Rugrats: A Lockean Tragedy of Identity

[morg4555]

Why am I watching this?

[jag519]

first!

(like this if you get why I say it)

[Egyptianprincess1996]

Since when do babies comunicate with other babies??? let alone kids communicate with babies....

[Meg0246]

... I will never watch cartoons the same again, for I now feel the need to analyze everything.... It's not a bad feeling, just kind of busy feeling... hm odd

[eyekandi69]

You made me want to learn philosophy.

[simplayaj]

haha you're funny.

[starryeyed110796]

...I need a dictionary...

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@starryeyed110796 No you don't. You are on the Internet. You have Google.

[mohopgold4747]

You are so eloquent. Does everybody talk like that after going to college?

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@mohopgold4747 Yes.

[MaddieMusic42]

i am a firm believer tht our experiances make us who we are. On the whole nature vs nurture debate i am mostlyy on the nature side although i know its a combination of both, with this in mind does tht mean we were completelyy different people when we were babiess?? sketchyyy...

[BreChristie]

wow, thats a really deep analysis of a cartoon.

[hinakiba777]

This is an odd question, but where does Kimmy fit into all of this. Is she older or younger than Tommy? Is she older than Phil and Lil? If she is younger than every except Dil, doesn't it mean that she and Dil would have that magic moment against the world together, instead of Tommy and Dil?

I'm just curious. Also that moment of technical social isolation for Dil may in fact explain why he's such a weird teenager....

[101converse]

You made me wanna study philosophy. This actually made me think more than I usually think, and I think a abundant amount.

[LaurenHood1994]

I can't take this guy seriously, he looks to much like the kid out of one tree hill who shot up the school!

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@LaurenHood1994 Really? THAT's the thing keeping you from taking this video seriously? If I looked different, you would have taken this philosophical/psychological analysis of Rugrats SERIOUSLY?

[LaurenHood1994]

@NowWeAreAllTom

probably not :L its rugrats :) probably more amused at the fact i was watching the rugrats movie while i watched this :)

[fecklessman]

this is officially the most depressing video i've ever seen about rugrats on the internet.

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@fecklessman Most depressing? Perhaps. But the award for most disturbing goes to Neil Cicerega.

[emmfan09]

I think I missed the part where the babies lost their memories of their childhood adventures. Did that take place in the insipid spin-off show?

[theteaproject]

I think this is probably the best video I've seen all week. Just putting that out there. -Alix

[Cheesewhaler]

While teens can converse freely with other teens, AND adults, but later they pretend to forget everything they ever did talk about as teens... it's a regression thing, I suppose

[raidonthestadiar]

Tommy Pickles completely embodied the Lockean philosophy of "DON'T TELL ME WHAT I CAN'T DO!"

[jag519]

@raidonthestadiar Lol, might be the wrong Locke... :-D

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@raidonthestadiar It's so lame that there's no "favorite" feature for comments.

[fecklessman]

@raidonthestadiar so some time in his toddler years, tommy pickles died and the all growed up tommy is actually a reincarnation of a mysterious smoke creature hell-bent on global destruction?

mind. blown.

[maculata]

Are you sure these babies actually existed within the confines of this show, or were they all an elaborate hallucination thought up by Angelica?

[evmoneyTV]

Rugrats was clearly the great American tragedy.

[CrAzYcHiCa428]

Oh my. You just took my favorite childhood cartoon and literally made me tear up over it. Well done, sir.

[HannahTheMidge]

If you hate new subscribers so much, you've got to tone down the quality of your videos. Geez...

[aquatius5]

I quite liked All Grown Up *shot*

[thepeteris]

My brother is 4 years older than me, and he says he remembers always being able to communicate with me.

Also, could they talk to Dill? I thought he was on another level below the other babies, and they just heard him making baby noises the same as adults would.

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@thepeteris They couldn't, but I'm envisioning a scenario that's probably four or five years down the line. Dil's only about a year younger than Tommy, who's only about a year younger than Chuckie, who's maybe a year or two younger than Angelica.

[kalchikc]

This has huge consequences for theory of language as obviously "baby language" must be wholly innate as there isn't just a poverty of stimulus for language acquisition there isn't any stimulus at all. There must be a "baby language organ" or set of modules that contain all useful/usable concepts and words for objects in the world. Rugrats has vindicated Chomsky/Fodor/et al.

[tobiosnmakky]

what would happen if instead of talking to a baby in a lanuage, adults attempted to limit all reaction with the baby to trying to learn baby langauge

[tobiosnmakky]

you forgot chuckies sister

[coralinehope]

I wasn't allowed to watch Rugrats when I was a kid. Pity. Pity me.

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@coralinehope You're 18 now. Watch Rugrats, like an adult.

[tobiosnmakky]

@coralinehope whyyy

[ZeavoTown]

& are you basing the science of this theory on the episode where angelica confessed aloud to having broken the lamp, then finished by saying "But you babies can't do anything because you can't talk! (evil laugh)." But then of course, the adults heardAngelica.This concept reminds me of whether Family Guy adults can understand Stewie. (ps, can they, or no? i remember them ending an episode pondering the concept, but they may have answered it definitively later, but i havent been watching)

[tobiosnmakky]

@ZeavoTown the adults cannot understand stewie, only the dog can

[TheBefalse]

One word : Brilliant!

wait does that make that three words really?

Dang now up to eleven!

wait ...grr ... now twenty two and an onomatopoeia!

[ZeavoTown]

This was EPIC. I would agree with the idea that the memories and specific experience would be wiped from memory. However, I would say that certain emotional lessons, development of motor skills as a result of specific incidents, development of person instincts, etc, would be retained. interesting.

[RatherBeSmiling]

I can't remember Rugrats...

[raidonthestadiar]

I believe in the "All Growed Up" special, which came before the indeed insipid show, there was a moment when they were sitting in the sandbox reminiscing, which could imply that they remember some things, but yeah they did not seem to be like, "Holy shit remember how when we were babies we could talk to each other?!?!"

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@raidonthestadiar You're opening a can of worms here, though. Continuity worms, to be precise. "All Growed Up" shows the babies IMAGINING what life will be like for them as preteens. "All Grown Up" purports to chronicle their ACTUAL preteen years.

[raidonthestadiar]

@NowWeAreAllTom I did not remember this and yeah that's real trippy. But I was a hipster 7 year old who always believed that the original 65 episodes were the greatest achievement in the history of television (if not all art) and complained about how it was never as good as it once was, so I barely watched All Grown Up.

[NowWeAreAllTom]

@raidonthestadiar I had to look up what the 65th episode was and yeah, I always felt the same way. I would talk about how "pre-Passover" Rugrats was the best and people had no idea what I meant. They didn't notice the dramatic shift in the show after it returned from cancellation Nor did they notice that it had ever been cancelled.

[MigdalaVered]

Oh yeah. Obligatory comment:

I feel like I've heard this before.

[raidonthestadiar]

I audibly gasped when I saw the title, and nearly favorited 10 seconds in, but then made myself wait 'till the end of the video. Mr. Tom in all his glory talking about Rugfuggingrats. Fantastic.

[MigdalaVered]

Ah! Finally this video. Good job, sir. My response will be up soon. If I can remember what I was going to say...