"Chum Bucket Had My Jaw On The Floor" — This Woman Studied The Sexualization Of Children's Cartoons For A College Course, And People Have Strong Thoughts
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Sarah LeMoine is a fourth-year media and communications college student who has gone viral on TikTok for what she says is apparent sexualization in Nickelodeon's SpongeBob SquarePants.
BuzzFeed spoke to Sarah, who is currently taking a course called "Children, Advertising, and Consumer Culture" and was assigned a group presentation where students would reflect on the topic of sex, children, and advertising.
"As I started to broadly research the sexualization of children’s cartoons, a common TV show that came up was SpongeBob. There were many articles about the innuendos and subliminal sexualization in the show. I thought that this was a strong show to use because many of us grew up watching it but wouldn’t realize the sexualization of it until you go back and watch it," she said.
Sarah decided to share some of her findings about SpongeBob SquarePants on TikTok. She garnered nearly 7 million views with her interesting takes on the longtime cartoon, saying, "They live in Bikini Bottom. A group of men live in a girl's bikini bottoms with Sandy Cheeks, Mr. Krabs — like the STD — Krusty Krab, Krabby Patty..."
And even though some people initially thought it was a reach...
...when Sarah brought up the Chum Bucket, some people changed their minds. Sarah pointed out that the name on the restaurant appears with a capital "C," lowercase "h," capital "U," and capital "M" — insinuating that it emphasizes the word "CUM."
Not to mention, "chum bucket" has all sorts of different meanings — none of which are G-rated — on Urban Dictionary.
Sarah also discussed the alternative readings of an episode in which the characters do karate. In the episode, SpongeBob tries to force Sandy to do karate late at night (which Sarah says could represent sex), and Sandy instead tells him he should do it alone, insinuating masturbation.
Through more research on subliminal techniques, Sarah and her peers believe it is apparent that the writers of the show purposely incorporated sexual messages into the show. "Notably, these are also children’s TV shows, and often parents are watching with their children. By including jokes and references that are understood by the parents but fly over the head of their children, the parent is also targeted and entertained."
If you want to hear more insights about what Sarah learned, you can watch her full TikTok here.
The sexualization of children's cartoons is not a new topic — people have been saying for years that Disney movies have sexual innuendos. In addition, many people attribute their sexual awakening to animated characters.
