Well Blade is a borderline type violent film, as the violence is comic book in style and mostly against non-human monsters. Still it would be an unusual 8 year old who could enjoy such a thing without nightmares. I don’t think the act of taking such a young child to see Blade III (if it is like Blade I,II) would indecate bad paerenting, perhapse the child has allready seen the earlier Blade films and enjoyed them.
Jeebus! Go to sleep and work and fall 57 posts behind!
Try following along in context. Aesiron was making a blanket statement that I am not affected by how others raise their childen. That is obviously false as we all interact in society. I am right now being affected by how your parents failed to teach you reading comprehension. Oh, and nice straw man about how somehow I claimed that it affected my freedom. I’ll have to look between the lines to see where I suggested that.
Yes, it sure would be a load of horseshit. Had anyone suggested interfering. But Hmmm. No-one in this thread did.
Wait. So interfering would be bad. But having an opinion and not making a scene in a public place is chicken shit? Or is it only chicken shit since she vented here? So many rules you have.
Wow. It’s amazing how many people seem to think that although the child’s dad, who lives with him (at least sometimes, I imagine) and raise(s/d) him, doesn’t know anything about what’s OK for his son, a bunch of people sitting at their computers on a message board know everything about what the kid can and can’t watch.
It’s clear–from the range of personal stories here, if nothing else–that violent movies have different effects on different children. As we don’t know the child in question, we thereby have no way to know whether or not the movie was appropriate for him.
Oh sure, quality father/son time, while Dad’s chomping and belching his way through the horror movie and the kid’s sitting there in the dark.
Parent/child bonding generally involves a bit more in the way of human interaction, not just two zombies occupying adjoining seats.
Wow. Is there any aspect of other people’s families on which you are not an expert? You know what movies are appropriate for all children, including ones you’ve never so much as clapped eyes on, and now you’re the arbiter of what’s “real” family bonding. Would that I were as wise as you.
I won’t say what that child should have been doing. I don’t know. All I’m saying is that if Blade III is like the first one, no child of mine will ever see it at age 8.
While it sure would have given ME nightmares, that’s not really the issue. Nor is it the idea of understanding real from make-believe, I’m pretty sure all 8 year olds get that. I just think they could stand to be a little older before seeing such a dark depiction of the world.
Wow. You aparently can’t tell the difference between make believe with actors and special effects and real life with actual people being murdered. That’s pretty fucking stupid. That’s actually amazingly stupid. Tell me, how many times a week do you have to throw out a pair of pants because the idiot clothing manufacturers put the zipper in the back?
Did I say anything about YOU? No. Nor did I say everyone who takes their kids to Blade (which as others mentioned is more cartoony than anything else) is unfit. I was answering the statement of “parents should trust the judgment of their children” (paraphrased). PERIOD.
You had it right with your first thought. No, of COURSE not, it was merely an example of the fact that parents need to use their OWN, not their children’s, judgment.
Kids very frequently think THEY are 'ready" for things that we know they’re not. It doesn’t mean that they’re dumb, or any other negative attribute. Calm down, I’m certainly not advocating swaddling them in bubble wrap.
Good God, that is a GUIDELINE, hence the with accompanying adult specification on the warnings. And you can cease and desist with the “stupid/dumb” etc 8 year old crap. Nowhere did I suggest that they’re stupid because they might want to see something that they’re not quite ready for, or rather that their parents and others feel that they’re not quite ready for.
Answered this above.
:o Sorry for saying “he” when reffering to you.
What seems strange to me is that people in this thread seem to be arguing that the parent is ALWAYS right. Do they think that there are actually no bad parents in this country? No parents who would actually make poor decisions for their children? You know of course that there is no exam needed to be a parent, no minimum standards, no licensing procedure. Parents throughout time have abused and mistreated children. Parents sometimes deserve to be criticized.
Parents can and do make bad judgements. I am not perfect. I have done things that I regretted. Parents do take children to movies they are not ready for. I have personally seen children leaving in tears from movies. This particular 8 year old at Blade III? May or may not be a good idea. But it would be the height of arrogance for any parent to insist that they are always right and always know what is best for their child.
Now as to the “I went to horror movies and it never hurt me” crowd… Thanks for the useless anecdotal data point. You see, people do actual research on the effects of media violence on children. Things like double blind studies, hormone measurements, brain scans, etc. You know, actual science? And the science clearly shows that violent movies and video games increase symptoms of agressiveness in children. My ex neighbor is a researcher in this field. Whenever someone from his office is interviewed for the news, they have a professor talk about their research and then rebut with some games programmer who says “Never hurt me!” If this thread is still going tomorrow I will get the researcher to send me a good reference page.
No, violent movies are not going to turn a child into a raving murderer. But violent movies are also not benign. A child is the composite of the things he learns. I happen to think that if you are going to teach a child about violence it might as well involve a good lesson too, like killing something to eat it. Not the lesson that “Random beheadings are cool. Nothing gets your blood pumping like a little f the old ultraviolence!”
