Scary Movies

Many parents we know are indifferent about what they let their kids watch. Not us. It's not uncommon for Bethany (almost a teen) to call from a friend's house to ask me to check the internet about the appropriateness of a movie everyone wants to watch. More than once, that simple call was enough for her friends to change their selection without much (if any) overt pressure.

I'll admit we're pretty conservative in what we allow into our kid's passive gray matter. But we've further edited our intake since the arrival of Neti and Meke.

For reasons we're not too sure about, neither one of them has shown much stomach for anything scary. Our scary movie pile now includes the likes of Ice Age, Toy Story, and Bambi. Finding Nemo is now classified as a horror flick (it has sharks, a bloody nose, AND the pelicans try to eat the main character!).

A trip to Daddy's lap is common if the climax of a DVD is more intense than "Oh no, Alpo has lost the letter M".

About a month ago a Rated G new release from the video store sent Neti screaming out of the room with her eyes covered. She sobbed for 10 minutes with her head buried in her pillow before regaining control.

It's hard to tell exactly what's going on. Is it simply that American kids more desensitized at a young age than Ethiopian kids? Or does the cartoon conflict on the screen somehow trigger bad memories? We haven't detected a pattern. In the meantime we still filter their input.