Do you let your young one watch horror movies?

[Stockdale]

This is such a touchy subject, I can't help but post. I

am in the process of raising three little horror movie junkies - ages 12, 5 and 3. With respect to my littlest two - a good Vincent Price or Godzilla is about as graphic as it gets (well Jurrasic gets tossed in too), but there is a too graphic/violent line. For example, just this weekend, I commented to them over cookies that it'd be a great weekend for a monster movie - and the five year old brought me Hellraiser. I said to him " yah, thanks but we're not watching this one." With the 12 year old - If its R than no, but otherwise - sure. Even some older R films are alright, subject of course to my approval. Its all judgment, Reveal. I think you're doing the right thing by exercising yours. If its too much, its too much no matter what anyone else says.

BTW, under Arkhandus' method, I must really be messed up. I watched a ton a horror films when I was kid. The UHF stations had all Saterday afternoon horror films. Boy, do I miss those.

John

 

[reveal]

BTW, under Arkhandus' method, I must really be messed up. I watched a ton a horror films when I was kid. The UHF stations had all Saterday afternoon horror films. Boy, do I miss those.

John

I grew up on Hellraiser, Nightmare on Elm Street, Last House on the Left, I Spit on your Grave, etc. from the time I was 12. I guess I'm really whacked too.

 

[Cyberzombie]

I don't like most horror movies, so it doesn't come up.

I'm careful about the violence level of a movie more, though. My son has very violent tendancies, so I'm careful what he watches so he doesn't get new ideas. He's also a parrot, so if the movie is heavy in the "F" word, I wait until he's in bed.

 

[Presto2112]

My son is only a little over a year old, we do not let him watch very much television at all (this includes him sort of watching while my wife and I watch TV or movie, if he becomes too interested the TV goes off and we pick it up after he goes to bed).

Recently we had a LotR marathon at the house and had a few friends over. During any of the scenes that involved violence or even some of the orc scenes I would either play with him with his back to the screen or Mom would come get him and play with him in the play room.

I don't even see myself letting him watch those genre of films at three either. It's not that we plan on keeping him from seeing these types of films until he's 18, but we do intend to wait until his cognitive reasoning is a little more mature. (Face it, by the time they hit 13 or 14 they will just head to a friend's house to watch what they want).

So I don't think you are being naive at all....

I haven't even let my 5 year old watch LotR. I'm waiting until he's about 7.

 

[BOZ]

I saw Poltergiest when I was around 8 years old, and I had to have a light on in the bedroom for three years afterward. I slept in the top bunk cause I thought if Gremlins came to get us, they'd get my sister first and I could jump down and run.

see, that's the problem... our 9-year old is ruined for horror movies by having seen so many at such a young age. she described Poltergeist as "boring". i was scared-less when i saw it at that age.

 

[reveal]

see, that's the problem... our 9-year old is ruined for horror movies by having seen so many at such a young age. she described Poltergeist as "boring". i was scared-less when i saw it at that age.

I remember when I was younger, my parents and my aunt and uncle went off the watch Poltergeist (it had just come out on video) but wouldn't let me and my cousin watch it. A few years later I finally saw it and thought it was boring. But by then I had already watched a couple of Nightmare on Elm Street's and Hellraiser, so it was pretty tame in comparison.

 

[IronWolf]

I haven't even let my 5 year old watch LotR. I'm waiting until he's about 7.

Oh and I quite agree. My post probably came across a little confusing. My son was in the play room for the vast majority of the movie with his mom. On occasion when he came in to be with the rest of us he would play with his toys, read a book, etc. All while not even watching the screen. For those few moments his attention was caught by the TV I would either pass him back to Mom to play with or I would help him flip the pages in a book. By no means did my son watch the marathon!

 

[Torm]

The rule around our house is that none of us watch anything the kids can't watch. The idea being that there is a line, and below that fairly liberal line, anything we watch is fine as long as we talk to the kids about it - answer questions, explain things about both content and production that they may not be familiar with yet, etc. - and anything above that line is probably stuff that no one should be watching.

This results in some unusual things, I'll admit. None of us, myself included, have seen any of the American Pie or Scary Movie movies, for example - but my kids (8 and 12) have seen Red Dawn and The L Word. And we all watch a lot of news. And because we talk about all of the stuff we watch, I know more about Pokemon, Digimon, Winx, and Kim Possible than most 30 year old men, and they know more about the Cold War, the War on Terror, and religious and diversity issues than most 8 or 12 year olds - and I'm closer to my kids because of it.

Some people have asked how we can know if a show is okay or not without seeing them before our kids. The answer is, we can't - so when in doubt, we skip it. Plenty of other good entertainment out there. And if we find out in mid show that we made a mistake, well, we're probably just going to end up having a longer conversation for it.

Both of my kids saw the LoTR movies in the theatre. Those are classics, and I took the Major Payne route regarding monsters in the closet for them both a long time ago. Not literally shooting into the closet, but the same idea. And Mommy and I have explained to them about how the only REAL monsters are human, and why they don't usually need to be afraid - and when they DO need to be.

Sorry if any of this seems preachy. I don't mean for it to, but I strongly believe in the First Amendment, and the power of my TV's off switch, and I get irritated when people want to let their kids use random media like some sort of babysitter, and then have the gall to blame that media for anything.

To answer the original question, my family doesn't watch a lot of horror movies - and the ones we do see are mostly psychological horror. But I think whether it is okay or not depends on whether you talk about them or not, and your attitude towards it.

P.S. to Arkhandus: I'm glad to see that you're showing concern for kids - it shows you are noble in your intentions - but honestly, if you ever have kids, you'll get a LOT better results treating them like normal PEOPLE and trying to guide them best you can with experience and knowledge, than treating them as some sort of organic machines that have to be programmed a certain way.

 

[BOZ]

you don't even watch adult programming when the kids are not around? don't deprive youself now.

 

[Darth K'Trava]

We never saw any movie that wasn't rated PG for the longest time. So no horror for us. I did see one one time (don't recall how old I was at the time) but I didn't get scared from it. But I didn't see any point in seeing any movie that was *supposed* to be scary and wasn't. But if the family went out, it was to a PG-rated movie. Nothing more. It wasn't until much later before we could see PG-13 stuff. Anything R-rated, I saw on my own after I was old enough to watch it.

I think my sister is a bit more liberal with what her kids see and hear. I don't know the movies she shows them but her daughter (12 yr old) listens to Eminem and some other rapper I don't recall the name of. But I doubt she gets the censored version of the cds..... :\