6, 1988, Donald Wildmon, head of the American Family Association (AFA), alleged that "The Littlest Tramp" depicted cocaine use, instigating a media frenzy. Concerning Bakshi's involvement with Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures, the AFA claimed that CBS "intentionally hired a known pornographer to do a cartoon for children, and then allowed him to insert a scene in which the cartoon hero is shown sniffing cocaine." Bakshi responded, "You could pick a still out of Lady and the Tramp and get the same impression. Fritz the Cat wasn't pornography. It was social commentary. This all smacks of burning books and the Third Reich. It smacks of McCarthyism. I'm not going to get into who sniffs what. This is lunacy!" Bakshi defended the episode, saying, "I despise drugs. I would be out of my mind to show a cartoon character snorting cocaine in a cartoon", and stating that Wildmon had interpreted the scene out of context. "Mighty Mouse was happy after smelling the flowers because it helped him remember the little girl who sold it to him fondly. But even if you're right, their accusations become part of the air we breathe. That's why I cut the scene. I can't have children wondering if Mighty Mouse is using cocaine." On CBS's order, Klein removed the sequence from the master broadcast footage. Wildmon claimed that the edits were "a de facto admission that, indeed, Mighty Mouse was snorting cocaine". Bakshi agreed to the removal of the offending 3½ seconds from future airings of the episode because of his concern that the controversy might lead children to believe that what Wildmon was saying was true. Wildmon's group then demanded the removal of Bakshi but, on July 25, 1988, CBS released a statement in support of him. Influence and legacy The show was considered revolutionary at the time and, along with 1988's Who Framed Roger Rabbit, inspired a wave of animated shows that were much zanier than those that had dominated children's animation in the previous two decades. It is credited by some as the impetus for the "creator-driven" animation revolution of the 1990s. It was a huge springboard for many cartoonists and animators who would later become famous, among them John Kricfalusi (creator of Nickelodeon's The Ren & Stimpy Show), Bruce Timm (producer of Warner Bros. Batman: The Animated Series), Jim Reardon (writer for Warner Bros. Tiny Toon Adventures and Disney/Pixar's WALL-E, and director