As updates continue to retabulate the death and injury tolls, much has yet to be determined about last night's midnight mass shooting at a showing of the latest offering in the Batman trilogy.
Here's a video from BBC News including one eyewitness account:
Young children, including, reportedly, a mere babe in arms of only 3 months of age, and another only 6 years old, were in that theatre when the armed gunman first lobbed a smoke device of some sort such as a teargas bomb, into the audience and began firing on the crowd.
So not only were very young kids out in a crowded theatre well past their bedtimes, but they were being exposed to the often violent nature of every superhero epic currently being churned out by Hollywood. I have to ask myself, What were their parents thinking?
There is absolutely no excuse for this. A young child's psyche is a precious, fragile, impressionable treasure, which must never be exposed to too much in the way of stimulation, particularly after dark. Their minds cannot process the darker nature most adults can handle in this world.
The fact that there is now a real shooting connected with such a viewing is too tragic for words.
This is no time to be fussy, but you'll have to excuse the mom in me for finding such circumstances simply inexcusable. No infant is ready for all that noise and mayhem such as movies make so real today. And no child under 11 ought to be out for so late a showing. This was a midnight showing (set to be over after 2 AM or so) of a film based on a comic book hero whose adventures include graphic depictions of dark and dangerous circumstances no child under 11 needs to see anyway.
Yet, we in our country seem set on allowing our kids to be "in the know," to have the latest gadgets and toys, and to see the latest popular movies and TV programming, regardless of any consequences to the forming minds between their small ears.
Yes, what has happened is awful, horrifying. My heart goes out to one and all who may have endured this incident or any of the fallout from it.
For me, personally, however, this has also pointed up what I perceive to be a current poor habit among parents in general: to encourage the enjoyment of violent behaviors on screen as though it hardly mattered to those too young to properly process such forms of entertainment.
I would heartily urge every parent to please reconsider their ideals surrounding this very issue.
After all, you wouldn't expect your child's mind to fully understand something as grown-up as a chess game, so why assume s/he is then capable of absorbing and processing the real meaning of violent behavior such as gratuitous violence on the screen?
And if you cannot afford a babysitter along with the expense of going out to the movies (and let's face it, it ain't a cheap form of entertainment nowadays), you might consider doing a babysitting trade with trusted family members or friends.
Just please don't think it does not matter. Eventually, I feel certain our generation will come to regret their choices to expose young children to the mass media in such an offhand manner.
Thanks for reading.
Please excuse my overall absence and/or lack of enthusiasm for responding quickly to any comments here. I am soon to move, and have much work left to do.
Thank You.
Peace
PW
Sources:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9Toh7YVzp4&feature=watch_response
http://gma.yahoo.com/mass-shooting-colo-movie-theater-14-people-dead-085940786--abc-news-topstories.html
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Jacob Sugarman
Hesham A. Hassaballa
pastvoices
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Delorys Welch-Tyson
Salon.com
Comments
I'm sorry about what happened in that theater but I don't get why those kids were at a midnight viewing, unless the parents were figuring the kids would sleep through it.
It is shocking, is it not?
I just stopped by briefly to see if there even was a comment or comments.
My Ironic Moment of the Day:
The ad that was running in this page was for Dark Knight.
I feel it should be illegal, considered a form of child abuse or neglect, if you will, to subject any child under a certain age to such a show, least of all keep them out that late for something far from essential to their wellbeing.
Anybody else see it that way?
I agree with you entirely, PW.
My Youngest begged to go see Dark Knight last night at the midnight showing with a friend, he's 14 1/2. I said no for all the reasons above, and told him he could go during the day, with his older brother (22) only. You just can't erase certain things from the mind...and this particular child would have been affected more than his brothers' at the same age...parents have to be aware.
I also get being worn down and letting them go see a too-violent movie -- or taking them with you so the parent can go -- but it's not worth the consequences as you're completely right, a damaged psyche is much harder to repair than it is to protect.
As far as kids being out late I'm always surprised at the number of small and young children accompanying parents in the grocery store in the middle of the night. Why one parent isn't home with the child already tucked in I don't know.
Just Thinking made a great point, each child is different and there's no way to know how they'll be affected. One may develop fears and anxieties, another may become numb and have no empathy to the suffering of others, and yet another may act violently when they see the attention it gets. Relying on luck that your child will not respond negatively is not the best form of parenting.
When raising my own children I noticed that long before they could talk they were soaking up everything happening around them. As the techies say it's GIGO, garbage in, garbage out. It seems many are just too lazy or self-absorbed to consider the effects of many things they expose their children to. The poor kids.
l'Heure: You make a valid point here. It's a crapshoot,really. And such a gamble is liable to come out badly in the end.
Two parents of my own generation once thought their kids' minds weren't so easily influenced by violent thoughts as long as they got exposed to the violence in films and TV from pretty young. They called it "de-sensitizing." A ghastly thought, when you come right down to it. I recall their young ones (age 4 1/2, at the time, one of them) watching all of the Terminator. I was really dismayed at this, and said so at the time. This was not my policy at all.
They are well adjusted adults now, those kids, yet they could just as well have turned out to be wounded by the upset engendered by such early viewing of the adult content their folks then allowed for them. Others (whose parents did likewise) I might mention grew up insensitive and gruff, rude even, lacking in a certain level of feeling for the sufferings of others.
Just Thinking...: I know of no infant which could tolerate ear plugs for any longer than it takes for you to say the word "knife."
And the flashing lights and mind-numbing sound effects in most theaters can only be guarded against somewhat, if at all, in any child's case, no matter how small.
