putting this here (II)

Just another Pony thing, but this is one of the best essays I've read explaining "Why do grown up serious adults like a show for little girls?"

Short answer: because it's written not to be JUST for little girls.

And I would add, for me personally: It promotes virtues (both the Fruits of the Ponies like Loyalty and Generosity, and the bigger virtue of being friends with ponies, er, people different from you) that I tend to think are overlooked in our culture today.

Also, it does use some fairly complex vocabulary, even in jokes. ("Tenacity!" "Gesundheit!") And there are all the mythological references, which make me feel better about paying attention in fifth grade language arts. (Because one does not use mythology that much as an adult, at least not in my field). It's a show that aspires to smartness, and that celebrates it - it's not only okay to know what Tartarus is and why it's funny that one of the ponies would be treating Cerberus as "just a big furry guy who got out of his yard," it's something to be celebrated. And I like that, because it often seems to me (as I said about my gladness that Call the Midwife was back) that so much of our pop culture now seems to aspire to stupidity rather than cleverness. Or to simple snark rather than the kind of humor (wordplay, silliness, and incongruity) that I actually enjoy.

(And thanks to fellow pony-fan Charles G. Hill for sharing the link in his Twitter stream)