14 y.o. ds wants to watch pg-13 movies

amother

Sun, Sep 04 2011, 6:34 pm

This is my perspective but you need to know if this style applies in your house. Why don't you tell him he may as long as there are no issues of non-tznius/s-xy camera moves/pritzus in it? because he wouldn't want him to come to sin, would he? The language he's been exposed to already more certainly than not. Then he should know the ratings are not really age based at all, there are some higher rated that are fine to watch - some PG that are not fne at all. He should give you specific name of a movie and you can check it out for him.

bigsis144

Sun, Sep 04 2011, 6:48 pm

My first PG-13 movie (when I was 15, my younger siblings started with the same movie, when they were 13 and 11) was Lord of the Rings -- and I can see the difference in starting with fantasy violence (especially in that particular story's context; I don't know if some horror movie that featured werewolves or aliens would have passed the test) vs. real-life gang-style violence, torture-p*rn (like slasher films or the Saw movies), etc.

We were a girly family, though, and none of us had a yetzer hara for blood and guts.

amother

Sun, Sep 04 2011, 7:16 pm

sequoia wrote:

And once again, watching human beings get tortured, murdered, and dismembered is perfectly okay. Perfectly kosher.

I hate this attitude.

I didn't know they allow that on PG-13, thought the extreme scenes were reserved for R ratings. And most normal, mostly sheltered young ones in my experience are drawn to action, not horror.

I think you should do away with the rating idea in ds's head, tell him movies need to be ok to watch, you are not in agreement with the people who rate things.

My ds had a child send him a very disturbing video clip - all animated btw. Was utterly disturbing and was a laughing attitude, sequoia, which is why low rated animated movies need extra screening.

I think saying yes with fine print is better than saying no.

Chana Miriam S

Sun, Sep 04 2011, 7:46 pm

I think I must be a terrible mother. not only do I let both my 12 yo and my 15.5 yo watch pg 13, we are intending to inculcate our children with our love of quentin tarantino films. ds has already seen reservoir dogs...

seriously though, we see a lot of movies, most often as a family. we talk about them and discuss the things we watch. once, we took our kids to a broadway play and dd and I left because she said ' I don't think this is appropriate for me.' truth was, I was wanting to leave too, but when she said it it solidified it for me.

my children are both great kids, excellent neshamas and frankly, neither of them have hissy fits like your kid does over movies, or really, when I think about it anything else either. they trust us when we say 'we don't think this is appropriate,' because we do let them see things we think are appropriate regardless of their ratings. if they did there is NO WAY I would let them do whatever they were having the fit about. NO. WAY.

ok, quentin tarantino is not particularly appropriate for anyone but we are bloodthirsty lovers of violent QT movies, and we don't run around chopping off people's heads, so really, what is the problem?

amother

Mon, Sep 05 2011, 11:10 am

op here: Thanks for your replies and support. My son got all the answers and explanations from me. He said that the pg movies are for 5 years old and if I don't let him watch pg-13 he is just going to resent me for the rest of his life. He was exposed to some internet for a couple of years when he was 12.13 I was working full time and we had some other issues going on in our house. He thinks there is nothing wrong with some kissing.. He wants to watch action movies and he doesn't give up whatever I say.He hears about all the movies that come out from friends in yeshiva and demands to watch them also.

naomi2 said:
stick to your guns PG-13 is not appropriate for a fourteen yr old yeshiva boy!! maybe find another outlet for him. a club, sport, gym, instrument or class.

maybe thats my only option. I also got him some video games to keep him occupied.

If don't know if I should continue to let him watch pg movies

grace413

Mon, Sep 05 2011, 11:17 am

amother wrote:

I don't have an opinion on the movie issue. However, his saying that he will resent you for the rest of his life if he doesn't get his way is just typical teen manipulation. Many kids at that age resent their parents for living and breathing, and if he wants to resent you, he will no matter what you do.

amother

Thu, Sep 08 2011, 2:51 am

tryingmybest wrote:

I would seriously rethink the enviroment he's in. If its "black hatter" type yeshivish, I would not expect these movies in their homes. And I wouldn't believe that "everyone" is watching it so fast either. If I were you, I wouldn't allow ANY movies b/c one leads to the next and you never know what a young teen can end up with.

you are right but I am trying to stop the movies gradually. Because he is really kind of addicted to it. I think there is a boy or two who watch these movies or even maybe a little more but the most of the fifty boys in his grade son't watch movies at all.

chani8

Thu, Sep 22 2011, 12:49 pm

By the time a boy is 16 years old, he should start making some decisions by himself, including what he allows and doesn't. You wont be able to control his life forever. And if you have done a good job, by now he will be solid in his yiddishkeit. He knows what is permissible to see, and you can gently let him know that you trust him, and then give him some advice (because that is what mothers are for) that he should know that he will come across problems, it is inevitable, and that whenever you personally come across problematic stuff online, you skip over it, even if you think you are missing something, because it is better to miss something than to upset your neshama with not-tznius muck.

