yet there weren't any specific cooking questions. weird

feeding implies nourishment in my mind.

Stuffing is what you get at McD's. Too much of that and the kids look overstuffed.

that there are precious few happy married parents in kids' "literature/entertainment".

[link|http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2002/0201fea1.asp|http://www.catholic....2002/0201fea1.asp]

There have always been plenty of Disney movies in which parents were absent or deceased (as in Snow White and The Jungle Book), fathers were overbearing or unreasonable (Peter Pan, Mary Poppins), or mother figures were cruel (Cinderella, Snow White). However, positive portrayals of active parents were far more common in older Disney films than in Disney nouveau. The nurturing mothers in Bambi and Dumbo (where was Jumbo though? -tb), the loving parental couples like Jim Dear and Darling in Lady and the Tramp, and Pongo and Perdita of One Hundred and One Dalmatians find no counterparts in recent Disney animated films. Instead, virtually all modern Disney parents fit into one or more of the following negative stereotypes.

Feeble, ridiculous fathers. Found exclusively in post-Mermaid features, Disney\ufffds feeble fathers tend to be doddering, diminutive, childlike, comical, corpulent, and completely clueless. Certainly they are unable to provide their offspring with meaningful support against the villain\ufffdin fact, often they trust the villain implicitly. Belle\ufffds dotty inventor father (Beauty and the Beast) exemplifies this stereotype, as do Jasmine\ufffds dopey royal sire (Aladdin) and Jane\ufffds dippy naturalist-explorer father (Tarzan). A related stereotype\ufffdfathers who are feeble but not ridiculous\ufffdis embodied by the aged, crippled father of Mulan and, in Atlantis, Princess Kida\ufffds elderly father.

Domineering fathers. Disney\ufffds domineering dads are generally strong and capable\ufffdbut also imperious, impatient, and impossible to please. Failing to understand their offspring, they have "unreasonable" expectations that interfere with their children\ufffds self-actualization. Eventually, these fathers must learn to accept their children for who they are and repent of their overbearing ways. As mentioned earlier, this sort of father was not unknown in older Disney; but no Disney feature before The Little Mermaid laid such emphasis as that film did on the child\ufffds feelings of frustration and resentment over not being understood. Mermaid\ufffds King Triton is the exemplar of this stereotype, which also applies to Chief Powhatan (who imperiously expects Pocahontas to marry Kokoum) and Kerchak, Tarzan\ufffds surrogate ape-father.

Absent fathers. Post-renaissance Disney fathers are less likely to be absentee dads than their pre-Mermaid counterparts, though they\ufffdre such poor parents that that\ufffds hardly a plus. Still, absent fathers in the recent films are not hard to find. Aladdin, Quasimodo, and Tarzan have all lost their fathers. Hercules is separated from Zeus (and of course Hera) from infancy to adulthood. And Simba\ufffds father Mufasa (The Lion King)\ufffdotherwise the recent era\ufffds only really positive, active father-figure\ufffddies while Simba is still a young cub.

Absent mothers. The single most overwhelming feature of parenthood in Disney nouveau is the almost total absence of the mothers. They are absent in far greater numbers than either renaissance fathers or mothers of the pre-Mermaid era. In fact, with only a single exception (Mulan), every single relevant major character in Disney\ufffds recent major releases either loses his or her mother in infancy, or is permanently separated from her during or before childhood, or simply has no onscreen mother at all.

It\ufffds the heroines who are being raised by single fathers with no sign of a mother. The heroine\ufffds motherlessness serves to accentuate her own feminine virtues and independence, since her father is invariably either domineering, feeble, or ridiculous, and there is no "competing" feminine figure to suggest that the heroine needs any support or guidance.

With the male leads, by contrast, a balancing female presence is almost always presented. Simba and Hercules, though separated from their mothers in childhood, are reunited with them in adulthood; Tarzan and Hercules each get surrogate mothers. The only unambiguously involved and positive parent-figure of either sex in the entire Disney renaissance is Tarzan\ufffds surrogate mother, Kala\ufffdand she\ufffds not human.

Benevolent but irrelevant mothers. The mothers of Simba and Mulan don\ufffdt stand out in their respective films. Unlike their husbands, the mothers aren\ufffdt even plot points. Much the same could be said for an irrelevant foster-mother, Alcmene (Hercules. In contrast to pre-Mermaid mothers who took an active role in helping their children deal with adversity\ufffdMrs. Jumbo, Bambi\ufffds mother, Perdita in Dalmatians Duchess in The Aristocats\ufffdthese modern moms are passive. For example, even with Mufasa dead, Simba gone, and her evil brother-in-law Scar tyrannizing the kingdom, Sarabi can only wait around for her son to grow up and return to set things right.
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At least the Incredibles featured an intact nuclear family with both parents working at being engaged.