You didn't say exactly what you were watching...correct age for what?

I am one with really little ones,all under 5 and we can't even watch tv after 7 at night with all the bad words, exposed parts and inuendos. What ever happened to little house on the prairie and the brady bunch.

Stacie
(who is only 33 but still shocked))

I'm shocked, too. My kids are 29, 28 and 21 but they're still too young to see some of this crap on TV. I guess I *am* a prude, but the stuff on NETWORK TV today would have had an R rating in the 1970s.

I miss the GOOD old shows, like Dick Van Dyke and Andy Griffith and Lassie. Seriously, I thought those shows were much better than the drivel we see today.

My eight year old grandson was here to stay for a while after christmas and we are very careful about what he watch when he is around. But..he also knows what is off limits and will tell us if it is something he's not supposed to see

I AM a prude!!! I detest most of the garbage on tv,especially the sitcoms.

I'm talking shows with adult humor and the sexual remarks..even tho it was 'bits and pieces' scattered throughout..I thought it was too much.

My son brought these movies/shows with them so it's like they hadn't seen them before. He assured me it was no problem..well, it was for me, but I'm just the Gran. :)

Oh yes, my grandson turns 11 today and his dad was hoping to find him 'That 70's Show' as a gift. Sorry, but I wouldn't have let my 11 yr. old watch that type of show.

I'm totally with you!

When my boys were growing up, (now 26 and almost 28) I wouldn't let them watch the Simpsons! Ohhhh they were mad at me, but that was ok...it was my job. There were alot of shows I didn't allow.

It isn't just the movies or the after 7/8pm shows, it's daytime tv as well. Ever watch a little of Dr Phil, even Oprah, let alone the other 'talk' shows. And then there are the syndicated shows......they were earmarked for later night tv when they were produced. As soon as they go into syndication, they're on at any time of the day/night.

Shirley

Oh, I agree with you all....I'm just so appalled at such shows as Two and a Half Men, etc. There must be more to life than just sex!! There just doesn't seem to be any underlying (?) story there at all. I watch The Newhart show (about the Vermont inn) every chance I can, and it is so darned refreshing.

I rarely censored what my kids watched on tv. My sister censored everything. My kids are pretty good adults, but my youngest has given me some (okay all...) of my grey hairs. LOL But in general, I'd say I've done quite well with my kids. My sisters kids are all heavy drinkers, one walked his pregnant bride down the aisle, the other had someone hold her baby while she got married, three others are single parents. Not that I have anything against unwed parents, as I was one too, but when you shelter your kids too much they grow up to be more curious and wild. My kids knew movies were just fiction, that only the news was real and even then the news could be exaggerated at times. We discussed what they were watching and if they didn't feel comfortable watching something, they usually went to their rooms and read a book or played.

Like Debby I never censored either. I always felt that much would just go over their heads and if it didn't it was an opportunity for them to ask questions. If they were old enough to ask the question they were old enough to get an honest answer. The answer would be short at first. If it satisfied them then I figured it was what they were ready to input more detailed info. Sometimes it would lead to further discussion which meant they were ready for more information.

I looked at these occasions as opportunities to make sure they got the real information they needed and also as a chance to insert my values.

My kids grew up just fine and got into far less trouble than a lot of their friends who were censored and learned to sneak. They also learned I could be trusted with anything they had to say to me.

I didn't censor my kids tv either. Neither did I censor their music. But I told them that i did not want to hear some of the stuff they listened to, and they could not put tv or music that could be considered objectionable on when their friends were over...because I wasn't going to undermine the other parents. I also did not impose a curfew on them...I told them if they were reasonable about the time they came in at night it would not be necessary.

My kids turned out great. They're very responsible, and somewhat conservative, actually. They do not drink and have never done drugs (an awful lot of Mike's friends have told me how BORING he was at parties). They are not perfect, but they never went through a "rebellious" streak. Strange, because an awful lot of the kids who were raised by "strict" parents went absolutely wild when they hit their teen years. Not all of them...but a lot of them.

