Steven N.
Hungarian daily Magyar Nemzet has complained to the National Media and Communications Authority (NMHH) about a non-binary bison in a Netflix animated show, summarizes Telex from a Média1 story.
The paper’s complaint is that the character Fred appears in a show without an age rating, which Magyar Nemzet claims violates Hungary’s media law. Incidentally, another character in the series has two fathers.
However, NMHH, which has recently had a change of leadership, only has jurisdiction over media service providers registered in Hungary. As Netflix’s European headquarters is in the Netherlands, the media authority cannot take action on the matter. The Hungarian Media Act, says NMHH, does not apply to foreign-based media companies.
Magyar Nemzet was also able to crack down on Netflix because of the Hungarian anti-gay law originally intended as anti-pedophile, which has had the effect of restricting media portrayals of those in the LGBTQ community.
The Los Angeles Times notes that Fred is the first such regular character to appear in programming for preschoolers.
[Telex][Photo: Netflix]
