Not just that... (Fireteam Builder Events)

by Kermit , Raleigh, NC, Thursday, March 26, 2015, 02:19 (3318 days ago) @ General Vagueness

Nowadays I have to warn Lil' Blue not to talk about it while at school. With places suspending kids for making things in the shape of guns or even pointing their fingers like guns, I don't want to go through the problems we'll have if he says the wrong thing.

So much this. Last night my 3yo saw a piece of chicken breast and called it the gun piece because of the way it split at the back made it look as if there was a handle. Heaven help me if my 6yo got this piece of chicken in his lunch and picked it up. Boys will turn anything into a pretend weapon. I think of a story one of my in-laws shared where his nephews, who were completely isolated from depictions of violence, received a lightsaber for a present, his eyes lit up and knew EXACTLY what to do with it. It was a weapon, not a magic wand or staff or cane, but a weapon.

Our society has become hostile to in-born male traits (rambunctious, boisterous, & physical among others), and because of it society is failing our boys. Not to say society isn't failing our girls too, it is in many ways, but it's acceptable to be vocal about that, not so much about how it fails our boys.

I think what you're seeing is people realizing those things aren't exclusive to boys, and people rejecting violence really hard, maybe too hard, but it's understandable when you have kids killing people.

People sure talk like it's exclusive to boys. The same people tend to say things like "violence never solves anything," to which I say, "Yeah, like Nazism." Serious people have long recognized the need for children to grapple with issues of life and death through play (cf. Bruno Bettelheim), and I think it's ignorant to try to whitewash the world and human nature "for the children." To go further, I'd say that there are biological differences, and that there is a strong male impulse to protect the weak, but I realize some might view that as controversial. To bring it back on point on a video game site, I think this impulse is behind the popularity of video games among mostly males in the 21st century, relatively safe civilized world. The need to protect and fight violence with violence is behind most video game plots that I've ever played, but to be clear: I'm NOT saying that a female protagonist can't be the protector (some of my favorite games, actually) or that women don't respond to imaginatively (or in reality) filling these roles (ask my buddy Bigarm). Regarding kids (or anyone) committing real murder, I'd submit that on some level there's been repression and the dysfunction can and often does stem from the lack of an outlet for imaginative play in which children are allowed to feel powerful.