But that's mean!

I'll warn you. I'm in a bad mood.

I've begun to see the whole "I don't like what you've said/written/produced, stop it or I'm going to whine/cry/call my mom/call my lawyer/bring down the government on you" culture rearing its hideous head more frequently lately, and it's royally torquing me. Especially when it's all "It's for the chilllllllldddddreeeeennnnnnnnnnnnnn"

Gah.

Lets go over it one more time people.

I'm not entirely unsympathetic, but guess what. You're a parent now. Congratulations. That tax deduction comes with responsibilities. It means you have to monitor what they're watching/doing/listening to. It means that instead of buying a sanitized movie, you make them watch what's appropriate for their age group. It means that instead of plunking them down in front of the TV or computer, you watch with them. You surf with them. You monitor what they're doing. If your kid drinks a mouthful of head & shoulders because you weren't watching them, you don't blame Proctor & Gamble because their shampoo isn't in childproof containers, you blame your ass for not paying attention.

And, as other people have said it before, kids are remarkably resilient, and if you instill the vaues you WANT to instill in them, even if they do come across the occasional swear word, boobies, or metaphorical mouthful of Head & Shoulders, they're not going to immediately turn into drug-addicted nymphomaniacs. Case in point. My mother threatened to beat me within an inch of my life with a vacuum cleaner if she ever caught me smoking. (Never mind that both my parents smoked on and off.) To this day, I've never smoked a cigarette. (Now the joint I smoked on New Year's Day a few years back... that I was pretty sure her radar picked that up even 1,500 miles away, but hey.)

Sure, my parents fucked up in a lot of ways, but they did their job. They didn't write to congress to tell them to take the Incredible Hulk off the air, because it scared the shit out of me. They just didn't let me watch it. And when I spent 90% of my early teen years reading every Stephen King book I could get my mitts on, they didn't worry that I was going to turn into a satanist, and demand that the publishers edit Mr. King's books, they were just glad I was in my room and shutting up.

That's why the PTC and their unholy union with the FCC really irritates me. Instead of spending all of your time writing letters to the FCC to bitch about a show, here's a novel idea- change the damn channel. Or, if you watch it with your precious little snowflake, explain things. "Oh, we don't use that word because it's not polite." "That man just hit the other man, why do we know that's wrong?" Make the episode into a learning experience, instead of insisting the government make everything safe "for the chillllllllldreeeeeeeennnnnnnnnn!!!"

Am I out of line? Am I forgetting something? Discuss. I am going to go dance about the office, as "Looking out my back door" is on.