in different parts of North America and learning about their homes and their lives. So I'm making a reasonably-educated guess that "Emma and Lily" aren't a lesbian couple; they're kids whom Buster visits, and who happen to each have two mommies. (gasp) That means that the "annual Christmas tree bonfire" the girls have with their families is probably some kind of godless homosexual Satanic witchcraft ritual!

Or not.

Anyway, it happens that the series is funded in part "by a Ready-To-Learn Television Cooperative Agreement from the U.S. Department of Education through the Public Broadcasting Service." Which is apparently why Education Secretary Spellings got involved.

Gay.com reports that in a letter to PBS president/chief executive Pat Mitchell, Spellings demanded that PBS return the government money. Congress' and the [Education] Department's purpose in funding this programming certainly was not to introduce this kind of subject matter to children, particularly through the powerful and intimate medium of television, Spellings wrote.

Spellings said the episode does not fulfill the intent Congress had in mind for programming. By law, she said, any funded shows must give top attention to "research-based educational objectives, content and materials."

But Postcards from Buster does have educational objectives: its website explains that one of its key goals is "to build awareness and appreciation of the many cultures of North America."

In today's world, it is important to learn both about people like ourselves and people different from ourselves. In each episode of "Postcards from Buster," Buster meets kids from all walks of life: kids from different regions, different religions, different backgrounds....

Looks like Spellings wants to add an asterisk that says "Kids with gay or lesbian parents not included."

Wonder how Madam Secretary would have reacted if she'd known that Buster had already visited . . .
. . . that Sodom-by-the-Sea, San Francisco?