Once upon a time
there was a sweet, little girl named Gracie.
She was almost three years old and she loved dress-ups, all things
pink, and Disney movies about princesses.
One day, when
Gracie was playing with her toys and her baby brother, she got frustrated and
told her mother that she was “very angry and needed to get a knife to cut
someone.” Mother was alarmed and she talked to Gracie but what she
said didn’t make any sense to Mom.
Knives were put further out of reach.
The next day when
Gracie got up, she talked about being angry and needing to cut someone. Mother was getting more alarmed. She called Grandma and she called her
friends. Did anyone know where Gracie
was getting such ideas? Why would a
cheerful, tiny little girl talk about knives and cutting? No one could offer a suggestion.
Mommy and Daddy
and Gracie watched a movie one night together.
There was the witch, doing battle with the hero who came to save
Rapunzel, and what did the witch grab? A
KNIFE! The witch stabbed the hero and he
was going to die, but the handsome hero was saved because Rapunzel had magic
powers to heal him.
Mommy and Daddy
talked. Let’s see, how many princess movies
had a knife or dueling or stabbing? Ahhh,
lots of them. Gracie went on Disney
detox and has lived happily the six months after.
This is
cautionary tale, and absolutely true. Why would a tiny child living in a calm and happy home talk about
stabbing people? Because that’s what they did in the movies. It wasn’t CSI or shoot’em-up blood and gore violence, but Gracie picked up
on a pattern nonetheless.
Adults often
think kids don’t really notice or understand everything they are seeing. They notice.
Children don’t always understand what they see, which sometimes is
worse. Grace is very observant, and she
could verbalize what was going through her head so her parents at least had a
better chance to figure it out. But all
children soak in so much, even if they don’t have the words to talk about
it.
I think Disney
makes some wonderful movies, and if the movies had no conflict or struggle to
overcome, there wouldn’t be much of a story to them. “It’s Another Happy Day in the Kingdom,” does
not make an interesting princess movie – and it is not a realistic expectation
for life, either. There can actually be
some great life lessons in seeing heroes and heroines overcome challenges. Life in reality can be harsh and sometimes
people do bad things, get hurt or even die.
It’s all right for children to know that. If I had to watch only Dora movies with my
grandchildren forever I would burn the DVD player now.
This is the
important take away from the story of Grace and the Knives: what our children
watch, we need to watch, and we adults need to watch mindfully. We need to notice what our children are
seeing and we need to talk to them about
it. We need to make sure our children
understand how to resolve conflict (without knives) and to have courage even
when other people make bad choices, and to remember that people can be hurt for
real and no magic will make it better. Parents need to sometimes just put away the movies.
It’s important
to discuss what is real, what is pretend, and what is okay and not okay to do.
We need to listen to our children and try to understand the world as they see,
not as we see it, and then teach they so they cannot misunderstand.
And if you
maybe are tempted to let the little ones watch something with the teenagers
that is too much for a child, remember Grace and the knife. That should be enough to make you want to get
out Candyland instead.
© Diane Mangum 2012
