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Originally Posted by Cathar
Pfah, name me a single child capable of reading who hasn't already heard the F-word used many times before, and knows full-well that it's a "grown-up" word.
Children are far more adaptable than people give them credit for. By age 6 they pretty much know at least half the full range of profanities commonly used in society, and by age 3 they learned to know not to use such words in ear-shot of authority figures when they innocently repeated such words where their parents could hear them. Our daughter learned the F-word from merely being in society at age 3, and it was at that age that we explained to her that it was not a nice word for little people to repeat.
If we want to bring sex and children into the debate, then ponder why is sexual nudity treated with such "shock and horror" when children see it every single day when they take their own clothes off, yet images of extreme violence are far harder to shield children from, and in my experience as a father, it is far more difficult to explain to a young child about extreme violence, than it is to explain something as obvious to most children that people have bodies much like they do.
I know my children well enough that if I had to choose between exposing them to nudity, as opposed to images of the casualties of US-led wars in foreign countries, I'd feel a lot more comfortable with the nudity as children pretty much think little of it.
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No doubt that kids pick up a complete vocabulary of profanity very early on in life. However, I believe in polite society and it is important to teach kids when certain behaviors are acceptable and when they are not. Dirty stories, profanity and lured comments about sexual conquests are fine around contemporaries in the appropriate setting. However, that is not appropriate around my parent’s grandparents or nieces and nephews.
I agree that sex in general/reproduction/nudity is fine and understanding how your body works is great. However, do you want to have to explain to a six year old some of the more deviant sexual behaviors? Again there is an appropriate age a maturity level for exposure to these things.
The same is true of violence. I think that graphic violence and violent death is in appropriate young kids. But like sex violence is part of our nature…got boys? “Why did you hit your sister/brother?”…”I don’t know” I mean come on, nothing is more dangerous to lower life forms than a few 13 year old boys with firecrackers.
As to the US-led war comments…first you have to explain that there are fanatical people of a particular religious faith that believe that your kids should be dead simply because they do not subscribe to there particular twisted view of that faith. Explain to them why it is that people believe it is noble to blow up themselves and innocent civilians. Once you make it over that hurdle it’s easy to explain, why we big mean Americans are picking on the poor Fanatical Islamists. lol you slay me Cathar, I know your grandparents did share a similar view about Imperial Japan.