It was a time-honored tradition for children of the ‘70’s and ‘80’s: waking early on Saturday morning, curling up on the couch with a bowl of Cheerios and watching cartoons.  For many of us, Saturday morning cartoons played an integral role in our childhood development. The Care Bears taught us the importance of sharing; Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner showed us that bad guys finish last; and Captain Planet informed us of the dangers of environmental degradation.

            During the ‘70s and ‘80s, major broadcast networks such as ABC, CBS and NBC had over 20 million viewers tuning in each week to their Saturday morning slot. Toy advertisers benefited from the networks’ ability to create a single timeslot to target younger audiences. Merchandising became easy. A child’s favorite cartoon hero became their favorite action figure or play thing. G. I. Joe, Transformers and Strawberry Shortcake dolls grew to be prized collectables. The number of My Little Pony dolls a girl owned would determine her status on the playground.

Today, however, successful Saturday morning cartoons draw less than two million viewers. What has changed? What has lead to the almost total obliteration of this sacred Saturday morning ritual? Saturday Morning Cartoons have become a thing of the past, due to increased governmental regulations, a greater prevalence of cable and satellite TV, and kids’ evolving preferences.In the late 1960s, parent lobbyist do-gooders, began voicing concerns about the violence, immorality and lack of educational content in Saturday morning cartoons. Classic television entertainment like Tom and Jerry, was attacked for its depiction of violence and lack of political correctness. In the ‘70s, lobbyist pressure increased, causing networks to implement stricter content rules for their animated programs. This restriction limited the development of drama and suspense and hindered artistic expression to the point where basic storylines were repeated over and over and the children watching became too smart for the dumbed down versions of their favorite TV shows. Other lobby group like Action for Children’s Television(ACT), began voicing concerns about the children’s advertising in the late ‘60’s. By 1970, ACT had created a petition for the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), to ban commercial advertisements from children’s programming all together. ACT also began targeting shows that produced popular toys like G.I. Joes and My Little Pony, which they believed were half-hour commercials. Due to outraged demands of parents, the National Association of Broadcasters was forced to limit commercial time to a mere nine and a half minutes per hour. This made Saturday morning childhood entertainment less profitable for the major television networks.In 1990, the United States Congress passed the Children’s Television Act. The Act  required that all television stations to run at least three hours of educational and informational content every week. New educational childrens shows began to take the place of loveable cartoon favorites. And so, the Saturday morning cartoon line up began to die.NBC and CBS began to replace their Saturday morning lineup with new live-action educational teen entertainment. Shows like Saved by the Bell and The Fresh Prince of Bel Air became more relevant for young viewers. There were very few programs catering specifically to teens and “tweens,” at this time. Thus NBC chose to get away from cartoons all together in order to focus on filling a previously ignored niche. With the introduction of cable TV channels like Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network, children’s entertainment has become avaliable 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The Saturday morning timeslot holds no significance for a child who can watch the same show every Tuesday after school.

As cable TV has developed, so have children. Some kids like animation and others do not. Networks have developed show lineups that reflect this immense diversity in kids today. Ratings show that a network will perform better with a mixture of live-action and cartoon shows.

Today, children have more choices than previous generations. It is a huge challenge for networks to get kids to watch television when the Internet, videogames, toys and after school activities are all vying for their attention.  

The Saturday morning ritual that united the kids of the ‘70s and ‘80s may be dying, but not cartoons for kids. Television entertainment for children has never been more prominent. While the Saturday morning cartoon connoisseurs of the past may not revere the cartoons of today, The way we remember Saturday morning cartoon is the same way that the kids today will remember Nickelodeon and the Cartoon Network. The only thing that kids have lost is the joy of waking up at ungodly hours to watch Scoobie Doo and The Ghostbusters with 20 million other children.