Okay...I am seeking some good sound opinions here. I can't stop thinking about this so I have to see what other people think. I had my garage sale this last Saturday and two of the things I couldn't wait to get out of my house were these two play station games, two different versions of Grand Theft Auto. Now I don't know if any of you have ever seen or played any of the Grand Theft Auto games, but they aren't something you want your 9 year old stumbling upon. At least I don't. Which brings me to my question. Out of all the PS2 games I had for sale, these two were the only two to sell. And they sold to two different young children. One of which is 9 (he was a classmate of Austin's) and one of whom I don't know but he was clearly younger than Austin. Both kids had their mother with them to which they had their approval. Has Austin been right all along? Am I really a mean mom after all?! I couldn't believe that their mothers hardly batted an eye at what was being purchased. I almost felt I should warn them of what the game was about but realized the mothers knew. So the question is this...is this something you would let your kids play? Is it really not as big of a deal as I am making it?
For those of you who are uncertain of what the general idea of these games are, I will give you a little summary...I couldn't find something specific on the interent so I am going to have to go by only what I have seen played. A few things that stick out in my mind is that you can abduct a women and take her to the park in the back of your van and rape her, you can mow pedestrians over in the streets or stick a cap in their head, run from the cops, and even run yourself off a cliff if you want. All of this without reprecautions. In fact, you even earn money for each person you kill. Am I overreacting when I don't want my 9 year old son playing this? After all it is rated M for mature. And I know mature adults who enjoy this kind of humor and that's fine, but to my dismay I sold these games to young children. All I was thinking about was the fact that I wanted them out of my house. I didn't think twice who was going to be purchasing them. I feel terrible that these kids are going to be among my kids in society and that these aren't the only kids seeing this stuff. It's so scary to think about what your kids are learning from other kids when you aren't around. And Austin thinks I am ridiculous for being so 'strict'. So am I? Please leave a comment or take my poll off to the right (it's anonymous). It's not going to change the way I do things, but I would love some opinions on the matter! Thanks!
1 comment:
You follow your gut when it comes to the video game... It's just like parents letting their little ones watch R rated movies. It's your call. You're not evil, you have your reasons but I bet Austin's going to learn or play this game sometime soon so the best thing in my opinion would be to talk about the game and let him know what real life is like, this game is gross and awful but if he knows it's just a game you're still 'parenting' when you're not around
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