This is only tangentially directed at your reply, but this is the kind of statement that I'll sometimes hear other parents say, and it makes me think that they've completely forgotten what childhood was actually like. Like, the idea that normal, fun activities and sports are bad because they bear some abstract resemblance to adult violence feels very contrived and misses what childhood play is about.
Yeah I'm not saying it's bad for the children, but it's unpleasant for me. It seems violence is a concept that gets deeper and uglier as you grow. For young children it's often abstract and maybe harmless. I just read a book to my child that turned out to have violent scenes that horrified me a bit but he barely thought about it and only in technical terms (like where is that artery ripped by the wolf). Same with people that had fun watching horror movies as teens, then find them unpleasant when they're older.
It's not really that abstract. You smash the shit out of a cardboard box and candy comes out. Breaking things is not fun. I also hate youtube videos of people breaking stuff for fun.
I don't know. I broke a lot of things when I was a kid, mostly because I was excited to see how they work, but have no knowledge of their value or how to safely disassemble them. I don't do it as an adult because I now have that knowledge. So don't judge a kid as an adult.
I wouldn't say "violence", rather, an opportunity to demolish something on (good) purpose. Same reason children will be glued to the window if workers outside are going at it with jackhammers, or, better yet, an excavator is crushing and scraping off the asphalt. (Yeah, I remember exactly how awesome that was.)
Those who don't lose the fun of hitting things graduate to hitting things with swords and end up in the SCA (not the coffee one).
I see the point about violence but I'm ok with it because it's based on fun and not anger. Olympic archery, javelin, or even fencing have an obvious past in warfare but today they've become sports.
I can only speak for some of the European versions of SCA-like clubs but there's a lot of pride-flag flying strictly-no-fascists fun activity with a dose of pretending to be children again.
is play not an indirect method of practicing the physiological mechanisms designed for violence ? baby lions are both happy to play with other animals, and to eat them ... which inevitably progresses to predation only ... and humans are the apex predator ...
Children have no concept of violence or empathy or right or wrong. Children often are extremely violent to other kids and sometimes even adults. They kick they scream they punch and they destroy objects. It's on the parents to teach them these concepts and its fun to have settings in which that behavior is allowed.
> Children have no concept of violence or empathy or right or wrong
This is not correct. I remember having a sense of shame when I was 4 when I tried to hurt another kid. Kids will also hide the things they do wrong, because they know it is wrong.
Or they know they'll be told it was wrong. Children start knowing nothing then they slowly absorb what they're told again and again, and what they see around them until they feel it. They go from knowing nothing, to knowing what the adults told them, to internalizing that and feeling it rather than just knowing it (maybe these 2 concepts fully overlap in other people's minds).
But until they do get all of that, they'll spend a lot of time plucking wings off of insects, burning ants with a magnifying glass, pulling the cat by the tail, or throwing rocks at dogs and frogs.
I am an incredibly non-violent person, but have a toddler has really made me work hard to understand the difference in what associations we attach to "violence" as adults.
I try to help him understand this slowly, but a lot of "play" can look violent to my eyes, and I struggle to remember that. A 3 year old just doesn't see it that way yet, and that's fine. But it's hard to remember that in the moment.
That's the problem. Hitting a tied up animal until it breaks is clearly a violent affair, similar how hanging puppets in nooses or putting a doll in a guillotine.
I'm sure that there are kids growing up in places where bullfights are common thinking that torturing and killing a bull in a party-like atmosphere is fine.
I mean yeah, absolutely. But a child growing up in a western society is unlikely to encounter either of those. But generally I do see Pokemon as violent and I wouldn't let my 5 year old watch it quite yet. When he's a bit older I hope he enjoys playing through the original games and the OG tv show with me, but I see parents playing the TV show for their 4-5 year olds and I think that's just too young. Same with Spidey and friends and few other shows made "for children" which absolutely promote violence despite the colourful aesthetic.
This is only tangentially directed at your reply, but this is the kind of statement that I'll sometimes hear other parents say, and it makes me think that they've completely forgotten what childhood was actually like. Like, the idea that normal, fun activities and sports are bad because they bear some abstract resemblance to adult violence feels very contrived and misses what childhood play is about.
Yeah I'm not saying it's bad for the children, but it's unpleasant for me. It seems violence is a concept that gets deeper and uglier as you grow. For young children it's often abstract and maybe harmless. I just read a book to my child that turned out to have violent scenes that horrified me a bit but he barely thought about it and only in technical terms (like where is that artery ripped by the wolf). Same with people that had fun watching horror movies as teens, then find them unpleasant when they're older.
It's not really that abstract. You smash the shit out of a cardboard box and candy comes out. Breaking things is not fun. I also hate youtube videos of people breaking stuff for fun.