Just a thought.
...yeah, NO.
Now that I'm thinking of it, that theatre I went to the concert to also had a back room for Moms and infants to sit where it was more quiet for films (not that I sat there for the concert, it wasn't available)...they don't build theatres like that anymore, and still....
However, a movie theater is a public place. Questionable parenting practices (like letting kids stay up past their bedtime in the summer to see a violent action movie) has nothing to do with a deranged gunman in a theater. It's really irrelevant.
A theater is a public place. Kids are legally allowed to be there with their parents. This discussion, in my opinion, is irrelevant. Should the theater put up a sign that says "After 8:00 p.m., all children should be home in their beds or else risk being shot by a deranged, armored gunman who has tear gas and an assault rifle"? No.
The two happenings--a mass shooter and kids up past their bedtime at a questionable movie--are not related.
I could have been dancing naked down the aisle with a giant parrot on my head, and I don't deserve to be shot for it. Advisable? No. Polite? No. Socially acceptable? No. But deserving of being shot by a deranged gunman? Also no.
Just Thinking: I think we have an interesting and friendly semi-debate going here.
:)
I see a significant difference in content between a violently themed movie with special effects intended to shake us in our seats and a reggae concert. Every bit of reggae music I've ever been exposed to has a gentle, loping feeling, a a beat which does not shift suddenly, and no shrieks of fright or amazement. Perhaps the crowd may cheer at a concert such as you mention here, but they are gladdened by the performers' work, never startled nor shocked. And aren't the lyrics mostly about peace and freedom? A far cry from angry snarls or threats of death and violence.
As for one 14 1/2 year old's psyche being adversely affected by superhero style violence-oriented films, while another's might seem fine, I would have to disagree with you. As young minds form, their synapses are set into different patterning than is relevant toward personal growth and mindful ways of thinking whenever exposed for too long or often enough to such fare.
Kids must process whatever they experienced the day before within their dream sleep. If that's crowded out by thoughts of heavy violence, then they'll have to process that too. I feel strongly it crowds out other ideas which may be far too important to be missed.
Just a theory.
Is it justifiable to take any child under the age the film's been rated for, no matter the hour? This may be debatable.
I feel strongly about that very issue, and am stating a personal opinion. While you are welcome to do the same, it seems to me you've missed the point of my discussion by a mile.
Some content is neither appropriate for young minds nor is it necessary to take one's kids to anything they are under the age limit for.
We could even argue that your examples have absolutely nothing whatever to do with the psychological ramifications I see as being inherent in choosing to teach children it's all right to blow someone's head off. Children under certain ages are unable to see the difference between what is real and what is unreal. Ask anyone in the legal system about it, and you're certain to hear kids' testimony is often considered skewed for that very reason, and is generally not admissible in any court. Because they can't know the difference, it is better to expose their minds to ideas which further them, and help them to be patient, loving, and considerate with each other.
How do violence-oriented dialogues help children to adjust to one another? GIGO, as was mentioned here before.
Thanks for stopping by.
And that one's first thought upon hearing of this horrific event would be, "What were those parents thinking?", as opposed to, say, "This mass shooting spree is absolutely horrible and insane" is somewhat puzzling to me.
This has become quite the tangent... : )
I can only say what my now adult kids say about it themselves, as far as kids processing movies differently and also what they fear that is different, depending on the child -- they both have said they were fine about the few violent films they saw with their Dad and knew it was fake, but for one of the sons , he was haunted by the visit to the zoo for years...
As for underlying desensitizing or violence-producing behaviors, they are still underlying if they're there as far as I can tell. That said, if it had been up to me, neither of them would have seen any violent movies at all as children.
As for this topic being relevant to the shooting, it would be the main topic of conversation everywhere if one of the small children had been killed last night.
I see this post as an important aspect of parenting and safety in general to consider, if not a tangent from the insanity of the shooter and the shooting itself.
There's something important to debate here, I think.
Jeanette: This was an afterthought, not the first thought for me at all. It came only once I'd read for several articles and viewed a few video reports on the subject. I kept on hearing that small children had been in that theater until it dawned on me just how much I really do disagree with young ones viewing anything that violence-oriented.
As I also was by no means the first one to post on the subject of the shooting, I chose to address the issue mentioned, as a sort of sidebar to the whole of the story.
And, no, I never suggested that the shooting was caused by any past psyche damage owing to under age viewing of any violence-oriented media.
I simply point out how I personally see such choices as many parents are making thee days, as well as my own theory on the brain's need for quiet subject matter at bedtime.
Ardee: Are we blaming mothers in particular for anything in this case? I say "parents," meaning anybody raising young children.
Also, this is a discussion of the ramifications, not a mere putdown of moms who may feel fine taking their under age kids to violence-oriented films.
I believe I cited one family whose kids are grown and apparently okay today.
I personally do not agree with it, but I'm not in this to tell everybody how to raise their own children. I am adding an opinion which I have formulated after years of experience with my own and other people's children.
Just Thinking: Your wee one obviously was a laid back child, to have tolerated earplugs at so young an age. Socks were an issue in my brood LOL. Couldn't keep those little toes covered for the life of me!
Fear is one thing.
Attitude and basic feelings about others are an entirely different matter.
But I'm glad we can agree at least somewhat.
Thanks so much for staying the course.
It truly is amazing how few questions really have so far been answerable in connection with this horrific incident.
I wonder if we may ever know what causes someone to turn so violent so surprisingly?
I do feel strongly weapons experts should look into how we might protect ourselves better through limiting public access to the kinds of rapid fire weapons this man had at his disposal.