Sesame Street DVD for injured veterans

Teheheman

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NEW YORK - It's not your typical Sesame Street episode. There are no lessons in letters or numbers, but there are plenty of hugs and lots of talk about feelings.
Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization that produces the hit kids' show, is working on a DVD that will be distributed to military families. It's designed to help injured veterans talk about their disabilities with their children.
Gary E. Knell, president and CEO of Sesame Workshop, said some of those veterans and their families are looking for help from Sesame Street because the workshop produced a popular DVD last year aimed at helping military families discuss the strain of deployments.
More than a million children have parents who are in the military and have been deployed in the last six years. And roughly 18,000 military personnel in Iraq or Afghanistan have been wounded or injured seriously enough to be evacuated.
In the new production, Rosita, a fluffy blue mop-headed muppet, is upset because her father has returned home in a wheelchair. Rosita angrily refers to the wheelchair as "that thing" and reminisces about the days when she could dance to salsa music and kick a ball with her dad.
With encouragement from Elmo, Rosita musters the nerve to talk with her parents about how she is feeling.
"Sometimes I feel a little sad, because things are so different now," Rosita says during a family outing to the park. "I wish your legs were OK, Papi, and I wish you didn't have to go to the doctor so much. And I just wish things could go back to the way they were!"
Rosita's father tells her that although he may have changed, his love for her hasn't. And he persuades her to hop on the back of his wheelchair so the two can try a new kind of dancing.
Retired Army 1st Lt. Ed Salau said it's important for families to find new activities to do together after a parent is injured.
Salau lost a leg in a rocket attack while serving in Iraq. He said when it happened, he immediately thought of his young children.
"I got my leg blown off," he said. "All I was thinking about was, 'Am I going to be able to dance with my daughter or play soccer with my son?'"
Back home, Salau said he worked quickly to re-establish a physical closeness with his children, which sometimes can be difficult for families. "Hugging still means everything it did before you were hurt," Salau says.
Knell said Sesame Street is trying to model behavior and provide the vocabulary for parents who need extra help. "In many cases, Mommy and Daddy or caregivers may not have the tools necessary to deal with these very tough-to-teach issues," Knell said.
Psychiatry professor Stephen Cozza of Uniformed Services University, which trains military doctors, said a parent's injury or emotional problem is often "a big white elephant in the room that nobody's talking about."
Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Michael Lammey and his wife, Rose, can relate to that. Michael was badly burned in an explosion while serving in Guam last year.
The burns almost killed him and left him disfigured. Rose said she and her husband initially had a lot of trouble discussing what happened with the couple's three young daughters.
"We didn't know how to handle that sensitive issue. We just put it aside for a little bit until we could sit down as a family and talk it out," Rose said in a telephone interview from San Antonio, where her husband is still receiving treatment.
On the other hand, there can be a tendency to give young children more information than they can handle, said Cozza, who also is an adviser to Sesame Street.
He said the new DVD seeks to strike the right balance by showing families how to talk openly about the changed situation they face without frightening young viewers.
While the program doesn't directly address emotional disorders faced by an estimated 20 percent of returning veterans, the DVD can help frame family conversations around that too, Cozza said.
Leslye Arsht, deputy undersecretary of defense for military community and family policy, said Sesame Street is doing something that isn't easy for the military to tackle alone.
"There is no more credible voice for 3- to 5-year-olds than the voices of Elmo ... and parents trust him too." Arsht said.
Army Maj. David Rozelle agreed. An amputee who spends time counseling others, Rozelle was injured in Iraq before becoming a parent to two young children.
"These little people our kids trust so much can explain limb loss and help kids cope," he said. "We don't do it very well ourselves."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071004/ap_en_ot/sesame_street_iraq

Wasn't sure whether to put this in Headlines or Sesame Street, but here it is.

Daniel
 

peyjenk

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LOL, I was just coming here to post this myself. :smile: Isn't this great? I think it sounds wonderful. I love the way these characters have become so much a part of our culture that they are trusted to teach kids about the hard issues such as this.
 

BEAR

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Wonderful! It's nice they chose Rosita of all characters, too.
 

beaker

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I wonder if this video will explain why the government doesnt care
about injured soldiers, or their mental well being? Look how many soldiers dont have any decent care once they get back.

I wonder if the Muppets will explain the REAL reason their mommies and daddies are injured...you know, getting blown apart and killing people for the sick fantasies of Bush and the corporations.

In watching the powerful film "The World According to Sesame Street", its clear how ugly the horrors of war are...but we see how Sesame Street has tried to go to war torn countries to help kids whove had their innocence stolen.

And I cant help but think of all the innocent children and families whove been killed by the US government in the last 5 decades.

In reality, this dvd should have never been made because there shouldnt be
tens of thousands of injured(and 4000 dead) American soldiers. they have no business in Afghanistan or Iraq.

As the US prepares to launch an illegal unjustified attack on Iran and get us into another war...I guess we'll see yet another Sesame special on how kids can cope with their moms and dads coming home in flag draped coffins.

Just remember, the SAME REPUBLICANS who tried to END PBS funding and Sesame Street are the ones behind these sick, evil and twisted wars for profit.
 

CensoredAlso

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I think it's very kind of them to do an DVD like this, for the sake of the families and children who are suffering. They have to know that someone cares about the sacrifices they've made. And they have to learn how to deal with it all.

However, I do agree, this should never have happened in the first place. And it's disgraceful how our veterans have been denied the help they desperately need at home. If they're going to make DVDs on the subject, I hope it praises the soldiers themselves and the sacrifices they've made, and not the war itself.
 

Drtooth

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Never should have happened in the first place is right. And I don't even mean post 9-11. I mean, all the crap we did in the 1980's (including the war against Russia in Afganistan) pretty much led this sort of thing to happening.

I'd love the same money hungering war mongering wag the doggists to actually help the ssoldiers they exploited for all this nonsense. But that ain't gonna happen. All the benifits will go directly to the rich war profiteer companies behind these gaffes.
 

superboober

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At any rate, more relative to the topic on hand (and look at it this way, bin Laden does NOT believe in finding the Rainbow Connection or the magic of the Rock or any similar principles, so that's one strike against him he'll never get rid of :attitude: ), perhaps either Bob or Susan would have been a little more fitting than Elmo to explain something of this magnitude. But regardless, it's a good idea to try. Healing does begin at the basic level, after all.
 

CensoredAlso

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perhaps either Bob or Susan would have been a little more fitting than Elmo to explain something of this magnitude
I agree, the point might be made better with a different character. But they are generally sticking to one, heh.
 

Drtooth

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At any rate, more relative to the topic on hand (and look at it this way, bin Laden does NOT believe in finding the Rainbow Connection or the magic of the Rock or any similar principles, so that's one strike against him he'll never get rid of :attitude:
No, but he does believe in taking over the world and using "religion" as an excuse to sucker idiots into doing his bidding.

But I can't say I'm too happy with having Muppets fighting in wars or anything. This is an idea which would make Jim sick to his stomach, and he'd probably contemplate destroying everything he created so they could never be used in that way again.

If they needed to touch on this subject, they could have made the characters Fire fighters or police officers, who also are in danger of sever injury or even death on a daily basis.

And they can't have actual stories of actual humans, rather than Muppets? I mean, this isn't like having an HIV positive character in Africa. You're forcing mortality on characters who are (like any cartoon creation) immortal. it kills the magic in oh so many ways.

I can applaud SW for trying to do a good thing here, but I don't like exactly how it's done.
 
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