brendan-229 If you want to keep KN on the air, send a red, blue, green, or yellow bandanna here NO LATER than March 20th.Leslie Moonves President and Chief Executive Officer, CBS Corporation CBS Television Network51 West 52nd Street New York, NY 10019And/or sign the petition, here:http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/kid-nation-2.htmlSome kids from the show have signed it!We really need to keep this going! There have been people saying, more like whining, "Child abuse!!!! Ooohh, those poooor children, and what horrrrrible parents!" I LAUGH at these people. Clearly they never even watched the show. They were able to leave at any time they want. They also had to AGREE to be on it in the first place! Then their parents had to agree. To be honest, I'd KILL to have a chance to prove myself and kids everywhere to adults. To let them no where not defenseless infants that must be protected, sheltered and hand fed until the age of 18, where we suddenly magically become adults. In the words of Laurel, "We have minds, we can think!" Also, a tip to people who watch only what the critics tell you to, Sophia has some advice for you. "The critics weren't there!"

huh_oh_i_c This show directly taps into the pioneer folklore of American cultural story: Despite hardship, and the looming danger of chaos, if we all stick together, we'll make it. Now, there's a lot to say for a never-say-die attitude. At the same time, I wonder if this show strengthens Americans in the believe, that their we-are-better-than-thee approach in the world is justified, that they are the "Chosen People" and thus are more entitled than other nations.All that aside, this show is pretty good. It is clearly shown that even though we might think of children as angels, they are not. They have the same capacity for cruelty and stupidity as adults. Taylor is the perfect example of a spoiled beauty queen. In the first episode she says: "I'm a beauty-queen and I don't do dishes" and she acts accordingly. She sleeps in very late and doesn't do her job as Yellow Leader to make breakfast, except on the first day. Taylor has discovered the George Bush defense: When something happens bush doesn't like, when he gets criticized he denies it and says: "So? What are you gonna do about it? and "I don't give a rats ass", as well as "It wasn't me!" in all their various diplomatic variations.This is very similar to Taylor's highly annoying "Deal with it!" The amazing thing is, they BOTH GET AWAY WITH IT! Just like that evil Big Brother guy. At the moment of writing, after episode 3, Taylor's got openly and publicly criticized at the town hall meeting. Typically, she got out of it, like a regular politician, by making an empty promise and ... crying! Edit: Just like a true politician (Bush, anyone?) she has done NOTHING to keep her promise, by the end of episode 4! Edit: it's now episode 9, and she STILL hasn't worked an ounce! What's more, she's proud of that fact! Greg is also worth mentioning. Since he demonstrated so far, the worst reaction to his adversity of not winning the gold star, by acting out and bullying, he fails to see a very basic thing about living with other people: you have to be, up to a degree, likable as well as work hard. Most adults could have told him that the best reaction to losing the gold star would have been to work just as hard and be gracious in defeat. But at fifteen, he's (understandbly) unable to see that. He's for a large part justified in his feeling of being treated unfairly. It's just not good politics to start bullying like he did.Mike, seems hell bent NOT to give Greg a Gold Star. That is petty and low. He thereby has reduced Greg to a 2nd class citizen: "No matter how hard you work, we're gonna give the reward to a little girl anyway!" (whose parents were so irresponsible to let her go away on her birthday, at that!) What's been made clear by the showdowns is that the Green Team must be the worst organizers. Bigger kids should be better at everything: they're smarter, tougher and more experienced. Yet, the Yellow team (on average the youngest kids) doesn't always lose. Kudos to the creators of the showdowns that they reward organisation, as well as strength speed and tenacity.The so-called controversy around "child-labor" is indicative of another feature of America, the overly bureaucratic and rule-obsessed side. I guess the pioneer-myth-side is preferable.

listerfiend510 The way the show worked was interesting. As it was said above the kids needed to make the town work in 40 days. The only problem I had about this was that no matter what...the town would work. The challenges were interesting to watch along with the voting for the gold stars. Obviously the older kids were focused on a bit more but even they had something to contribute to the show. There seemed to be a few stereotypes in the town also...the brat, the brain, the idiot, the wise guy, and all of them made the show what it was. I was kind of looking forward to real struggles but there must have been a crew that took care of the kids and the plot was a lot of drama. Ill have to admit the experience looked really fun and I would have done it myself.

L_Miller This is my favorite show of the 2007 season. I agree with the other comments about the "child labor" commentary - in America you can always find a university professor/media gadfly/reporter desperate for something to talk about somewhere willing to voice clucking concern. Some people reflexively see anything not involving indulgent, extensive and repeated -heart-ing of kids is torture and abuse. And we must be suspicious of the artifices and manipulation of reality television. I don't care for all the Burnett-style time-lapse shots and really dislike the way tyhe general store has started to play up the play-drinking aspects. These kids watch TV too, and when you give them shot glasses for root beer and water you're encouraging them to act out.But for me the watchable part of this show, the thing I tune in for every week, is the way these kids found so many ways to cope, to live together and deal with the situations that came up without all the lies and self-aggrandizement and duplicity most adults engage in.They're so wonderfully honest, and sometimes they like each other and sometimes they hate each other but they crash into things, look around, dust themselves off and move right along. They are all right, and they find their way, and their strength and resilience makes me feel better about the future of the world for an hour on a Wednesday night. All of the episodes have been fascinating to watch - during the election show when Mike realized that every single kid on his team had voted against him, he visibly sank. Then he picked himself up and took his place among those who had voted him out. You know that will be an event that will always be part of his life, and maybe it will make him a better person and maybe it will undermine him, and instead of "ooh, isn't it cool?" I wanted to show this to my nephews and say this kid is demonstrating what you should do in the world when it hands you failure - you sink for a moment, and then you pick yourself up and deal with what's left.I highly recommend this show, at least so far.