Add me to the prude list. I watched two of my granddaughters one summer. Tori was about 10 or 11 and Aly was around 8 at the time. They wanted to watch some of the talk shows in the afternoon and I didn't think the shows were age appropiate so I told them no. They said that mom let them watch the shows (I doubt that)so I told them they could watch when mom was home but when I am in charge the answer is no.

We never censored what our kids watched, but the programs were much better back then, sit coms that parents and children could enjoy.

Had a friend ask what curfew we sat for the kids and had to tell her we never had one and they all got home at a reasonble hour. No, they weren't perfect but have turned out to be very good adults with their families.

i thnk donna is correct...my kids were born in the 70's, raised in the 80's, and we really didn't have to censor as much as my kids do for the grands...ds1 rarely watches anything but movies or sports with his girls (age appro for the movies) dd1 watches very little tv with her girls, although sil is crazy for some of the dreadful sit-coms...

dd2's kids don't watch other than in the am (kids shows)

My child was born in the mid-eighties, he's now 22. He's an awesome young man, magna cum laude at his university.

I didn't censor him, but we usually watched TV together. It included many shows, like the Simpsons, which had adult overtones. The fact is that if they are young, the sexual innuendos fly right over their heads. If they do understand them, it's best to talk about it.

Don't kid yourselves - they will see this stuff. My son saw his first Hustler mag at the ultra-Christian neighbor family's house, when he was eight. Yes I was shocked - mostly because that family's oldest kid (only 10) knew where his dad's stash of porn was. Neighbor Dad denied the mag was his, but his name was on the mailing label, LOL.

He did have a bedtime when he was young, and a curfew when he began to drive. I set an alarm clock outside my bedroom door if I wanted to go to bed earlier than his curfew time - he either got home on time or Mom-the-thundercloud was waiting for him or on his cellphone, LOL.

Seriously, I'd rather send them out prepared than "protect the precious child". Over-protected equals unable to deal with the real world.

What's really funny to me is a lot of TV we may have watched as kids would never pass the PC test today. Can you imagine the uproar if we had shows like Amos and Andy,F Troop,Hogan's Heroes, The Three Stooges,The Honeymooners (to the moon Alice)etc. today? Even I Love Lucy had themes on making light of domestic violence (Lucy's black eye) and racial profiling. The Real McCoys with all the stereo-typing? Don't think so. Sanford and Son and the Beverly Hillbillies wouldn't make the cut either. Poor Hopsing would have been written out of Bonanza today. The animal rights activists would go after Davy Crockett and his coonskin cap. Forget most westerns... the weapons the weapons aiee. Street justice...oh noooo.LOL

It wasn't all Ozzie and Harriet and Leave it to Beaver. Oh yeah forget those also. Too many allusions to the boys' friends getting whippings and beatings by their dads.(and no one thought to call CPS)

Can you imagine the feminist uproar today over shows like Laugh-in and Shindig? (Bikini clad girls and girls dancing in cages)

The cartoons we watched, Popeye was a role model because he ate spinach. Never mind the gist was it would make him strong so he could beat the krap out of someone. Explosives,tying people to the train tracks,bombing the enemy (the Commies the Germans) oh the stuff our young minds were exposed to. However did we survive?

Wildchild,

I totally agree, and wish I brought up some of those examples. The ultra-conservative neighbors would let thier kids watch all of the shows you brought up, but the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were the (as they put it) "Devil's Spawn". And it was such an uplifting cartoon, LOL - full of acceptance of others, and finding the best solutions to conflicts. Yeah, my son didn't get to play over there terribly often.

I guess I'm a bit of a prude(and I'm 25) I still get uncomfortable watching some stuff with my parents. I don't think expecting something to go over their head always works- they might ask their friends about it later or imitate it without knowing what it means. I was at a friends house when I was a teen, laying on the couch and their 3yr old came up and tried to french kiss me! I was totally freaked out but they said" oh she's been doing that ever since she saw it on TV" YIKES

I can only speak for preschoolers, since I am a preschool teacher. I definitely see a difference in children that are allowed to watch TV shows and movies that are not appropriate for this age group.

