Bluey's dad adores his kids. A conservative writer says that's unbiblical.

Jeremy Pryor has a lot of dumb thoughts about a wonderful cartoon dog

This newsletter is free, but it’s only able to sustain itself due to the support I receive from a small percentage of regular readers. Would you please consider becoming one of those supporters? You can use the button below to subscribe to Substack or use my usual Patreon page!

---

If you’re a parent, or you know any parents, then you undoubtedly know that there’s really just one children’s cartoon that’s both beloved by kids and enjoyable for adults: Bluey, a show centered around a nuclear family of four dogs living in Australia. Whether it’s the multiple layers of jokes or the kick-ass music, if your kids want to watch Bluey, it’s not the worst way to spend your time. In fact, in April, the season finale was so moving that it had adults crying.

And when everyone loves something that wholesome, you can bet there are knee-jerk contrarians waiting to tell you why it actually sucks.

The knee-jerk contrarian in this case happens to be conservative writer Jeremy Pryor.

That’s because, on the show, father Bandit is an archaeologist who’s also a loving dad to his daughters. Pryor has a big problem with that. Somehow.

Bluey, Bingo, and Bandit (screenshot via YouTube)

According to a piece first published on Pryor’s Substack in early 2023 and republished on The Blaze on Sunday, Bandit’s playfulness and the way he bonds with his kids is just not biblical and manly enough. Therefore, Pryor says, it sends the wrong message to children:

He embodies almost all of the elements of the traditional mother, purged of the essence of elements from the historic father.

…

The dad, Bandit, is seen as a constantly nurturing, always-present playmate to his two daughters, Bluey and Bingo. He’s so present, in fact, that fans of the show often joke about when Bandit finds time to work, and in the show, it’s clear that the mother has less time to play than the dad.

…

I first heard of red flags in "Bluey" from my two teenage daughters, who watched an episode after hearing from so many Christian families who loved the show — and they immediately saw what was happening.

Their first statement was something like, “They treat their dad like a plaything.”

I then watched one three-minute clip on YouTube from a different episode and saw what they were so alarmed by.

There are hundreds of interesting elements of fatherhood that one can glean from studying how God interacts with the meta father (Abram), but I’m pretty sure Bandit is in no way tethered to this understanding of fatherhood.

Bandit plays with his kids, dresses up in wacky costumes to humor them, and never disciplines the children with a rod. That apparently makes him a beta. The antithesis of God’s Plan. The sort of dad that Real Christians™ hate.

(The idea that dad rarely works isn’t even true! In a recent episode, Bandit went on a work trip for six straight weeks!)

The Blaze headline goes even further in treating the character as a bogeyman: “How a beloved children's cartoon turns fathers into mothers.” As if loving your kids is gender-specific.

Pryor doesn’t actually have much to say about the show itself. He admits he watched a single short clip—”Everything I’m writing is from one three-minute clip,” he said on Substack, in a line that was removed from the Blaze version—and that was enough to write up about 1,400 words on the topic of masculinity. Bible-based masculinity, of course.

The odd thing is that he doesn’t even bother laying out what a real father ought to be doing instead. He only nudges us, alluding to traditional gender roles and warning us that “embracing these kinds of portrayals… will go a long way in shaping our intuition around the essence of these roles.” As if having more fathers like Bandit—the sort of dad that kids actually like—would ruin society.

The story is actually pretty boring when you read it because it doesn’t even attempt to make a strong argument for why Bandit is bad father. It’s hard to do that when your entire understanding of the character is based around a single clip, but considering that’s how most Christians read the Bible, I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised.

If anything, the original Substack version is more damning because this is the screenshot Pryor uses as his feature image:

There’s no explanation of that scene. The image is meant to portray Bandit as non-manly.

But I think it deserves a short description: That scene is from an episode in which the kids put on a show about how their parents first met. At one point, they drag daddy into their storytelling and he reluctantly agrees to put on the baby costume. Is he happy about it? No. Is it an amusing sight gag? Absolutely. The point is: He did something he didn’t want to do because it amused the children.

Is that really a bad male role model?

Pryor writes of Bandit’s character:

Our culture LOVES this depiction of fatherhood.

It empties the father character of all the elements of the traditionally masculine father we’ve grown uncomfortable with and at the same time, it provides freedom for the mother to get out in the world and explore her individual passions.

If your idea of a “traditionally masculine father” is an abusive asshole who believes a woman’s place is in the home, then sure, Bandit isn’t that guy.

That’s why he’s not just a good father; he’s better than the “traditional” guys we’re used to seeing. Pryor treats this like a problem when it’s really the sort of thing you’d hope any decent father would do for his kids: Play with them, make them laugh, be friendly while also setting sensible boundaries when necessary.

You would think Pryor would appreciate that a hell of a lot more than the typical sitcom or cartoon dad: An idiot who marries up, has no discernible skills, and seems oblivious to his kids’ needs.

By the way, Pryor gets another detail wrong—a detail he uses to make a key point—when he talks about main character’s name:

And in the same way, creating a daughter named Bluey using the color blue is totally lost on us. It goes right past our conscious awareness. If we do think about it, we think it’s cool that they’re reversing the gender stereotype of colors.

Bluey isn’t blue because the creators are trying to push back against gender stereotypes. Bluey is a Blue Heeler, a type of Australian herding dog. (Blue Heeler = Bluey. Get it?) It’s not complicated. It’s definitely not a liberal conspiracy.

One consolation to all this is that the people reading the Blaze appear to share the belief that Pryor’s article is just plain dumb. Their comments include: “What a sad take on such a great show,” “The world is on fire and This show isnt one of the problems,” and “I think you are really reaching to come to this critical analysis.” You know it’s a bad article when even Trump voters say the outrage is misplaced.

Anyway, if you’re keeping score, conservatives hate childless women, childless couples, gay couples with children, straight couples who conceive children through IVF, and straight couples with naturally born children if daddy is too nice.

---