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TROUBLE: Cartoon accused of stereotyping black people

HIT SHOW Rastamouse was the 'most complained about' children's TV series of 2011, it has been reported.

The BBC children's series, based on a crime-fighting Rastafarian mouse, recieved 200 complaints for allegedly stereotyping black people and for making the Jamaican rodent speak patios.

“I think Rastamouse is offensive. It’s like saying black people are vermin,” Diane Ladydee Clarke wrote on The Voice's Facebook page when the series was first aired.

“Postman Pat = human. Bob The Builder = human. Fireman Sam = human. Rastamouse = a mouse. Call me picky, but all the others belong to the human race – apparently the Rastafarian does not!! With the constant negative portrayals of black people on TV, I cannot accept that this is pure coincidence, and not part of the underlying, subtle racism of middle class white people,” added user Wudi Kojo Bruni.

Rastamouse was first shown on CBeebies January 2010, and despite facing an initial backlash from some audience members, the BBC claim the show has mostly recieved 'positive feedback', and remains one of their 'most popular' childrens programs.

A BBC spokeswoman told the Daily Mail: "This was one of our most popular children's programmes last year."

"We have had a huge amount of positive feedback about Rastamouse, which continues to be a hit with our young viewers and which was consistently in the top ten CBeebies shows viewed on iPlayer throughout 2011," they added.