Sharing is overrated

Going back a few weeks, we talked about some of our (often embarassing) quirks. Well, this is kinda another one: I love some of the kids shows on now and sometimes even watch them without the girls around. Case in point: "Yo Gabba Gabba." Now this is a show that the girls love (although Eva seems to be coming down a little from the peak of her excitment about it) and I really like, but MM has only grudgingly accepted in the house--not for any moral reason, I don't think; just because it annoys her so much sometimes.

I think part of it is that, even though MM loves music and has a far better educational background in it, I love to sing in funny voices with random lyrics pretty much all the time. Eva has inherited this from me, and Charlotte is coming along nicely as well. YGG caters to this annoying quality in the three of us and has the added benefit of really bizarre costumes, character names, and Biz Markie teaching kids how to beat-box. Yes, Biz Markie, along with miniature monster, a magic robot, and the occasional celebrity (like Elijah Wood) teaching a "Dancy-Dance." It's awesome.

However, there are occasionally some things about it that get on my nerves a little. For example, today the kids and I were watching an older episode that we had saved on the DVR. One of the characters was playing with a ball and didn't want to share. This one, Brobee, represents the most toddler-like of the monsters, so he frequently has to deal with toddler-like issues. Anyway, the trees in the forest started singing to him about how fun it is to share your things with your friends. He responded that he was having fun playing with it on his own, so why share? Because, the trees said, it's a lot MORE fun to share.

This seemed like a stretch to me, personally. Maybe it's because I'm sort of anti-social, but I frequently have a lot more fun doing things alone than I do with others. I'm not saying kids shouldn't be encouraged to share; in fact, I get on our kids all the time about needing to. But that's the thing: it's important to share because it's the right thing to do. I don't see why we should sugarcoat it and say it's going to be so much more fun than just keeping your stuff to yourself when, potentially, it will actually be a lot less fun to share. It makes me wonder if, deep down, whoever wrote that segment just doesn't believe in things being objectively right and wrong, that they want to encourage good behavior while appealing to no more than the person's self-interest as a motivation.

Or maybe I'm just reading too much into a show with the word "Gabba" in its title.