What are people teaching their children!? (1 Viewer)

[Kevin Grey]

I wonder how much has changed as a result of the PG-13. I was born in 1975 and PG rated movies with a fair amount of violence like Jaws and Poltergeist would air during the daytime on HBO when I was growing up. Poltergeist still counts as one of the scariest films I've ever seen and I saw it for the first time at age eight at 10am on a Sunday morning.

 

[Garrett Lundy]

Prior to the invention of the personal firearm it was a great mystery as to why normal children would do that thing with their hands, but then Samuel Colt invented the revolver and suddenly everything fell into place.

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

It's a wonder that I turned out as well as I did, my dad let me watch The Exorcist when I was 8 and Halloween when I was 7! But other than spending a week sleeping with my parents, it had no ill effects on me and they are two of my favorite films now.

I knew they were movies back then, not real, they were scary (REALLY scary), but they couldn't hurt me and I knew that because my dad said so and I trusted him. Too ften I think that parents don't bother explaining anything to their kids, they just plop them down and let them watch and play violent video games.

I also think that I was born with a natural abilty to use common sense, no one ever told me never to smoke, but I made a decision very early on that I wouldn't...and never have. I may have been 4 or whatever it was, but I wasn't dumb enough to put something that smelled so bad inside my body. I also have never touched a drop of alchohol, except for cough syrup.

I was blessed with the desire to live a clean life and to listen to my mother and father and didn't want to fall into the traps that my sister and brother fell into, drugs and partying...I learned from their mistakes. I'm 33 years old now, am a nice guy with a good sense of humor, a strong moral fiber and happy outlook on things, all due to my parents strong guidence and a healthy dose of common sense.

Just one individual's story.

 

[todd s]

Its funny you mentioned the Exorcist. About 4 months ago. My son who was 2 1/2 came to sit with me on the couch. So I gave him his first man lesson....Channel surfing. He enjoyed it. Then one of the channels was showing the Exorcist. It was the 2nd half of the movie...when the good stuff is happening. When I tried to change it he got mad. So for about 15 minutes we watched it. Most of it went over his head and I doubt he will have any lasting effects. Although, when he wanted a snack...he kept yelling at me..."The power of Christ compells you!

 

[mark alan]

The kids don't alway follow genetics. You should see my 4 year old daughter pretending to be the Hulk, while wearing a princess gown.

 

[mark alan]

All you have to do is figure out how to spin your head around and you can warp him for life.

 

[Alex-C]

good stuff about early horror movies...
you may find this funny, but there is a serious side to it.
when I was about 8, not really sure now, our family watched Trilogy of Terror together and while it may seem silly or campy to some, especially those who are now accustomed to more visceral and real visions of terror, I was quite tramautized.

I can clearly remember just how scared I was by watching this TV movie. I had nightmares for many months afterwards and I was certain that the zuni fetish voo doo doll lived in our house. I actually prayed to it to not come and get me at night.

I swore to my parents that I had seen it in the corners of the house, under the couch. I mean, I was a well adjusted kid, not given to dramatic tendencies and the like, but this period of my life affected me in a deep and profound way until I very gradually moved on.

I will not make the same mistake my parents made on this one. My mom still apologizes to me 25 years later now, about allowing me to watch this.

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

Alex,
I know exactly how you feel.

I'm 33 and I collect film statues and figures, many of them are horror film related including a full size Chucky doll that stands just mere feet from where I sleep, and I saw a figure of the Zuni Fetish doll in Spencer gifts last year and I didn't buy it.

The Zuni doll is the only horror icon that I just don't want in my house.

 

[Eric_L]

I have an interesting story about that.

I remeber being in line at a grocery store when a young kid, 3 or so, wnated a candy bar from the other aisle where a hospital employee who had just gotten off work was standing. He was black and wearing the standard white 'jammies' common in hospitals. The child asked his mother for the candy bar and when she said "which one?" The child innocently replied "That one, over by the white guy".

The hospital employee laughed and said that was the first, and probably last, time he'd ever been called that.

 

[David Williams]

For me, it was Creepshow. To this day I can't watch that movie and I can't hear the name 'Bedelia' or see Stephen King's picture without thinking of it. Thanks, Dad!

 

[StephenA]

The first time I remember watching a horror type movie was when I was about 3 or 4 and I saw Poltergeist on TV one early morning. While watching it I decided to go wake my mom and and say to her "they're here!" She was asking who was and I said it again. She was freaked out until she saw what I was watching on TV.

 

[MarkHastings]

Even though I was 10 at the time, Friday the 13th FREAKED me out! I had this alarm clock in my room and it was one of those old style ones where the numbers would rotate every minute. The sounds that it made when the next number would come up, was this creaking sound that sounded very similiar to the Jason sound; "Kih kih kih, ahh ahh ahh"

I didn't sleep well for MONTHS!

 

[Lynda-Marie]

Mark, Marvel had a female version of The Hulk called She Hulk. Jennifer Walters, a lawyer, was Bruce Banner's cousin, and she received an emergency blood transfusion from him after being shot by a mob boss.

