The Public Broadcasting System — the one American taxpayers fund, whether they like it or not — aired a new episode of the long-running kids' cartoon Arthur in which an elementary school teacher reveals himself as a homosexual by walking down the aisle with another male.

"Arthur," the longest-running animated series for children in the USA, began its twenty-second season with the surprise "marriage" of Arthur the Aardvark's teacher Mr. Ratburn to another man. 

In the episode, Arthur and his classmates are intrigued to discover that their teacher is getting married and begin to investigate who his bride might be.  When the children appear at the ceremony, they discover that Mr. Ratburn doesn't have a bride.  Instead, he walks down the aisle of the wedding tent on the arm of a male aardvark named Patrick. 

The adult aardvark winks knowingly at the viewer whereupon 8-year-old Arthur and his classmate exchange delighted smiles. 

I wonder how many parents thrill at the thought of a homosexual "winking knowingly" at their kids as he prepares to go to bed with another guy.  A man winking at eight-year-olds on his wedding night is creepy even when he's legitimately getting married — by which I must specify to a woman, since that redundancy has to be spelled out in our perverse generation.

PBS presenting a male rat pretending to marry a male aardvark propagandizes children in deeper ways than just the attempt to normalize homosexuality.  The concept of "species" is exclusively defined, with the understanding that members of different species generally can't breed.  So even if Ratburn were truly getting married — that is, to a female aardvark — kids just getting introduced elsewhere to basic biology couldn't be blamed for concluding that procreation is not in the picture here.  If the two characters are getting married knowing in advance they can't have children, then what is marriage for?  It must be some fuzzy notion of "love" or "happiness" that centers on fleeting good feelings — and so there's no good reason for the institution to be constrained by sexual complementarity...or number...or, um, species.

But in fact, marriage is designed and intended for the propagation, education, and protection of children, with the exceptions proving the rule.  It can exist only between a man and a woman.  It proves what a mess our culture is that such a bedrock, no-brainer truth is now controversial.

I saw a Facebook post joking that everyone had long figured Ratburn is gay anyway, so no big surprise.  This attitude is part of the problem.  We've shifted over the past generation from "assumption of hetero" to "assumption of homo."  Kids with close same-sex friends are presumed homosexuals and have to defend their rightly ordered sexual orientation.  The aggressive movement to mainstream sodomy has made platonic male friendship difficult.  Anyone who doesn't fit an extreme stereotype of his sex is assumed gay...and anyone who does fit the extreme stereotype is in the closet and overcompensating.

A sort of forced naïveté among conservatives might help push back against the constant, grinding agenda of moral turpitude targeting our children.  You can see two guys walking down the street together and take it for granted that they're friends.  You can see a tomboyish girl and take it for granted that her sexuality is rightly ordered.  Assume that everyone is psychosexually normal, and express bewilderment when someone suggests otherwise.  People suffering from life-threatening passions and dangerous sexual delusions need compassion and the truth gently but firmly expressed.  But in a case like Arthur, where wealthy and influential degenerates are trying to madden and corrupt innocent children, one must express disgust, and excise the propaganda from his life and his kids' lives.

Arthur is not "just a TV show."  It's a surface-level indicator of deep societal degradation.  Conservatives need to take good moral standards seriously, live that stance all the way down to their choices of entertainment, and expect the same from their neighbors.  Otherwise, good luck protecting your kids.

Drew Belsky is American Thinker's deputy editor.  Contact him at drew@americanthinker.com.

Image via YouTube screen shot.