Parenting and comics

Ultxon

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I don't remember this ever being brought up but a recent event really made me give this some thought.

A while back a friend of my sis was enaged with this guy. The guy was a comic guy like ourselves and collected a bunch of titles. Well, he and my sis' friend went differant ways but he accidently left his comic collection with her. She gave them to my sis's 3 year old son since he liked Hulk and Spider-Man.

So, he's had these comics for a while. Recently I went over there and went through some of the comics to see what stuff he had. His dad, my brother-in-law, notcied some of the titles I looked at. He became infuriated. He had no idea what his son had seen. So he looks thoruhg them and begans to sepearte the "good comics" from the "bad ones". Deadpool, Blade, Cable, X-Men, Spawn, Conan, Wolverine, The Tenth, and several other titles went straight to the dad's room in a closet. 3/4 of the collection was now in storage. Afterwards, I had conversation with him about the state of comics and how it wasn't until recently that a rating system of some kind had been approached. He had been through the problem that many older indivisuals had. Comics were for kids or so he thought and he was a little distraught to see characters with knives and guns running in a book about god guys vs. bad guys in silly costumes. Any thoughts?
 
In fairness if the kid is three, his dad has a valid point. The comics code(and The Simpsons) have alienated comics to a ridiculous level. Its only the movies bringing in new readers nowadays, and even they are of the younger age brackets. So an entire generation has no idea about what comics are like.
Tragic ain't it?
 
Yeah, it is something tragic. I mean look at the all-new all differant X-men. when they came out they had a little stamp that says its apporved. Nowadays, those old issues have a stamp that says that they are for 12 and up, mostly because of Wolverine I surmise. Wow, how things change.
 
Ultxon said:
Yeah, it is something tragic. I mean look at the all-new all differant X-men. when they came out they had a little stamp that says its apporved. Nowadays, those old issues have a stamp that says that they are for 12 and up, mostly because of Wolverine I surmise. Wow, how things change.

I believe Wolverine was the first "hero" to kill someone in a comic.

People don't get that comics aren't really for kids. Whenever my comic book store has a sale, there are always a bunch of parents with little kids.
 
I'm pretty sure that Batman killed a couple people in the early days, but I think that ratings in comics are long overdue. I mean Conan has decapitations all over and there is absolutly nothing on it that says kids shouldn't read it.
 
Well i believe that Red Hood delivering a bag with the heads of Black Masks dealers is not a pretty sight for those who have less then 12 years.
 
Ultxon said:
I'm pretty sure that Batman killed a couple people in the early days, but I think that ratings in comics are long overdue.

He snapped some necks back in the day, but DC would try to tell you that they didn't actually die.

I mean Conan has decapitations all over and there is absolutly nothing on it that says kids shouldn't read it.

Ultimate Quicksilver said:
Well i believe that Red Hood delivering a bag with the heads of Black Masks dealers is not a pretty sight for those who have less then 12 years.

The Ultimates can be pretty bad too. Remember what the Hulk did to Her Kleiser? That panel with his face hanging was just sick.
 
Yeah, but the hulk one had a rating on it, PSR+. Thou what that means to an average person is nill. Good thing marvel is changing it a bit. Funny thing is, I still bought it even thou I was 15 at the time. the cashier didn't even look at the rating.
 
Ultxon said:
Yeah, but the hulk one had a rating on it, PSR+. Thou what that means to an average person is nill. Good thing marvel is changing it a bit. Funny thing is, I still bought it even thou I was 15 at the time. the cashier didn't even look at the rating.

Me too.(14)
 
Ultxon said:
Comics were for kids or so he thought and he was a little distraught to see characters with knives and guns running in a book about god guys vs. bad guys in silly costumes. Any thoughts?

Did you explain to him that it is a misconception that comics are for kids?

As for the kid - get him "Owly". Seldes introduced me to it and my son really liked it. It's like a graphic novel put there are no words, so even though there is a story you kind of make up the details as you go. Great for kids.
 
I put this into the same catagory as parents who get upset when they stick videos into the vcr just to keep their kids quiet without bothering to see what it is the kids are watching. "It's your fault and not the artists who made the product." It strikes me that this kind of thing is yet another example of people not wanting to take responisbility for their own stupidity.

