How old before they understand and we have to find a new Sunday afternoon activity?

galvanizersbaby

FairyElephant wrote: »

galvanizersbaby wrote: »

Sorry Galvanisersbaby, I must spend too much time on boards as I'm using too many initials for things!
BM = Birth Mother, they are my StepKids (DSS= Darling Step Son).

We had them to stay with us quite a lot of the time when they were younger, and their Dad & I decided we would set our own rules for them while they were with us. DH didn't approve of a lot of his Ex's rules (or lack of) which became very slack after they split up, but we didn't say anything to the kids, just let them know the rules of our house!

Right I see so you mean their mum - I would never have guessed BM meant birth mother - I would imagine that situation to be quite difficult for everybody
Myself and my ex husband are divorced and we are lucky that we both agree on the same set of rules where it comes to our kids - I would imagine it would be quite confusing for them if we didn't!

liney

We went to see Wall-E at the pictures earlier in the year, with my son who was nearly 4. The little boy who was much older then him in the row infront started crying when he thought Wall-E was dead; my son leant over and said 'Don't cry, he's not really dead. And it's only pretend anyway' So it depends on the child i think.

We watched non violent/sexual movies wth adult themes when DS was a babe, and i have recently let him watch Willow, which some may say it unsuitable. He loves anything fantasy based, it's a story about good winning over evil, and i'm pretty sure he's not scarred. LOL.

Lunar_Eclipse

GracieP wrote: »

children don't generally put two and two together when they are watching tv.

Whilst that may well be the case for some children, I think it is a thoroughly inaccurate generalisation. Children are like sponges and as parents we should assume they take it all in.

TV programmes and movies are graded U, PG, 12, 15 etc for a reason. Whilst one can disagree on the odd occasion, I don't understand why any parent would thoroughly ignore the classifications, set by professionals with the back up of research that we are unaware of.

Triggles

I understand the reasoning for the age ratings, however, I do feel every child is different as well. Our 2 yr old grandson was frightened by a Dr Who episode that his mum was watching. Our 2 yr old son, however, will sit and play with his toys with his back to the television (because he likes to line his toys up in front of the fire guard) and ignore the programme. The only thing that gets his attention when grown up tv is on (including news and such) is commercials. :rotfl: That being said, we rarely watch anything that we don't feel is appropriate in front of them anyway. I look at the age guides, but honestly we make our own decisions on what is appropriate for our child. We did this with our older children (24, 22 yrs), and it worked just fine. We are lucky in that our toddler goes to bed at 6pm, so that leaves us the rest of the evening to watch things we don't want him to watch anyway, plus the benefit of having Sky Plus so you can record programmes and watch them later. We've had a couple gifts of DVDs that were a bit old given to DS as gifts, and we just put them aside for when he's a bit older or more ready to watch them.

Katie789

Triggles wrote: »

. We are lucky in that our toddler goes to bed at 6pm, so that leaves us the rest of the evening to watch things we don't want him to watch anyway.

How do you manage that? Do they sleep through the day? Or just get up at the crack of dawn? V jealous

jellyhead

arthur_dent wrote: »

Horrors from the Eighties would now barely be 12 rated

I've got Gremlins on video, and it's a 15!

AnnieM_3

Gremlins is SCARY! I'm 30 and I've still only seen it once (when I was a kid) cos it upsets me!

Someone else mentioned Ghostbusters - that scene in the library? :eek:

gairlochgal

Very interesting discussion.

One thing I'd add is not to forget the power of the off button. I have told my kids (8 and 11) that there will be things they are not allowed to see for very good reasons and if I see one coming, I just step in and turn it off and will explain why I've done it. They are both fine with that. I also have a rule that it goes off if one of them is scared - not allowed to taunt the other one into staying with it.

DD1 has friends who have been going to 12s since they were 7-8 and she minds a little bit about not having carte blanche. But on the other hand she went to Beowulf for a friend's birthday and came home and cried all night, so she's not keen to go to all the violent ones.

To the OP, I'd say yes you should find family friendly stuff if you can. Maybe you could work on things like comedies you've missed. I have watched stuff like Carry On and (original) St Trinians with my two. Also loads of good vintage TV comedy is easy to get hold of - we watch Dads Army, French and Saunders, Father Ted, My Family very happily together and recently discovered Some Mothers Do Have Em. I see it as a good antidote to all the US stuff they watch when they have control of the telly!

The scariest episode I've had with my kids so far is when DD1 was 6 and a classmate threatened over several days to come to our house and stab her and told horrible stories about killing another child. (This was in a tiny private school, btw) My DD was terrified and talked about killing herself so she wouldn't have the fear hanging over her. When it was all looked into, turned out the classmate had seen a violent video with her big brother, was hugely troubled by it, and this was how she was acting out. So I am pretty protective on this kind of thing.

vegankris

GracieP wrote: »

Well I watched it as a child and grew up to work for charities like Oxfam and Barnardos. I'm a qualified first-aider and I regularly stop to help strangers (human of animal) in difficulty. I have on occasion put my safety in jeopardy to help others. I have also been pushed out of two jobs (with large corporations) because I stood up for the rights of others in my capacity as shop steward. So obviously it made absolutely no difference to me.

I think you have under-estimated your children's ability to differentiate tv from reality and your ability to help them understand.

QFE- i think many people have a tendency to underestimate their children's intelligence in general. Makes me wonder if they forget being that age themselves?

spinning_hamster_wheel

No way would my son be allowed to watch an outright horror and I was amazed the amount of parents who brought their very young children to see the Dark Knight when it came out, although I suppose there was very few actual scenes of nastiness, but I'm amazed that film got a 12 rating.

I think chastising parents who allow their kids to watch soaps is a bit much (we don't watch soaps because I can't stand them!), even Tom and Jerry has scenes with Jerry battering Tom with a frying pan or Elmer Fudd wandering around with a gun trying to shoot a wabbit. I agree with the above poster, do not underestimate your childs intellegence!

Some kids films like Madagascar and Shrek have slight innuendo but kids dont focus on that they just enjoy the story, its only adults with perverse minds that think about it! I remember seeing Carry On films when I was quite young and finding it funny, the adult stuff just went way over my head and I enjoyed the comedy.