social media

Social craze: Twitter ruining children’s books everywhere

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Written by GemmHirst
Chris Hardwick is a presenter of @midnight, a Comedy Central series in the United States that trolls through social media to find the funniest, and often darkest, takes on popular culture.

Chris Hardwick is a presenter of @midnight, a Comedy Central series in the United States that trolls through social media to find the funniest, and often darkest, takes on popular culture. On March 25 he started a hashtag called #RuinAChildrensBook and tweeters went crazy for it. Yes, apparently tarnishing wonderful childhood memories is how tweeters now get their kicks.
 
Going too far?
 
From the editing of children’s titles to the editing of the front cover, some of you out there decided to take on the #RuinAChildrensBook one step further. Those clever tech-heads started to re-arrange the front covers of certain children’s books to make them look inadequate for the eyes of children.
 
The clear users of Photoshop and editing software made even ’50 Shades of Grey’ look attractive to small children. Admittedly, some of them are quite funny and I marvel at the clever use of play on words and the ability to twist innocent children’s books is just genius.
 
However, a few of them were a little inappropriate to be shown on Kettle. So here are the top 10 tweets that I could show. 
 
Kettle‘s top 10
 

 


Conclusions

 
It made me think, “How has the sordid mind of society developed?”, as when I was younger, I had no other twisted connotations to the story of ‘Winnie the Pooh’. Or are the authors of children’s literature purposely including dirty-minded jokes as a method of preparing the children for later life of innuendo? I now see Enid Blyton, A.A. Milne and Dr Seuss in a completely different light.
 
Is it simply an in-joke for themselves to have a good giggle at later on in their careers? I can just picture them now: sitting in their living rooms with a glass of Pinot Grigio, with the laptop on and laughing at every innuendo they make. Sickens you a little bit, doesn’t it?
 
What did you think of #RuinAChildrensBook? Let us know in the comments below.
 
Photo: anders.bachmann / Flickr