Fine and dandy, and applicable to individual situations where one knows something of the parties involved, not, you know, knee jerk speculation on an Internet message board about people whom even the OP doesn’t know.
May or may not, I agree. NOBODY in this thread, on either side of the issue, has any clue weather it is or isn’t in this particular instance. Baring compelling evidence that a given parent is encouraging or allowing something that is harmful to a specific child, a parent’s right to raise their children as they see fit should be unencumbered and everyone else should MYOB.
It’s even more arrogant for someone who knows neither the parent nor the child to insist that they ever know what is right for stranger (baring the obvious like “Don’t put your baby in the fire”.).
Do you have a cite for this beyond an ex-neighbor? I would be interested in reading these studies.
Me, too. I grew up with a steady diet of both classic and newer horror movies, and I swear I’ve never worn a hockey mask and carried a machete at the same time; I don’t ever remember demurring at the chance to drink… wine; I shave when there’s a full moon (but that’s pretty much every day); I knew a guy named Frank who drank beer from giant cups made in Germany, but he ran out of money doing that, so his electricity was cut off; I tried making a glove with knives, but instead, ended up with a mitten and chopsticks; and, finally, I can’t carry a note for anything, so the bitch, Christine, dumped me.
See? Normal.
You know, if you’re going to chastise people for “useless anecdotal data points,” you’d better have something more substantial to back it up than “my ex-neighbor is a researcher.”
You know, if you’re going to chastise people for “useless anecdotal data points,” you’d better have something more substantial to back it up than “my ex-neighbor is a researcher.”
I’m a parent who already trusts my child’s judgement, and he’s not even two yet. You think peas are icky? Okay, eat some carrots instead. Dinner time and you’re not hungry? Fine, you can have a light snack before going to bed. When he thought he was big enough to get onto the couch by himself, I let him try. It took him some time and he fell down once or twice, but he got it. Same with stairs; I was there Just In Case, but he got all the way up on his own. Surprised the shit out of me, too. I really didn’t think he’d do it.
And these two are mutually exclusive?
I do agree that kids are often wrong. In this particular situation though, I don’t agree that a parent can simply “know” that their child isn’t ready, and I definitely don’t think parents should stop their kids from trying new things, either because they are not ready, or because they assume their child isn’t ready.
I think that parenting ought to be a collaborative effort between the parent(s) and the child and that, at the age of 8, there is no reason a kid can’t be involved in his own entertainment. I’m in no way suggesting that an 8 year old (or a child of any age) should be able to do/see whatever he wants; I’m just not going to be so dismissive about things based on age and the idea that I somehow Just Know. I’ve got less than 2 years of experience with this whole parenting gig, so I guess I’ll have to wait and see how it all works out.
Parenting, like religion and politics, is one of those “agree to disagree” things, so I think we should just do that.
Deal?
Yeah, yeah. Like I said, it doesn’t turn you instantly evil. It has been shown to increase agressiveness. Increased agressiveness is not a wonderful desirable quality in a child, but it also does not instantly get them put in jail for life.
Since there is interest I’ll send him an e-mail. I’d rather not pick a website myself because, as with most controversial topics, there is a lot of bogus research out there as well as good. I’ll have him point out a few bad sites as well as the good ones.
The argument had seemed to me to be expanded beyond the OP slightly. It was annoying to me that people were claiming parental infallibility. Arguing that the parent might actually be wrong does not instantly imply that the casual observer was right.
You keep making those claims, but I’d first like to see those studies, how they’re set up, how they’re defining “aggressiveness” and whether I agree with them that it is a bad thing. So, I’ll just wait until your friend e-mails back.
I don’t need any sites he considers to be bad ones; I just need studies which support your position.
Well, this is the Pit. I’m not sure if it is legal to post actual scientific papers here, but, here is what he sent me. A couple of websites with loads of papers, and a few recommended papers.
www.psychology.iastate.edu/faculty/dgentile/publications.htm
http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/faculty/caa/recpub.html
Gentile, D. A., Lynch, P. J., Linder, J. R., & Walsh, D. A. (2004). The effects of violent video game habits on adolescent aggressive attitudes and behaviors. Journal of Adolescence, 27, 5-22.
Anderson, C. A., & Bushman, B. J. (2001). Effects of violent video games on aggressive behavior, aggressive cognition, aggressive affect, physiological arousal, and prosocial aehavior: A meta-analytic review of the scientific literature. Psychological Science, 12, 353-359.
There’s a bunch more on these sites. I have not read most of these, but I personally know a couple of the researchers and have great respect for their intelligence. They are also always willing to accept any vaild criticisms, so fire away if you see something fishy.
The American Psychiatric Association.
The American Academy of Pediatrics.
A couple good places to start.