“In a Heartbeat”: Propaganda for Children
 
“In a Heartbeat”: Propaganda for Children
Written By Laurie Higgins   |   08.23.17
Reading Time: 3 minutes

Anyone who doubts that “LGBTQQAP” activists and their “allies” are pursuing the hearts and minds of other people’s children should watch this sweet, well-crafted, animated short film about an adorable, red-headed, closeted middle school boy whose secret crush on another boy is exposed when his anthropomorphized heart leaps from his chest and pursues the boy with whom the main character is besotted.

YouTube video

The award-winning film titled “In a Heartbeat” was posted on YouTube less than a month ago and already has well over 27 million views.

The middle-school boy, literally and figuratively hiding, sees his beloved walking into school reading a book by homosexual writer Oscar Wilde and absent-mindedly tossing and catching an apple. (Is this an intentional allusion to grade school innocence or an inadvertent allusion to the forbidden fruit, the eating of which constituted rebellion against God and resulted in the fall of man?)

The freckle-faced, red-haired boy’s pulsing, panting, love-struck heart bursts forth and soars after the object of his affection, pausing momentarily to stroke the hair of the beloved, and in so doing exposes his crush to the disapproving faces of censorious peers. The freckly boy grabs his heart which splits in two, and he flees the schoolhouse, seeking refuge again in the shrubs—his metaphorical closet—all accompanied by heartstring-tugging music. Not to worry, though! All ends well when his love interest suddenly shows up, bringing the other half of his broken heart to him, restoring it to wholeness. And there in anti-Eden, homoerotic love blooms.

To better comprehend the troubling effects of this video, imagine that instead of a classmate the object of the main character’s secret crush were his brother. Leftists would likely be offended at such a morally repellent suggestion, but why should they be? If, as the Left has countless times proclaimed, “love is love,” what could possibly be offensive about erotic love between two brothers?

Of course, only the fringiest of the fringy Left think there are no distinctions between types of love. If pushed for clarification, even most “progressives” will admit they don’t really believe all types of loving relationships are identical. They don’t really believe that erotic activity can legitimately play a part in all types of loving relationships. Only the wholly amoral among us believe that “love is love.”

The Left uses this silly slogan to promote without proving the moral proposition that it is as morally legitimate for two people of the same sex to engage in erotic activity as it is for two people of opposite sexes to engage in it.  The film’s creators are making the implicit argument that the biological sex of humans is irrelevant to the morality of sexual activity. Leftists use the adolescent slogan “love is love” to distract the public from the central issue—which pertains not to love but to sex. The central issue concerns sexual morality and sexual boundaries. The Left seeks to skirt that issue by dangling an anthropomorphized heart in front of vulnerable and manipulable children.

The Left does not want to discuss the different forms of love: erotic (i.e., romantic love), philia (i.e., friendship), agape (i.e., the love of God for man and man for God, sacrificial love), and storge (i.e., familial or kinship love). After years of proclaiming that “love is love,” Leftists will have a difficult time explaining to children why erotic pleasures have no place in relationships constituted by storge or platonic love. They don’t want to discuss how we determine which types of relationships ought not include erotic activity. They don’t want to discuss whether the experience alone of romantic love—i.e., the attraction to and deep longing for union with another person—automatically renders sexual interaction moral.

And those who believe in a solely materialistic universe are going to have a really hard time explaining the source of their moral beliefs about whichever types of sexual activity they deem immoral.

But none of these thorny moral inconsistencies matter to those so irrational and corrupt that they no longer recognize or respect the reality and meaning of male-female differentiation.

And none of these profoundly important questions about sexual morality matter in a culture where cartoons shape feelings—nothing more than feelings. In Amusing Ourselves to Death, Neil Postman warned that “Americans no longer talk to each other. They entertain each other. They do not exchange ideas, they exchange images. They do not argue with propositions; they argue with good looks, celebrities and commercials.” And even with cartoons for children.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:


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Laurie Higgins
Laurie Higgins was the Illinois Family Institute’s Cultural Affairs Writer in the fall of 2008 through early 2023. Prior to working for the IFI, Laurie worked full-time for eight years in Deerfield High School’s writing center in Deerfield, Illinois. Her cultural commentaries have been carried on a number of pro-family websites nationally and internationally, and Laurie has appeared on numerous radio programs across the country. In addition, Laurie has spoken at the Council for National Policy and educational conferences sponsored by the Constitutional Coalition. She has been married to her husband for forty-four years, and they have four grown children...
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