PBS Says No To Cartoon Rabbit Buster Baxter And The Lesbian Mothers He Befriends!

By JULIE SALAMON
THE NEW YORK TIMES

PBS this week decided not to distribute to its roughly 350 PBS stations an episode of "Postcards From Buster," which was scheduled for Feb. 2 and included lesbian mothers, even though a few days earlier PBS officials, among them PBS's president, viewed the episode and called it appropriate.

That was before Education Secretary Margaret Spellings denounced the program, starring Buster Baxter, a cute animated rabbit who until now has been known primarily as a close friend of Arthur, the world's most famous aardvark. Spellings said many parents would not want children exposed to a lesbian lifestyle.

Buster joined another cartoon character, SpongeBob SquarePants, who recently was attacked by Christian groups for being pro-homosexual, though SpongeBob's creator said it was all a misinterpretation. Buster's offense was appearing in "Sugartime!," the undistributed "Postcards From Buster" show, in which he visits children living in Vermont whose parents are a lesbian couple. Civil unions are allowed in Vermont.

Buster appears briefly onscreen, but mainly narrates these live-action segments, which show real children and how they live. One episode featured a family with five children, living in a trailer in Virginia, all sharing one room. In another, Buster visits a Mormon family in Utah. He has dropped in on fundamentalist Christians and Muslims as well as American Indians and Hmong. He has shown the lives of children who have only one parent, and those who live with grandparents.

Marc Brown, creator of "Arthur" and "Postcards From Buster," said: "I am disappointed by PBS's decision not to distribute the 'Postcards From Buster' 'Sugartime!' episode to public television stations. What we are trying to do in the series is connect kids with other kids by reflecting their lives. In some episodes, as in the Vermont one, we are validating children who are seldom validated. We believe that 'Postcards From Buster' does this in a very natural way -- and, as always, from the point of view of children."

The question is, does the episode violate the grant under which show producer WGBH-TV of Boston received federal funds? Wayne Godwin, chief operating officer of PBS, said "The presence of a couple headed by two mothers would not be appropriate curricular purpose that PBS should provide." Yet the grant says "diversity will be incorporated into the fabric of the series to help children understand and respect differences and learn to live in a multicultural society."