Our Earth

Miss Piggy: Fox News Criticism of Muppet Movie “Almost as Laughable as Fox Being News”

January 30, 2012 by Brett Wilkins in Animal Kingdom, Arts & Entertainment, Mass Media with 0 Comments

Anyone who’s been watching Fox News lately (ok, you caught me) can’t help but notice that the right-wing network has it in for puppetry. First there was an attack on PBS’s venerable children’s program “Sesame Street,” which Ben Shapiro, a guest on Sean Hannity’s “Great American Panel” said was undermining American families.

“I kinda wanna take ‘em out back and cap ‘em,” Shapiro fumed back last June.

That wasn’t the end of it. A few months later, panelists on Fox’s “The Five,” which replaced Glenn Beck’s old time slot, slammed Sesame Street for introducing a poor character named Lily.

“I just don’t understand why this muppet is hungry,” panelist Andrea Tantaros wondered. “Obama has expanded food stamps… Why is Lily hungry?”

Food stamp expansion or not, if Tantaros bothered to open her eyes she would soon discover that more than 1 in 5 American children is living in poverty (that number is much closer to 2 in 5 for black and latino children) and that 1 in 7 Americans is on food stamps. That’s nearly 44 million people receiving government food assistance, or more than the entire population of Argentina.

Why wouldn’t Lily be hungry?

Now Fox’s crosshairs are set on another American children’s institution. This time it’s the Muppets, another lovable creation from the mind of the incomparable Jim Henson. Fox has accused The Muppets, a recently-released addition to the decades-old Henson TV and film franchise, of liberal bias and “brainwashing” America’s kids.

But did you really think the famously outspoken Miss Piggy would take it sitting down?

Appearing at a “news conference” to promote the film, Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy fielded questions from reporters about the latest Muppet movie. When asked about all the criticism from the folks over at Fox News over the fact that the villain in the film is a big oil company, Kermit replied:

“It’s a funny thing, they were concerned about us having some prejudice against oil companies, and I can tell you that’s categorically not true. And besides, if we have problems with oil companies, why would we have spent the entire film driving around a gas-guzzling Rolls-Royce?”

To which Miss Piggy added: “It’s almost as laughable as accusing Fox News of being, uh, you know, being news.”

“Boy, that’s going to be all over the Internet,” Kermit deadpanned.

“Yeah, if they take what I say seriously, they’ve got a real big problem,” the porcine princess added.