Reminds me of a story a friend told me about coming home to find that her mother had rented Peter Jackson's Meet The Feebles for her six year old sister and her friends, not bothering to actually note the R rating, nor read the back to see what the film was about. An R rated show with puppets is not going to be the Muppets, no matter how much a parent wants it to be. Apparently, the mother wanted to go back to the video store to complain but my friend talked her out of it and got her to admit that it had been her own mistake.

People can work so hard at not admiting their own mistakes.
 
The thing is comics [bold]were [/bold] for kids. Would you watch Disney as a kid and years later expect it to have porn? Hell no. You would assume it would continue with g rated material. I think this is the problem. And as I said ratings for comics need to be administered. The only thing keeping a kid from reading a "bad" title is the knowledge of the cashier who sells it to them. And I have a hrad time thinking that very employee at a comic shop knows what aud each title is meant for.

I'll see if I can't find that title E. All I've been doing is grabbing things like Calvin and Hobbes and reading them to him.
 
Ultxon said:
I'll see if I can't find that title E. All I've been doing is grabbing things like Calvin and Hobbes and reading them to him.

Hey Calvin & Hobbes ain't bad either. :D
 
You guys are fighting about comics check out the Saturday cartoons, like....DBZ....or Yo Gi OH....and parents are ok,cuz there "cartoons" its not loony tunes anymore. same way with comics i guess...
 
Look, when you are that young I'm not even sure you understand. If the kid gets scared, take 'em away from him, if he likes it give it to him. I have been reading all kind of comics since I was 3, I only looked at the pictures and just enjoyed my mother reading them to me. Yes, Spawn is a bit dark and violent, but so is the real world. Showing a kid that the world is one big paradise is just plain WRONG; Because when they finally watch stuff like 9/11 and crap, they are shocked. Sit down with the kid, read it for him you see that he doesn't like it, Throw em away.
 
Ultxon said:
The thing is comics [bold]were [/bold] for kids. Would you watch Disney as a kid and years later expect it to have porn? Hell no. You would assume it would continue with g rated material. I think this is the problem. And as I said ratings for comics need to be administered. The only thing keeping a kid from reading a "bad" title is the knowledge of the cashier who sells it to them. And I have a hrad time thinking that very employee at a comic shop knows what aud each title is meant for.

I'll see if I can't find that title E. All I've been doing is grabbing things like Calvin and Hobbes and reading them to him.

Actually comics were pretty much an adult thing at the start and it wasn't until the 1950's that there was a push to make them all kid friendly. The perception has been that they used to be for kids, the reality is that they got changed to something for kids (more so then not. I am, admitedly, generalizing).

Also, I disagree with the suggestion that it is the responisibility of the clerk selling the comic to know who a comic is intended for at the point of purchase. I do not believe it is their responsibility to police the purchasing of comics. That is the job of the parents. And no one else's. If the parents will not assume responsibilty for the reading material of their children, why should someone who may not even know the child be held responsible? In my oppinion, this is just an example of refusing to accept the responsibility of having children in the first place.
 
Parental Supervision? Suggestion? Required

It's instead of PG-13 which is what it was.

Also, Superman used to kill people all the time in the 30s, or would leave them on the White House lawn to be taken to the gas chambers to be hung and then laugh about it. He was a ****.

Also, some comic store owner was arrested in Idaho (I believe, this was years ago) and CONVICTED for selling adult manga comics which depicted scenes of sex and nudity.

Not for SELLING them to kids. For selling them to adults in his store. That's right.

So hard was the bias comics are for kids, that the judiciary system believed that those comics, despite saying "mature audiences only" on them and the store owner never having sold them to anyone under 18, that those comics were intended for children and this was a jail-time offence.

:sick:
 
GMaster said:
What does teh PSR rating stadn for anyway?


I seem to remember a long time ago reading (on marvel.com) it stood for "Parental Supervision Recommended (for children 12 and under, or for children under 12, I forget which)".
 
Ultxon said:
I'm pretty sure that Batman killed a couple people in the early days, but I think that ratings in comics are long overdue. I mean Conan has decapitations all over and there is absolutly nothing on it that says kids shouldn't read it.

Eh....Cap?Ya know that whole WW2 thing?:D
 

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