Babysitters

     This is copied from my other blog, Between You and Me.  To be honest, I don't write in that one as much.  It's a commentary on pop-culture, usually funny, but sometimes more in-depth.  If you're interested in looking at that one, it's between-you-and-me-wink.blogspot.com.  This particular post seemed to also fit here, so I copied it.  Without further ado...

     I recently spotted a used book being sold for a few cents, so I snatched it up.  It was actually a boxed set of books 1-4 of the Babysitter's Club series, which were very popular when I was growing up.  I believe that there were 131 books in the Babysitter's Club series, written from 1986-1999 (plus some other interrelated series about the characters).  I lost count of them long before the series concluded (I grew older than the intended audience, although the characters were frozen as 13-year-olds for a long time).  My sister, friends and I read these books.  They were everywhere.  This very popular series is very nostalgic to my generation of young girls.  Back in 1990, there was a television show based on the books, and it was actually very cute.  In 1995 (just as I was growing beyond it and losing interest), a movie came out in theaters, which was fun.  Some of my friends tried to start their own Babysitters Club, but it didn't really get off the ground.  I didn't join, because we all knew different families who preferred particular babysitters, and wanted to arrange the job when they needed to, not wait for a certain meeting time.  Real life doesn't flow as seamlessly as in the book!  

1986 edition of book 1

1990 HBO Television series

1995 movie

     In 2009, the books (which by then, were out of print) were modernized as graphic novels, and more recently, Netflix has launched a Babysitters Club series, set in current times.  Researching all of this, I see more and more how this series is a product of its time, and didn't really age well.  

      Seeing these original books in the store stirred something in me.  And yet upon re-reading them, I was reminded of why this creative, promising series fell short for me, and still does.  I am writing as someone who read several of the books growing up (and re-read a few recently), as well as watched the 1990 TV show and 1995 movie.  I have not read the graphic novels, nor watched the Netflix series (though I have researched both).  

     The premise of the series (set in a small Connecticut town) is that bright, ambitious Kristy launches a babysitter's club with three of her friends (Mary Ann, Claudia and Stacey).  Over the course of the series, more members are added.  What a fun idea!  Kids like the thought of having a club with their friends.  I can see why this was appealing to girls (myself included!).  Kids start clubs all the time, but seldom do they have the organization or the longevity that the Babysitters Club has (which is unrealistic, but forgivable!).  Each member has her own backstory.  They are all very different, and the reader gets to know their personalities and secrets.  

     Kristy Thomas is a leader personality, the one with the big ideas.  She can be a trifle bossy, which alienates others, but if it weren't for her, the club would never have started, much less continued.  Kristy is from a broken home, and has struggled with the effects of divorce, and then her mother's remarriage.  I think Kristy is realistically portrayed as struggling with these things, and in her storyline, the confusion of dealing with that is shown as real-to-life.  Sometimes, children have these kinds of difficulties in their families, and watching Kristy struggle through those things can be validating.  In her case, the focus is on Kristy and her feelings, not on her parents situation.  

     Mary Anne Spier, Kristy's best friend, is also from a single-parent home (initially), but in her case, her father is a widower. Mary Anne's mother died when she was very young.  She is initially very shy, but finds her way.  Her father eventually remarries the mother of another club member, Dawn (Dawn is another member from a divorced home).  Mary Anne has a love for sophisticated things and places, but must keep that hidden from her overprotective father for a while.  

     Claudia Kishi is a Japanese-American girl.  She is from an in-tact family, and is especially close with her grandmother, who lives with them.  Claudia is bright, but not particularly academic, much to the chagrin of her parents and genius older sister.  Claudia's brilliance is more of a creative type, and she is very artistic.  She had been friends with Kristy and Mary Ann when they were all younger, but shortly before the formation of the Babysitters Club, she had felt that she outgrew them, and saw them as babies.  She has more sophisticated tastes, and started liking boys and fashionable clothing before they did.  She has her own phone line in her room, and this number is used for Babysitters Club meetings.  

     Stacey McGill is a transplant from New York City.  She is an only child, and her family moved to Connecticut when her father's job transferred him.  She is especially close with Claudia.  Stacey found out she is diabetic shortly before the start of the series, and she initially hides her ailment from others (it caused her a lot of embarrassment back in New York).  Stacey is the most boy-crazy and least innocent of the group.  It is implied her parents had money, as they could afford to live in a very nice apartment in New York City (I believe Manhattan), send her to a nice private school, shop at high-end stores, and eat at sophisticated restaurants.  Her parents had pretty much let her do whatever she wanted prior to the diabetes diagnosis.  Afterwards, though, they had become overprotective (also, they had been trying for years to have another child, and had been unable, which added to their complicated relationship with Stacey).  

