This is Starscream, the Transformer of my son's dreams, the "big thing" he most wanted Santa to bring this year. (See evidence of his Christmas morning joy here.)Yesterday we were in the First Day School building of the Meetinghouse; I had a day-long retreat to begin my year-long involvement in a Spiritual Formation group, T was off playing golf (on January 6th!), and D was in the room that is his school room during the week.
He asked to bring Starscream, and since he wasn't there in any Quaker context, we decided to let him, provided that it didn't cause any problems. (D has been learning that toys that seem too alluring to share are sometimes temporarily confiscated if kid tempers start to flare.)
Because Princeton Friends School was also having an Open House yesterday, we explained to D that he wouldn't be able to have Starscream in the room with him when the visiting parents and children came through, since we didn't want them to think that the toy was part of the room's holdings.
When one of the school administrators came through the room in advance of the start of the Open House (before we'd removed Starscream), he made a wry comment about D playing with a "warship."
D doesn't have any toys whose main purpose is violence. He doesn't own any guns. He knows that we hope that he remains a kind-hearted and good-spirited boy, and he's known boys who seem mean-spirited. He understands that we are concerned about how he plays with toys, and that if they seem to be bringing out the worst in him, they might go away. And he spends virtually no time in retail space.
But we are conscious of the fact that he's a boy with two moms who is going to be spending significant amounts of time over the next however many years living in Boyland. And we want him to feel like a native, not a foreigner.
So he has a Starscream Transformer. It can be a robot, or a spaceship, or a jet plane. It's really cool, and powerful, and he might save up his allowance to buy a different one. But Starscream is most definitely NOT a warship, at least not in our lives. D doesn't even know that word. And we're hoping that he didn't overhear it.
(Very tricky, this parenting thing. I'm constantly looking for other moms with whom I can talk strategy about resisting the strains of mainstream culture that are of the greatest concern to me.)
3 comments:
I am so with you on this! I have also raised a boy in Quaker school with no father living in the house. He loved legos. I wouldn't buy him guns. Somehow we managed to get him through to the age of nineteen with him still a kind, thoughtful, empathetic, strong, self-confident young man. By God's grace I must add.
Now I have another four year old who is intensely interested in guns and video games and super heroes, although we hardly watch TV (only PBS) and spend very little time shopping. I want him to be able to talk boy and be part of the peer group, but I don't want him to learn to be entertained by violence or let machines do his play for him. We have a lot to talk about, you and I!
Some boys are not naturally drawn to guns and war play, but a lot of them are. We held out for a long time, but some of these things edged in slowly over time. My boys didn't watch TV or movies for scores of years, but were exposed at friend's houses, by walking down the street seeing billboards, reading picture books, leafing through magazines at doctor's offices etc.. Instant affinity. Sticks became swords, a rock picked up on a hike was vaguely pistol shaped etc. We eventually realized that our boys are still kind, thoughtful and empathetic in real life, even if they occasionally play knights-at-war, pirates or space warriors. A hard concept to swallow, perhaps, while your son is still so young.
My husband and I are in complete agreement here. Shmoo is younger than D, so I don't think I'll be able to offer strategy to you, but I will be keenly interested in hearing more about measures you take.
I LOVED this paragraph: But we are conscious of the fact that he's a boy with two moms who is going to be spending significant amounts of time over the next however many years living in Boyland. And we want him to feel like a native, not a foreigner.
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