Also, I would not be so worried about the not-tznius (like kissing and mild not-tznius stuff), nor what other posters have hinted to about his looking causing him to sin. That is not for a mother to worry about and lets just hope that our sons are normal and healthy and that when they 'sin in private', that they are thinking healthy thoughts about beautiful women rather than becoming so isolated from females that they don't even have a desire for one C'S.

Our boys are being taught in yeshivas to be tznius and dont look at anything to do with women, and on the other hand, there is an epidemic of perversity going on with boys molesting boys and pedophiles attacking our boys. And mothers are so worried that sons will watch a little pritzus and mild nudity on PG13. We have bigger worries than that. Let the mussar come from the yeshiva and protect the boys from child s-xual abuse.

Rodent

Thu, Sep 22 2011, 5:29 pm

Personally I think you need to work backwards -- what do you see him doing as an adult?
Do you expect that he will never watch any movies ever (unlikely given his interest in them now), rebel against never having them and watch everything there is out there when he has freedom over his own actions, or filter movies to those that are most appropriate?

If you want him to be able to filter what he watches then now is the time to start training him on how to do it, he's over bar mitzva already. Personally (and if you want to take it with a pinch of salt then go ahead) I'd be discussing the issues openly and possibly devising a checklist together of what is ok and what isn't. Watching the movies together, if something inappropriate arises skipping through those bits, showing him how to do that, explaining why. Afterwards discussing if any improvements could be made to the list and if not coming up with ideas for how to avoid seeing inappropriate things on what has gone through the initial filter eg. turning it off or walking out, skipping sections, having something appropriate to read or listen to (eg. I-pod and diverting eyes) until it is over, I'm sure there are others. The same sort of thing applies to any magazines he sees, or billboards he'll walk past etc and the latter aren't things you can completely shelter him from, he needs the skills on how to do it himself. In today's society, and with today's technology, I'd rather be teaching my kids how to deal with it than having an all or nothing approach where they're likely to sink badly once they're out of my protection. I know we mean well as parents and sometimes it's easier to just forbid and avoid but it's our job to prepare them for the realities of life.

Ruchel

Fri, Sep 23 2011, 3:24 am

chani8 wrote:

It isn't natural, normal or biological for a teenager to eat traif.

Yes it is. You're hungry, you take what is around. Pure instinct.
Kashrus is nothing natural, neither is shmiras eynaim or anything else. Mitzvos elevate us above "natural needs". If you knew French I would say to listen to a great shiur of rabbi Chaya but I'm sure you have the same in English.

Yup Rodent, there are ways to avoid, and it's too bad they aren't taught in all schools. If taught from early on they become a habit, the later the harder.

chani8

Fri, Sep 23 2011, 4:13 am

Thanks Rodent, Well Put!

I was told that these days the way to deal with teenagers is through dialogue. We are supposed to talk to our kids.

As my children were growing up, often it was easier to run our large family like an army, being a (kind)drill sargeant barking out orders and imposing rules and punishments. But I see now that it doesn't work well when they become teens and have opinions and don't want to blindly follow the rules.

So now I am trying to think of the family as an office where there are rules and goals, but we work together with team spirit and respect for all. When the girls' hormones fly, though, it sure gets hard.

Anyway, teens are so hard. Well, maybe it isn't so much the teens who are hard, as the job of raising them. How in the world do we find that bitachon to trust them, to let go? And how do you have a dialogue with a teen who seems so ignorant and childish. At this point, I am sort of glad I made the choice (6 mo ago) to let (family) movies and (some) internet because now my children are getting a little more worldly, and I can relate better to that, and certainly there is more interesting discussions now. Before, all they could talk about was clothes and materialistic 'needs' (I need this and this and that!-ugh!).

I remember the 'family' movie we started to watch (but turned off) about a girl who was pregnant and realzing that my teen daughters have no idea that a girl could get pregnant without a chuppah - my oldest dd is just figuring these things out. Somehow, I just don't see this ignorance as sweet. Perhaps it is due to my bitterness of having my sons learn about relations from molestation. I feel so bad that my boys learned about this stuff thru perversity, and in turn that became sort of the way my girls have learned about relations, by discussing personal safety with the family. It's too bad. And I still have no idea how to discuss real stuff in a positive with my kids, like how to let them know where babies come from.

Have any of you told your kids (the truth about) how babies are made, and at what age? I just can't imagine letting my naive girls watch PG13 movies when they don't even know the basics of life. Are teens meant to figure things out on their own, so we should just let movies be their education? I am really wanting to know your opinions, those of you who allow movies and internet.

Chani8