     These are the initial four members.  As I said, more join later on over the course of the series.  I'm not going to jump into them, though, because I'm going to analyze the series itself more than the characters.

     Through this series, the girls deal with normal growing-up things, such as having a crush, getting in fights with friends, and of course, babysitting.  From the books I've read (and, as I said, I didn't read them all), it appears these girls have trouble making friendships with those outside the group, or feel threatened if one of their members has a friend the rest don't know.  They're overall nice girls (and very responsible), but they are kind of cliquish and petty.

     While these books are fun (and nostalgic now), what I disliked about them was the way they normalized broken relationships and families.  I think Kristy's reaction to her parents' divorce is normal, and really portrays the effects of divorce on children realistically.  Art imitates life.  However, through the course of the series, there are several situations with divorce and remarriage, and I feel it glorifies it and makes it look like a fun adventure.  Stacey McGill's parents divorce in the middle of the series (when there was no hint of it prior).  It is said that they went to marriage counseling, and the counselor told them to divorce.  That really bothers me, because, if they were in counseling, they obviously wanted help for their marriage.  This counselor told them there was no hope, and they listened.  That's harsh.  There is always hope, so this is a wrong message.  I know the focus is on Stacey and her story, not her parents, but it is still a wrong message.  They already had two characters from divorced homes by this time (Kristy and Dawn), so there really wasn't a need to throw this curve ball at Stacey.  It was also part of the plot line.  After Stacey and her parents had lived in Connecticut for a while, her dad's job transferred him back to New York City.  Because readers were so upset that she had moved away, the author decided to move her back after a while, and they did this by having her parents divorce, and her mom move back to Connecticut with Stacey.  The way it was done made marriage and family seem disposable.  The better message is showing people working through their problems, rather than just calling it quits.  

     Additionally, the way the girls act with boyfriends is often similar.  Boyfriends are seen as disposable in a lot of cases.  They break up and go on to another one.  That is a wrong message, and prepares young girls for divorce more than marriage.  It is true that few girls marry the boy they went out with as a teen, but they should still value all people in their lives.  Personally, I believe the teen years are best suited to developing one's own abilities and skills, and becoming who they're meant to be.  A lot of dating can really distract someone from those goals.  I'm not someone who is 100% against all teen dating (all circumstances are different, so I can't make a hard, fast rule), but the girls in the Babysitters Club are pretty young to be engaging in these kinds of dating relationships that probably won't go anywhere.  I would have preferred  the books showing the girls having some innocent crushes on boys, but not having that be the center of their universe.  They're too worldly-wise.  

     The only enduring love shown in the book is the friendship between the girls themselves.  These bonds run deeper than marriage, family or boyfriends, and that is kind of enmeshed and unhealthy.  There seems to be a lot of girl drama between them, and that also made me uncomfortable at times.  

 

     So far, everything I have said could still be argued as being art imitating life.  I think the author should have given the reader something better and more beautiful to strive for than the failures around us, but...okay, it's how life works sometimes.  However, in the new Netflix reincarnation of the series, I have some real issues.  I reiterate that I haven't watched it, but I have read up on it.  They turn sweet, shy Mary Anne into a social justice warrior who speaks up on behalf of a transgender child she is babysitting.  Dawn's parents' divorce was said to be because her dad came out of the closet.  This new series is not only normalizing disposable marriages and relationships, but also the LGBT community.  This is already being shoved down everyone's throats and bullied on us.  We don't need more of it.  This is an agenda.  The whole idea of this is a whole conversation in itself, but I'm going to try to briefly explain why overall gripe with the entire Babysitter's Club franchise.  

