I seem to be on this roll with posts on censorship, etc. lately. I don't know why it's been on my mind (maybe because of the Miley Cyrus and Brooke Hogan posts!!!) but, thanks for rolling with me on this!!!


Since my kids became old enought to talk, I've turned off TV shows that display the parental warnings at the top left that have 'V-violence', 'S-sexual situations'... Just about anything with a TV-14 or over is off limits. I don't worry so much about 'L-language'.

This was one of the reasons that I had to back off on watching Oprah and some of the other after school shows that I used to watch. Now, it seems like I can hardly watch anything if my kids are around since all the shows that I personally like have warnings V and S. LOL...

Here are the ratings:
Television content rating systems - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

My kids are now 10 and 13.


Thoughts to share???... besides telling me that I'm too protective and need to ease up and calm down??? Hah.

Mine are 11 & 14 and I feel your pain. I was pretty vigilant, too, until my oldest got to be about 12. I got tired of never watching what I wanted and figured once they get in middle school they're hearing/learning it all anyway and a lot of that stuff opens up a dialogue. We've been watching the (I think A&E) show Intervention about drug/alcohol abuse & interventions and my kids have learned a lot about what drugs can do to you.

We pretty much watch anything anymore PG-13 and below without a thought. We will see why something is rated R and we monitor that a lot more. But oldest is hanging out with her friends more at their houses, going to high school next year and will be driving soon. I don't want to shelter them from everything and then send them off to college with limited knowledge and then they're suddenly on their own. They need to start being exposed to things now while you still have the ability to explain it and help them make sense of it all.

That's just my opinion and how we're handling our kids.

Lisa

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"It's not having what you want,
It's wanting what you've got"

Exactly!

Parenting has so many difficult decisions as we go through each step along the way. We all learn as we go -- we are at this juncture in our boys' lives when we have to protect them differently then we have during their younger years. We do this by hopefully teaching them to make healthy decisions.

It is nice to be able to discuss these things with people who are in similar stages or who have recently gone through them.

Cuthie, for my 8 and 5 year old, I block anything above pg. for my 13 year old, I block pg14 and above, but then he goes to his friends houses and plays Halo and Grand Theft. We've had (over and over and over, lol) the sex talk, he knows all about drugs (still having those talks too), etc. So I guess this summer I'll take the block off the pg14. Not the rated R though. Not until high school for that one.

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"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God? " ~Epicurus

Glad to know I'm not the only parent out there doing this! My kids are almost 7 and almost 9. We don't usually let them watch anything above PG unless we've screened it first to see why it's rated that way. Some PG doesn't make it's way into our house either. I totally forgot that in the 80's, you could say the "s word" and "a word" in PG movies. That would yield a PG-13 now. I guess I've seen the TV edited versions to much...LOL. I try not to let the kids see mindless violence. We *just* let our 8 year old see Pirates (the first one). We had to explain a lot (he overthinks everything). I don't allow video games that have violence either. I don't let my son play in the houses of the neighbor boys (who are the same age and some younger) because they have "m for mature" games that I won't let my son see (and not play for sometime). We will probably ease up a little as they get older because(as well said already), it gives a great discussion board to talk to your kids. We have watched intervention drug shows (with bad words bleeped...they know that a bleep is a bad word) and we had SUCH a great discussion. I would have no problem with my DS and DD watching a show on natives (who only wear bottoms...if that) because that is their culture and we take about that. Nudity isn't a big deal here but sex is. We were at a local art how where nude photos of women were displayed. My son didn't blink an eye..but another 9 year old we saw there was staring mouth dropped. I don't want that.

So, I've totally confused you probably LOL

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Proud to say I haven't shopped at a Wal-Mart since Sept 2003