Justice for Peppa

I’m just past the halfway mark on my 36th year of life and am here to say, with pride, that I love Peppa Pig. The elder millennial in me wants to feign youth by saying I “stan” Peppa, because I really, truly do. She epitomizes main character energy, and she does so unapologetically.

I don’t remember my parents expressing even an ounce of shame over screen time when I was a kid, or spending even a second censoring what we could watch. I was a cable kid; I surfed the channels with reckless abandon. It’s possible that as the youngest of four children, the rules bent by the time they were enforced for me. I have more memories of watching movies like Drop Dead Fred, Death Becomes Her, and Jerry Maguire than I do Kidz Bop or whatever the 90s equivalent was. As far as cartoons were concerned, I remember select episodes of Dr. Katz, Daria, and Beavis & Butthead. I much preferred Seinfeld, Friends, Mad About You, and even The Sopranos to classic kid programming.

As a parent, I’m a little more hands-on, but I don’t hover.

My son has never been a screen-demon; as a toddler, he would passively watch a show, but he was more interested in people and toys than TV. What he would end up watching was, for all intents and purposes, in my hands. And frankly, my maternity leave middle-of-the-night feeds involved everything from Bravo to binge-watching The Bureau, so my spectrum of appropriate viewing was slightly skewed.

The consensus seemed to be that Sesame Street was entertaining (Oscar is a vibe, and everyone from Adam Sandler to James Gandolfini has been a guest), Daniel Tiger was tolerable and wholesome, and Caillou was torture.

So when did we decide to turn against Peppa?

The recent — and truly brilliant — marketing campaign around Mummy and Daddy Pig’s new addition, baby Evie, has only renewed my support for the series.

My son discovered Peppa by way of other British kids shows like Fireman Sam and Bob the Builder. He never really took to American programming like Paw Patrol, but for Peppa, he was a captive audience. I welcomed her in as a pink protagonist with some biting British behavior.

Fellow millennial moms who have built careers while clapping back at labels like “abrasive” or “bossy” — or in my case, “domineering” circa 2012 while working in book PR — and who have worked tirelessly to make the world better for women — seem to be the loudest critics of Peppa and her alliterative cast of characters.

With a handful of parenting years under my belt, I’m at a point now where I curate what my kids are allowed to watch on YouTube Kids; only approved shows appear on their profiles. For my rising first-grader, I’m a little lenient. While he’ll still watch Peppa, he’s very super-hero-coded right now, and for better or for worse, he’s discovered a show called Henry Danger that he’s suckered us into approving for him. It has forced us to make distinctions with him about what words and topics are not OK to repeat, even if they seem funny when we hear them on TV.

For both kids, I have most religious programming blocked, especially if it’s outside our faith, allowing only “Shalom Sesame,” Laurie Berkner, and “Sing It! with Ms. Sara” for my daughter. It’s been especially amusing as of late to have her toddling around house demanding to sing about dreidels in May, and Pharaoh in June.

Our rules about screen time may not be overly strict — and as a result, my kids are quick to relinquish a show in favor of a more engaging, unplugged activity — but we do have limits and restrictions.

And this is where it gets blurry. Peppa gets branded as bratty, and so many of my parent-friends feel strongly that they don’t want their kids, particularly their daughters, to emulate this behavior, making Peppa a no-go in their homes. But just like Dr. Becky doing an entire episode on the silver linings of FAFO parenting, I feel strongly that Peppa’s faults are part of her charm.

Peppa is a normal four year old. And while I can’t speak to typical bovine behavior at that age, I can attest to how relatable her parents’ reactions to her schemes and sass have been for me as a parent to similarly aged kids. And if I relate to her parents, I have to believe my son, and now my daughter, relate to her. While the wholesome messaging is perhaps less obvious than anything from Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, most episodes still bring the plot back to positivity or a lesson learned. Added bonus? My son still refers to his swimsuit as a “costume,” pronounces garage as “gehr-edge,” and until recently called popsicles “ice lollies.”

In the same way that I tell myself that my daughter’s mischief and mayhem are priming her to be a CEO one day, I believe that Peppa’s behavior is age-appropriate and that parents can work with their kids to spin their own narrative.

I would rather my kid watch and learn from someone like Peppa than paint a too-perfect picture of what their childhood should look like. I’m all for a beautiful day in the neighborhood, but I’m also a believer in preparing kids for reality. So while pigs flying is relegated to a figure of speech, I’m fine with my kids watching pigs jumping up and down in muddy puddles (splish, splash, splosh, splish, splash…forgive the earworm).