     God's design in His word is for one man and one woman to vow before Him to be together for life.  That's what marriage is.  The two shall become one flesh (Genesis 2:24, Matthew 19:5, Mark 10:8, Ephesians 5:31).  If it is reiterated that much in scripture, God must mean it, right (God means everything in His word, even it if is only stated once, but these four verses truly emphasize it)?  Singleness is also God's will for some of His children (Matthew 19:12, First Corinthians 7:7). Sometimes, marriages end, and the results are heartbreaking and devastating to all concerned.  It isn't some fun adventure the way the Babysitter's Club portrays it.  It is heartrending.  They did a good job showing Kristy's struggle with it, but fell short otherwise.  It should not be normalized.  Children of broken homes should be validated, and that can sometimes be done through books and other media, but it shouldn't be portrayed as this great, normal, almost inconsequential thing.  Additionally, pushing the gay agenda (trying to normalize it) is also contrary to God's word.  I would love to see a Christian writer create a story about a character with same-sex attraction, or who struggles with gender dysphoria, but chooses to follow God's way, and lives celibate, daily struggling with these urges, but not giving in.  People with these feelings of same-sex attraction or gender dysphoria are real and part of our lives.  They should be acknowledged in art...but not the way the Babysitter's Club chooses to do it.  These people are just like the rest of us.  They are living with the effects of sin in our world, and temptations to do things their own way instead of God's.  Like the rest of us, they are called to deny themselves, take up their crosses daily, and follow Jesus (Matthew 16:24, Mark 8:34, Luke 9:23--another emphasized idea in scripture).  It is not God's will for anyone to indulge desires for sex outside of God's design of marriage between one man and one woman.  This applies to the heterosexual single person with burning passions and desires, it applies to the married person who finds himself or herself attracted to someone besides their spouse, and it applies to the person who has same-sex attraction.  These things are struggles in our flesh, and should not be celebrated or normalized.  Those who struggle with any of this should be accountable to other believers they can trust, and supported lovingly as they seek to do it God's way.  As for gender dysphoria, first of all, this is not the same things as same-sex attraction, so I don't know why it is in the same category.   If someone feels that they were born with the wrong sex organs, their struggle and experience should be lovingly listened to and acknowledged, but they should not be taught to indulge it.  They, too, need to take up their crosses daily and follow Jesus.  God didn't make a mistake when He made them as He did.  Jesus Himself knows what it is to have an insufficient body.  He was God, confined to a weak human body.  And yet He was obedient to the father in that body, even to the point of death.  A person's physical sex organs, not his or her psychology, determine his or her sex.  This transgender idea is being pushed on people who might not even consider it otherwise.  I knew two different individuals in different college campuses.  They didn't even know the other, but I knew them both.  Both of them went to the college's psychology department to deal with depression, and both of them were told by the counselors that they were really  transgender and suppressing it.  They were both able to be sold on the idea, because they were depressed and desperate.  That's a problem.  These universities preyed on already-hurting people.  They are now pawns of this agenda, and it has caused incredible hurt for them and their families.  I have seen people having this idea pushed on them that they might be transgender, simply because they don't adhere to all the traditional stereotypes of their given sex.  That is really foolish, and I thought we, as a society, were beyond that kind of sexist stereotyping.  Just because a girl is athletic and dislikes pink lacy dresses doesn't mean she's really a boy!  Nor is a sensitive, artistic boy really a girl deep down.  Additionally, I think it is sick the way people who are genuinely struggling with this are treated as if they don't have to have self-control, and at the same time, are treated like a racial minority.  Not agreeing with indulging this is then equated with the Ku Klux Klan or other gross racism in our nation.  Simply because I believe a person born with male parts is a male is suddenly equal to owning slaves or burning down the home of a family of a different race than me.  It is insane.  It is vastly different.  As Christians, we do need to be loving toward all in the LGBT community, but loving doesn't mean we have to share their worldview.  

     One positive mark I will give the "new and improved" Babysitters Club (new graphic novels and the Neflix series) is that they have made it more racially diverse.  While I disagree with some of what they push, I strongly agree with racial diversity.  Art truly does imitate life here.  The United States is a land of diversity.  E pluribus unum--meaning one from many--is printed on our money.  Americans have so many different ancestries.  I like it when this is expressed in art.  Furthermore, God's plan is for believers to reach "the ends of the earth" with the gospel, and He has brought "the ends of the earth" to us in many ways.  God shows no partiality (Acts 10:34-35).  So I think that this new generation of the Babysitters Club being more racially diverse is a good thing.  Kids being friends with kids of other races should be normalized, and I love that this series is striving to do that (it did so in the original series as well, but more so now).  

     That was a lot, but if we are going to establish the problems with the Babysitters Club, we need to examine our own worldview.  It is clear, even in the "innocent" book series from the 80's and 90's, a secular humanistic view is shown.  Families are inconsequential.  Marriage was disposable.  Divorce led to fun and adventure.  Boys were objects for girls to enjoy and fawn over (that's as wrong as males doing it to females, by the way).  With no moral compass, it is no wonder this series evolved into what it is now.  If you enjoyed this series (and I can easily see why you would), consider what message it was sending.  In fact, we should be doing this with all our reading, viewing and entertainment.  What's the message?  How much are we taking it to heart?   

     A Christian alternative to the Babysitters Club was a series written by Elaine L. Schulte, The Twelve Candles Club.  If you can get used copies off of Amazon, I highly recommend it as an alternative.  But whatever you read or find nostalgia in, Do all to the glory of God. (First Corinthians 10:31).