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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
Entertainment
Sophie Quick

Parents fear YouTubers are bringing ‘brain rot’ to Netflix. But are kids wising up to ‘slop’?

A pile of retro old televisions
Parents with a ‘no YouTube’ policy have noticed Netflix Kids is ‘suddenly more shouty, more gamified and more focused on dares’. Composite: Getty Images/Guardian design

Exasperated dad Simon Hooper shakes his fist at the camera in a viral video. “We managed to get rid of YouTube in our household six months ago and the kids are finally OK with it,” he says – but Netflix is “now commissioning YouTubers to make their brain rot and putting it back in front of my kids’ faces”.

The precise “brain rot” he’s referring to is the arrival of a polarising show that’s lighting up parent chats around the globe. And while Salish and Jordan Matter might be new to Netflix Kids users, the father-daughter content creators are familiar to anyone who’s spent any time on the internet.

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