Teletubbies was a popular British show that aired from 1997 to 2006. The idea was four alien toddlers named Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laa-Laa and Po who who spoke and behaved in a way human toddlers would. The show was full of colorful scenes with the purpose of capturing the attention of toddlers and help develop different parts of their brains. The first season of Teletubbies endured two million viewers per episode and earned the company producing it $800 million from merchandising sales.
The teletubbies were on top of the world until Tinky Winky, the purple teletubbie who carried a red magical bag, was accused of being gay. The actor who played Tinky Winky, Dave Thompson was fired and told that the producers disapproved of his interpretation of the character. How does carrying a bag make someone gay? What does an audience of one to four years know about being gay?
The idea that Tinky Winky had to be gay because he carried a bag to which some called a purse, and today would be called a man bag, is absolute something an adult would come up with. It isn’t something that toddlers would be aware of.
“Teletubbies.” Wikipedia. 25 August 2015. Web. 16 September 2015. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletubbies
Crockett, Zachary. “The Outing of Tinky Winky.” Priceonomics. 6 October 2014. Web. 16 September 2015. http://priceonomics.com/the-outing-of-tinky-winky/
I think you’re onto something, but I want you to be careful with your language. It’s not just about something an adult would come up with. I bet we could both imagine an 8 year old being the first one to call Tinky Winky gay. But there is a desire to identify the Teletubbies genders here, to have the pocket book be a clear marker of an undeniable gender. That definite need to define what is going on in terms of gender norms seems to be an adult desire to see the male / female genders as a natural and apparent way of understanding life.