A mother can tell. I can diagnose an ear infection just on behavior.
So when my four-year-old daughter turned into a grouchy, demanding, whiny little brat this week, my “mommy-sense” started sending up alarms. A further investigation and the whole sordid truth came out.
My baby girl tested positive for Caillou.
I was hoping it was something easy to treat. Like head lice or MRSA. But no such luck.
At one time or another, both my boys had a virulent case of Caillou. It took weeks to purge our household of that infection. Weeks of agony.
For those nursing the bliss of ignorance in this matter, Caillou is a French-Canadian animated TV series. The titular character is a four-year-old boy whose “adventures” are so mindlessly banal the producers elected to compensate by giving Caillou the personality of Joseph Stalin. He’s rude, obnoxious, disobedient and belligerent. And that’s when he isn’t whining.
Dear God, the WHINING.
Perhaps all this would be fine if the producers of Caillou hadn’t also imbued the show with a preternatural ability to control the behavior of its young viewers.
Whatever Caillou says, my kids say. Whatever Caillou does, my kids do.
Caillou is the Svengali of brattiness.
I fully expect, at some future date, the latest declassified documents from the CIA will reveal Caillou to be a junior offshoot of the MKUltra program. There is no other plausible explanation for the power this bald brat has over my children.
Unless Caillou is an actual manifestation of the Devil. Which I cannot disprove.
Much to my horror, I discovered there are actual scientists trying to justify this wretched show. According to the study, watching Sponge Bob Squarepants is bad for children’s brains but watching Caillou is not. It’s worth noting that these so-called “scientists” failed to research possible links between Caillou and parents with self-inflicted head injuries, which means the entire premise of their study is hopelessly flawed.
—
Misery loves company. And it’s comforting to know I’m not the only parent to hate on this hairless homunculus. (My anti-Caillou diatribe isn’t even the best — partly because I’m trying not to swear.)
But exuberant Calliou-bashing can only entertain for so long. I don’t want to make fun of Caillou, I want him to disappear into a deep dark memory hole, never to return.
And Mama don’t play. So I went straight to Jesus.
To be completely truthful, I went straight to Netflix and Netflix connected me with Jesus.
(They seem to have a direct line — which is pretty reasonable for $8 per month.)
So Jesus and I had ourselves a good little chat.
[fountain]NETFLIX JESUS
Thanks for contacting Netflix my name is Jesus how may I help you today?
YOU
I want to block Caillou from my account. Can you help?
NETFLIX JESUS
Hi there and i will make sure to get the right steps on getting Caillou blocked from your account for sure
YOU
Thank you.
NETFLIX JESUS
Lets start with what is Caillou? i have never seen it
YOU
Caillou is a terrible kid’s cartoon. Count yourself fortunate to have never seen it. And if you have kids, keep them far away.
NETFLIX JESUS
That bad eh? Well enough said then with those kinds of cartoons. We dont have a direct way to erase a sertain show from our library, but with you chatting in is a great way to get started on getting Caillou off our library. I will send a letter to my content department and get them working on getting it removed ASAP In the mean time, if you give Caillou a 1 star rating, our system will know that you do not like the show and will not recommend it again
YOU
However I can manage it. Thanks, I will rate it 1-star.
NETFLIX JESUS
Yes and thank you for chatting in, this is the best kind of feedback that we need to make sure that we work on making Netflix a great streaming service and get rid of unwanted shows
YOU
1-star, done. Anything else I need to do?
NETFLIX JESUS
Just from now on not even touch the show at all, our system will automatically make sure that it will not come up again as a recommendation.
YOU
I won’t touch the show. But can I block it from my kids’ profiles at all?
NETFLIX JESUS
From the kids profiles yes, you would need to change the kids to a adult profile and give it a 1 star as well and then go and change the profile back to kids and that will stay saved as a 1 star show
YOU
Okay, I will do that. Thanks!
NETFLIX JESUS
You are very welcome and thank you once again for chatting in with me, Have a wonderful rest of your day, And one more thing, if you wouldn’t mind, please stay online for a one question survey.[/fountain]
The fact that even Netflix Jesus can’t completely jettison this show from my account supports the earlier theory that Caillou is a high-ranking member of Satan’s entourage. I should dig deeper, but my priority right now is a rigorous Caillou detoxification program for my daughter. Exposing Satan’s minions currently moonlighting in Canadian television will have to wait.
And Jesus was nice. Not a great speller, but nice.
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