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Thank you, Common Sense Media. Your website helped me get control over what my wife and parents were exposing my four year old daughter to, by establishing a n

Thank you, Common Sense Media. Your website helped me get control over what my wife and parents were exposing my four year old daughter to, by establishing a neutral source of extremely valuable information. It became very easy to set guidelines thanks to your rating system and the wide range of titles reviewed. The new 3D animation style and cutesy animal characters are dangerously subversive. My mom thought I was being a grinch until I made her read a review from CSM of the Alvin and the Chipmunks movie she wanted to show my daughter: "There was a scene where the male Air Marshall (who was following them), woke up in a drunken haze (yes, there was a scene where shots and drinks were involved) with 2 new tattoos and in the bedroom or hotel room with another man (and all that that implied)." There is just no way this stuff is age appropriate. I don't care how far the Overton window has shifted. The Illumination Studios pictures are particularly insidious. I believe their content is generally inappropriate for young children, deleterious to moral character, culturally degenerate, etc. The character design aesthetics are offensive and stupefying. I wasn't surprised to find the same creative oversight involved in the duff Chipmunks pictures. Case in point is Sing, which when I looked it up, it turns out the movie is notorious for culturally stereotyped presentation of Japanese people, and animal singers who shake their butts around. There's no way young children can appropriately contextualize either of these things.

fjsolwmv 8y ago
This is funny to read. Kids stuff has been getting tamer and tamer over the years. Check out the early 2Oth Century Disney cartoons, the original Popeye, etc.
- corey_moncure 8y ago
  Do you suppose a lot of four year olds were watching disney cartoons for hours in their homes in the early 20th century?
- ip26 8y ago
  The audience for the original Disney cartoons, was adults.
cthalupa 8y ago
>There was a scene where the male Air Marshall (who was following them), woke up in a drunken haze (yes, there was a scene where shots and drinks were involved) with 2 new tattoosand in the bedroom or hotel room with another man (and all that that implied)." This appears to be a PG rated movie. This is nothing new. Let's take a step back nearly 25 years and check out things that happen in 'The Nightmare Before Christmas', a movie with the same rating: Finkelstein makes himself a female doll. A detached leg is used to seduce a villain, whom promptly begins to engage in foot play. There is a torture chamber crossed with a casino, where the casino games determine the level of torture inflicted. There's a skinned head, various detached body parts, brains, etc. Let's go back farther! Watership Down - 40 years ago. Doe rabbits fancied by one of the villains are offered up in compensation for his efforts. References to the needs of doe rabbits to sustain the warren Various bits of violence/gore with the rabbits, including a rabbit choking on a snare and coughing up blood Mild profanity - use of 'Damn' and 'Piss', with Fuck replaced with 'Frisk' in several instances. >There is just no way this stuff is age appropriate. I don't care how far the Overton window has shifted. PG as a rating is specifically not any sort of indication to age appropriateness. Emotional development of children in the ages in question is going to vary drastically, and the whole point is that it is then suggested that the parents, knowing best what content their children will be able to handle, make the decision. The maturity level of content in PG movies has, if anything, dropped over the years. Note that I am not questioning your choices on what you find appropriate for your children, just your interpretation of what PG means and whether or not the Overton window has shifted.
- corey_moncure 8y ago
  Thank you! I won't show these movies to my kids (yet), either.
- jlawson 8y ago
  Your comparison examples prove the points your arguing against. Both your examples are about fantastical violence and/or animal predator/prey violence - things that have little or no connection to a kid's real life growing up. It's not hard to dissociate real life from a casino torture chamber and a skinned head. What influence could this have on a child - make him make his own casino torture chamber? Grandparent complained about normalization of heavy drinking, tattooing, casual sex, deviant sex, dangerous sex, and related forms of degenerate behavior. These are things that kids must deal with growing up, and which they will be tempted to participate in, to their own detriment. It's totally different and much more insidious than cartoon or animal predator/prey violence.
dragonwriter 8y ago
> There is just no way this stuff is age appropriate. For a four year old? Sure, the MPAA PG rating fairly firmly indicates that the film contains material likely not appropriate for young children. > I don't care how far the Overton window has shifted. The content allowed for any given MPAA rating has generally gotten less extreme over time, rather than shifting the other way.

fjsolwmv 8y ago

This is funny to read. Kids stuff has been getting tamer and tamer over the years. Check out the early 2Oth Century Disney cartoons, the original Popeye, etc.

corey_moncure 8y ago
Do you suppose a lot of four year olds were watching disney cartoons for hours in their homes in the early 20th century?
ip26 8y ago
The audience for the original Disney cartoons, was adults.

cthalupa 8y ago

>There was a scene where the male Air Marshall (who was following them), woke up in a drunken haze (yes, there was a scene where shots and drinks were involved) with 2 new tattoosand in the bedroom or hotel room with another man (and all that that implied)." This appears to be a PG rated movie. This is nothing new. Let's take a step back nearly 25 years and check out things that happen in 'The Nightmare Before Christmas', a movie with the same rating: Finkelstein makes himself a female doll. A detached leg is used to seduce a villain, whom promptly begins to engage in foot play. There is a torture chamber crossed with a casino, where the casino games determine the level of torture inflicted. There's a skinned head, various detached body parts, brains, etc. Let's go back farther! Watership Down - 40 years ago. Doe rabbits fancied by one of the villains are offered up in compensation for his efforts. References to the needs of doe rabbits to sustain the warren Various bits of violence/gore with the rabbits, including a rabbit choking on a snare and coughing up blood Mild profanity - use of 'Damn' and 'Piss', with Fuck replaced with 'Frisk' in several instances. >There is just no way this stuff is age appropriate. I don't care how far the Overton window has shifted. PG as a rating is specifically not any sort of indication to age appropriateness. Emotional development of children in the ages in question is going to vary drastically, and the whole point is that it is then suggested that the parents, knowing best what content their children will be able to handle, make the decision. The maturity level of content in PG movies has, if anything, dropped over the years. Note that I am not questioning your choices on what you find appropriate for your children, just your interpretation of what PG means and whether or not the Overton window has shifted.

corey_moncure 8y ago
Thank you! I won't show these movies to my kids (yet), either.
jlawson 8y ago
Your comparison examples prove the points your arguing against. Both your examples are about fantastical violence and/or animal predator/prey violence - things that have little or no connection to a kid's real life growing up. It's not hard to dissociate real life from a casino torture chamber and a skinned head. What influence could this have on a child - make him make his own casino torture chamber? Grandparent complained about normalization of heavy drinking, tattooing, casual sex, deviant sex, dangerous sex, and related forms of degenerate behavior. These are things that kids must deal with growing up, and which they will be tempted to participate in, to their own detriment. It's totally different and much more insidious than cartoon or animal predator/prey violence.

dragonwriter 8y ago

> There is just no way this stuff is age appropriate. For a four year old? Sure, the MPAA PG rating fairly firmly indicates that the film contains material likely not appropriate for young children. > I don't care how far the Overton window has shifted. The content allowed for any given MPAA rating has generally gotten less extreme over time, rather than shifting the other way.