I dunno. That's why I'm never having children. In order to properly raise children, you have to give them time, love, attention, and all sorts of other unpleasant things I have no interest in. At least I'm mature enough to realize my limitations, however, unlike people who have children first, only to later realize they should have never had them.
@Alma, I would think Cartoon Network would be the lesser of the evils in the child television networks. Programs from the Disney Channel [especially] and Nickelodeon are presenting children with situations which are far from their scope of understanding [usually romantic/sexual situations involving teenagers] and which are neither educational nor imaginative [at least the trash-talking aliens are creative!] I honestly think that Disney overall should be boycotted, the way it is presently going, especially in its television programming which is nothing but rude humour, teenage sexual situations, and filth. Parents would have to be out of their bloody minds to let their children be exposed to something like that! Later on, they get surprised when their now teenage son/daughter is rude to them, has no creative vision whatsoever, and ends up in a series of abusive/risky relationships with a myriad of other equally idiotic teens. Well, dears, where in gods' Earth did you think they picked such things up from?! LOL! With television acting as the kids' babysitter, what else did you expect them to learn?
Children copy far many more things from television and other media sources than they do from people in their immediate periphery, as they are far more exposed to the television/music/films than they are to any other stimulus [with the exception of public schooling, which in my honest opinion is almost as bad, with its nationalist pseudo-history and whitewashing/indoctrination]. The average 8-18 year old child spends about 4 hours in front of a television set per day, plus 2 additional hours in front of a computer or video game screen, adding up to a total media exposure of about 6-7 hours per DAY. This means that the people who make these shows/games/songs/etc. are in control of what the average child is exposed to for 7 hours of his day, something which is, to say the least, worthy of concern. Most of the time, parents don't even care to watch the programs their children are so fascinated by, especially if they have "trusted" seals of approval such as "Disney" or "Cartoon Network." Admittedly, Cartoon Network is far less guilty of this deviance than is the Disney Channel, with Nickelodeon standing in the middle, offering not-so-bad programs such as SpongeBob SquarePants, but also offering horrendous Disney-esque porgrams [no doubt, to compete] like iCarly and the previously run Zoey 101 [with Britney Spears' untalented trainwreck of a sister]. Disney Channel, though, is the worst of the worst. Pretty much as soon as the pre-K programming ends, the atrocities begin--with such programming, they should at least call it Disney Teen Channel, since those are the situations and protagonists their programs present.
I don't know about you, but I find it incredibly creepy that an eight/nine year old girl [or worse, a six year old] is interested in what goes on in the lives of 15+ year olds. It's too soon for these kids to know about the idiocies of the pre-adult world, and Disney is doing them a disservice by presenting these dangerous things in a romantic/safe sense to a highly impressionable audience. I find it even creepier that a whole bunch of executives at a supposedly kid-oriented network would think presenting such situations to a small child is not only appropriate, but desirable. It's right up there with the child beauty pageants in creep factor, and no doubt, it attracts just as many creeps.
Perhaps what I despise most of all is that these shows reinforce gender/racial stereotypes to such a disgusting degree [no surprise there from sexist/racist Disney, far less so in Cartoon Network, and present to a smaller degree than Disney in Nickelodeon]. They're countering what good people died to pave a path for, and people are too stupid to realize what is going on with their kids, or else they think Disney telling their little girls to aspire to be some materialistic pop star/actress/other stereotypically feminine profession is "cute." I honestly wish I could legally slap such parents in the face and make them see what this TV is doing to their children's minds!
Anyway, enough. I just wanted to add my two cents into the whole children's television thing, because I've personally seen the deterioration happen right before my eyes. Perhaps that's why I always loathed girls' television programmes as a child.
I leave you with these two amusing videos illustrating my point:
(you might need to turn up the volume for the last one).
So lovely!