Originally, I think She Hulk was just supposed to be the Hulk with boobs, but John Byrne, one of Marvel's best artists/writers, made her into a surprisingly good character. Under Byrne's influence, Jennifer always had control of herself (never flipping out and running amok in a rage) and she was an intelligent woman with a wicked sense of humor.

Though I wish you would post a picture of your girl in Princess Hulk mode! THAT must be something!

 

[Malcolm R]

They're not, that's the problem. They're leaving that job to television, music, friends, and other third-party contacts.

Then when their little monsters don't turn out they way they wanted them to, they bitch and complain to anyone who will listen about how none of their children's
(mis)behavior is in any way their fault . . . then file lawsuits as necessary to further shift their responsibility.

 

[Chris]

Yes, parents let their kids watch TV too much. But for all it's goofiness and people who protested, afternoon television when I was a kid was cartoons, just time for a kid to "relax" before we had to get to homework.

I think the problem is that parents swing between one of two opposites:

1. Parents book their kids into so many freaking "go-go-go" activity activity activity that the kid never gets a chance to wind down and take a rest.

2. Parents do nothing, and the kid becomes a vegetable and plays playstation all day.

Nothing wrong with some TV. Something wrong with a lot of it. Hell, I remember coming home, watching GI Joe, then going outside and planning some GI Joe vs. Cobra strategy, baby.

Nothing like a group of kids playing "capture the flag" you know, when there was a real flag and it didn't involve playing a computer game. Or trying to do some "cool jumps" with your BMX bike

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

Chris,
your on the right track in regards to kids playing too many simulated computer games when they could be outside with freinds doing them for real.

I cherish those hot summer nights as a kid outside playing softball, frisbee, capture the flag and my personal favorite king of the hill. Sure we got sweaty, dirty and eaten by mosquitos but hey, we were kids and kids should get dirty sometimes.

Kids are IMO, particularly the older ones, too adult oriented at too young an age, they know how to operate the most complex computer programs, knows what a blog is and has one, gets a cell phone slapped into their hand as soon as they pop out of the womb and uses a laptop instead of a trapper keeper and they don't seem to be interested in playing outside anymore.

All that stuff is great for their education, but it's robbing them of the experience of being a kid. Again, just my opinion.

Dennis Miller said something that nailed it in one of his stand-up routines, he said...

"I was playing a video game with my son the other day, it was a video game of a father and son playing catch."

 

[MickeS]

I hate to say this, but... do you always do what your son wants, if he gets mad? If so, I think you'd be one of the parents the OP is railing against...

 

[Paul D G]

Now, that's not something I would have a problem with. Being not only a movie geek, but a HORROR movie geek there is no doubt going to come a time when I sit down with the boys and we watch some mayhem on the tv. But I will also make sure he understands what's going on, sfx, etc. I won't be six, but I figure by the time he's ten...

Quentin Tarrantino said in an early interview that his mom used to take him to all sorts of voilent movies. There was one she flat out refused to take him to tho he begged over and over and finally she said to him "Because you wouldn't understand it, Quentin."

So, by age ten will he have seen Jurassic Park? Most likely. Wolf Creek? No way.

-paul

 

[Joe McCabe]

I have to be honest here...I think the original poster's shock regarding his little boy wanting to act like...well... a little boy, is more horrifying than the child's desire to pretend he's shooting monsters with a gun.

Our society seems to have been brainwashed by political correctness, to an appalling level. A child wanting to pretend to be a hero and save the day, is not demonstrative of something sinister and evil. It's simply called an imagination.

Reality = In our world, people use weapons to "stop the bad guy". That's just reality.

Children want to pretend that they are bigger than life...that THEY are in control of something. Protecting the "princess" and killing the threat, are male NATURE.
You're trying to stifle nature's design.

Have we become so drunken in political correctness that we think we're smarter than nature now?

So, when your child comes home, and says "Look Mommy, I'm shooting the other kids in school..BANG!! BANG!! BANG!!"
Then, I'd be worried.

My children both under 10, have seen Jurassic Park and King Kong etc...BUT, I show them the making of features on things like that, I explain the process of filmaking...they understand that nothing they have seen is real.

And guess what..no nightmares...no "acting out violently".
They actually act like normal human beings.
Both of my children have never had an incident at school or out of it, and are always complimented on how well behaved they are
My son is in a gifted program, and my daughter has been suggested for the same one next year...just to illusrate that I'm not raising future mass murders here, who are currently making a living by taking other children's lunch money.

A friend of theirs, however, who is sheltered from EVERYTHING (cartoons etc.), is always doing something sneaky...constantly getting in trouble, and has already been kept back a grade.
Not that I think he's an evil kid or anything....I'm just trying to show that this "formula" that the P.C. Crowd has adopted for child raising has alot of holes in it.

 

[DanFe]

Back in the day, I used to play army with sticks. The thing was we all played, including my brothers and sisters. They were into it as much as any of us boys.