What on earth?? Nursery Rhymes

Of all things to bother me about parenting and babies a children's CD of nursery rhymes was a source of confusion on my part yesterday evening. I received the CD as a gift for Nicholas and it states it is for ages 1 and up sooo technically he's a little young but it keeps him happy in the car and keeps me from having to listen to the ultra annoying musical mirror we have in the backseat so we listened to it on the way to meet with family. Most of the songs are pretty old school with a little drama added with better than average instrumentals and various children's choirs who are pretty good on most songs. My favorite happens to be Fuzzy Wuzzy which I didn't know had additional verses or for that matter was even a song. As I drove along listening to the basics of Mary had a little lamb and ba ba black sheep a few of the songs got me thinking.

You see I have to much brain power on my hands apparently and one or two of the lyrics jumped out at me in an OH MY GOSH what are we teaching our children to sing??? I'm not talking about the type of thing like ring around the rosie was written about the plague that's not super obvious and a child wouldn't get it anyway. What I mean are the types of lyrics that are openly morbid or can be taken in a way other than perhaps the way it was intended. This is probably a sign of the times. Weren't most nursery rhymes written in the stone ages or something and now here it is 2010 and we have different view points.

K here is an example of what I mean. The song about the three little piggies. "There once was a sow with three little piggies, three little piggies has she..." do you know that one. Basically the story laid out in the song is the three little piggies went wee wee wee instead of oink oink oink and one day they decided to change that so they could be like their momma I guess. Know what happens to them in the song?? They DIE!!! Omg! So what's the deal with this song?? First of all why are we singing about piggies dying anyway? Isn't that a little sad for a nursery rhyme? The last part of the song basically says you should never try and "go oink oink oink, when you aught to go wee wee wee". Now you could say it's saying not to try and be something you're not, not a bad lesson perhaps. On the flip side maybe it's saying you have to just accept your lot in life and you can never move up to be an oinker. Hey I saw the secret ingredient on Iron Chef last weekend was suckling pig... maybe these little piggies were trying to avoid that fate by looking or sounding more grown up? What am I suppose to say when Nicholas is old enough to ask me "Mommy why did the piggies die?" Ummmmm I dunno son, maybe because the person who wrote the song wasn't a PETA member? Speaking of PETA how come they are chiming in on some of these killing animals children songs. The three little piggies isn't the only one. There is a song about going to an animal fair. A monkey gets crushed by an elephant... Is that a pretty picture? Over here on the right kids we can see where boomer the chimp USED to live before elephant squashed him and he became a little flat chimp spot on the ground.... Now that would be a hell of a trip to the zoo... Anyway aren't elephants and chimps dangerous animals? Why were they in the same enclosure? Obviously the elephant won the fight but still... What kind of message does that send? The third song that jumped out is called "Daddy wouldn't buy me a bow wow" which has been stuck in my head for a week now. The kid in the song says " I've got a little cat, and I'm very found of that, but I'd rather have a bow wow wow..." Welllllllll probably at some point this kid pestered his daddy for a kitty (or would that be meow meow) and daddy gave in. Now the little boy doesn't like his cat as much because the novelty has worn off and the litter box stinks and maybe the cat scratched him so he's decided he'll get a dog instead. I hope daddy doesn't give in to the cute song b/c that's awfully irresponsible as far as pet ownership goes.

I could keep going... some of these songs make you stop and say hummmm. Five little monkeys comes to mind here, man do I hate that song. What was the mother monkey doing while her little heathens were pushing each other off the bed and why didn't she beat them senseless for jumping on the bed in the first place? Would have totally negated the rest of the song b/c no more monkeys would have jumped on the bed after the first time the doctor said to stop. Anyone ever notice how nowhere in the song does it say the momma monkey ever wanted the kiddos to knock it off?? Maybe she was just hoping they would kill each other? *shrugs*

It seems to me that maybe I should stick to twinkle twinkle little star for a while until I can stop over thinking pop goes the weasel .... :P I think my kid might be better off learning the little made up songs that I sing him rather than the old school nursery rhymes of the past. I'm totally in love with Diaper on the ground, This is the way we eat our *insert item here*, The peaches song, Rub a dub baby Nicholas in the tub, and Born to Eat Peas (sung to the tune of born to be wild). Much more creative and they talk about things baby Nicholas is doing or should be doing :) Maybe they are better teaching tools lol.