The bad education.

Let me introduce this apparently nice lot: from left to right, Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laalaa and Po. If you have young children at home, you probably think you know too well those creatures and their very special language made of weird onomatopes. Well, you think and you are wrong. Under the furry cover hides the evil: the Teletubbies are in fact double-agents...

Liebst du Sie noch?

I personally discovered them in 1998 when living in Germany. I know that was two years after they went out of their Tubbytronic Superdome for the first time, but I had an alibi: I was 22 (slightly overage to be an early adopter). In Germany, like everywhere, the 4 characters were a phenomenon. Every child was in love with them... And I was curious. As a man of image, I was interested in the signs vehicled by these new icons.

I reckon I am no literate semiologist, however, there are some signs that were too obvious to be ignored:

• "Po" in German means Arse, and when you look at the Antenna of the relevant character... well, it is self-explanatory;
• Dispy's antenna, on the other hand, would be the centre-piece on any Dali's painting as the perfect phallic representation;
• The colours of this TV shows are reflecting the same spectrum as the Gay Pride flag;
• The TV programme was bought in France by Canal+, a paid-for TV broadcaster who was successful through football and Saturday night porn (there is obviously no ball in the Teletubbies...)
• And moreover, the episodes were infiltrated by what can be perceived as subliminal demonstration of Kamasutra positions:

Stop the conspiracy

So when last year, Reverend Jerry Falwell, former spokesman for America's Moral Majority, denounced the BBC TV children's show because Tinky Winky would be gay, I was relieved. I was no longer isolated. I knew that there were forces elsewhere to fight on my side against this conspiracy to turn our children into sex-slaves.

Seriously, I have decided to boycott this TV programme. So now every time I hear Itsy Bitsy catchphrases, I lock my daughter, Emmanuelle behind the green door of her room so that she can finish her essay on French literature... What was that book again? Oh, yeah... "Justine, ou les malheurs de la vertue" by Marquis de Sade. Now if with that kind of leisure time she does not get AAAAaaaaaah's at school, I don't understand anything at child education.