This is just you and your peculiar hang up though. Same with the piñatas are making light of violence commenter.
Piñatas are made and designed explicitly to be smashed open to get the treats inside.
We’re not buying brand new iPhones and smashing them, or buying food and making stupid “recipes” for rage bait.
Breaking stuff is fun, as is throwing rocks and building snow forts.
> Breaking things is not fun.
I don't know. I broke a lot of things when I was a kid, mostly because I was excited to see how they work, but have no knowledge of their value or how to safely disassemble them. I don't do it as an adult because I now have that knowledge. So don't judge a kid as an adult.
I wouldn't say "violence", rather, an opportunity to demolish something on (good) purpose. Same reason children will be glued to the window if workers outside are going at it with jackhammers, or, better yet, an excavator is crushing and scraping off the asphalt. (Yeah, I remember exactly how awesome that was.)
Destroying things is part of human experience. Kids got to have that.
I dislike them because someone inevitably gets sacked in the groin.
But that’s half of the fun!
Is it? Or is that just you, projecting. You could argue baseball, golf, hockey, are all violent as you smash a stick into a ball.
Maybe it's projecting but what I see is kids ganging up to break a target that is often human/animal-shaped, and that feels different to me.
Those who don't lose the fun of hitting things graduate to hitting things with swords and end up in the SCA (not the coffee one).
I see the point about violence but I'm ok with it because it's based on fun and not anger. Olympic archery, javelin, or even fencing have an obvious past in warfare but today they've become sports.
I can only speak for some of the European versions of SCA-like clubs but there's a lot of pride-flag flying strictly-no-fascists fun activity with a dose of pretending to be children again.
(Buhurt is a bit more complicated.)
There is no violence, because the pinata is not alive.
There is no more violence in hitting a nail with a hammer.
is play not an indirect method of practicing the physiological mechanisms designed for violence ? baby lions are both happy to play with other animals, and to eat them ... which inevitably progresses to predation only ... and humans are the apex predator ...
Depends. Dolls' tea parties aren't violent.
As a child I did not see it as violent
Children have no concept of violence or empathy or right or wrong. Children often are extremely violent to other kids and sometimes even adults. They kick they scream they punch and they destroy objects. It's on the parents to teach them these concepts and its fun to have settings in which that behavior is allowed.
> Children have no concept of violence or empathy or right or wrong
This is not correct. I remember having a sense of shame when I was 4 when I tried to hurt another kid. Kids will also hide the things they do wrong, because they know it is wrong.
> because they know it is wrong
Or they know they'll be told it was wrong. Children start knowing nothing then they slowly absorb what they're told again and again, and what they see around them until they feel it. They go from knowing nothing, to knowing what the adults told them, to internalizing that and feeling it rather than just knowing it (maybe these 2 concepts fully overlap in other people's minds).
But until they do get all of that, they'll spend a lot of time plucking wings off of insects, burning ants with a magnifying glass, pulling the cat by the tail, or throwing rocks at dogs and frogs.
> ... because they know it is wrong
No. They hide the things they do wrong because they learnt there are consequences and they dont want to get caught.
I am an incredibly non-violent person, but have a toddler has really made me work hard to understand the difference in what associations we attach to "violence" as adults.
I try to help him understand this slowly, but a lot of "play" can look violent to my eyes, and I struggle to remember that. A 3 year old just doesn't see it that way yet, and that's fine. But it's hard to remember that in the moment.
> As a child I did not see it as violent
That's the problem. Hitting a tied up animal until it breaks is clearly a violent affair, similar how hanging puppets in nooses or putting a doll in a guillotine.
I'm sure that there are kids growing up in places where bullfights are common thinking that torturing and killing a bull in a party-like atmosphere is fine.
One of the incredible powers of childlike imagination is the ability to differentiate between hitting a piñata and hitting an actual animal.
As a kid I don't remember, or have pictures of, an animal-looking piñata, they were just colorful boxes full of candy and things.
Do you see Pokemon as encouraging a culture of accepting dogfighting/cockfighting rings?
It literally is a reference to the Japanese hobby of collecting bugs and making them fight each other, so yes?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insect_fighting
I mean yeah, absolutely. But a child growing up in a western society is unlikely to encounter either of those. But generally I do see Pokemon as violent and I wouldn't let my 5 year old watch it quite yet. When he's a bit older I hope he enjoys playing through the original games and the OG tv show with me, but I see parents playing the TV show for their 4-5 year olds and I think that's just too young. Same with Spidey and friends and few other shows made "for children" which absolutely promote violence despite the colourful aesthetic.
That you see the world this way says more about you than the piñata.
Yeah, something very positive I think.