It's not that I was trying to "protect" my sons from certain tv shows, I just didn't want them emulating them. They LOVED to role play. (we also didn't have computer or video games...they played outside and used their imagination) They watched TMNT. I bought them the action figures. But, I definately didn't want them acting or talking like Bart Simpson, and that's exactly what they would have been doing.
Now, there were shows I didn't think kids needed to be exposed to...
We were at a neighbor's house once when Cops came on. I said I was talking my kids home, because I really didn't want my grade school kids watchin it. Their answer to that was they wanted their kids to watch it so they know what the real world was like. HA! That wasn't the world I lived in, and it wasn't the life our family lived in.
This is the family that later had a shooting at their house, and my husband had to go out and keep the kid who got shot from bleeding to death while the shooter was still out there. He was never the same after that. Nope, that wasn't the world I lived in, and it wasn't the world I wanted my boys to grow up in. There are alternatives.

I remember an illustration I used to tell my kids when they were little.
You can use any circumstance to fit your needs here.
A young person wanted to go and see some terrible movie and asked mama for permission. She was cooking at the time and decided to make some Jell-O- "Tommy" (we'll call him) "Go get those onion skins from the garbage bag, "Now, put them in the Jell-O while I stir it around" Tommy was horrified but he did it. "Now, get those eggshells and do the same thing" After a while Tommy said "But Mom, we'll never be able to eat that Jell-O it's all messed up!!"
"Exactly" said mom That's why Mom doesn't always approve of everything you want to do ..you don't have to clutter your mind up with all that garbage"

We are all familiar with Internet SPAM and Message Boards Spam.
But what about the SPAM that comes into our thinking day in and day out.
By Ugly lyrics, by a constant barrage of ads on TV; telling us we are not pretty enough or thin enough etc,. by some newscasters who inject fear and worry on every broadcast. By friends, and relatives perhaps laughing at us for the measures we are taking.
I was thinking that we kind of have to handle it like we do with SPAM on the computer. They say the worst thing to do is to reply to it; DELETE IT is most of the advice, even though it takes some effort on our part. They have certain programs now to help get rid of this stuff but most of the time it is up to us.

So, from now on when a disturbing thought comes in or unpleasant TV etc, if it is something seemingly not not under my control I'm looking at it like I would the subject line of a SPAM email, and if it is not something I know or need to know, I am DELETING it and not going to roll it around in my mind like a piece of sweet candy.

I also meant to say yesterday after reading all the responses from those who say they never censored. I have a neighbor who has a seven year old grandson and he can hear and watch anything that's going on. He is rude and crude and has no sense of what is real, right...or more importantly...wrong

maybee, that's because his parents don't talk to him about what he's watching on tv. If you read our responses here from those of us who didn't censor, we said we talked to our children. Better yet, we LISTENED when they talked and gave them the answers they needed.

Also, someone up there^^mentioned a 3 year old who tried to French kiss. I can tell you that when I was a teen, a family friends toddler kissed open mouthed all the time. This was back in the 70's! Children just do that sometimes. It has nothing to do with what they see on tv. Besides, that child may have seen mommy and daddy kiss open mouthed. Can't blame that on tv. It's just an excuse imo.

I agree with Debby. I always talked to my kids about what my reasons were for not caring for their some of their taste in music or tv. I didn't just leave them be with no discussion about it. After a while they saw my point, their curiosity was satisfied, and they had no desire or urge to rebel.

Ditto what debby ab said!

I didn't censor my boys and they turned out great. If I had, they probably would have gone over and watched/listened to tv/music at their friend's house. Better to have them at home watching it with me, and all of us being comfortable enough to discuss it.

It sounds like the parents of the 7 year old are using the tv as a baby sitter and not fully aware of what he is seeing. He needs discipline. Even though I did not censor, I always knew what my boys were watching.