Cartoon Heroes

We make a solid effort to limit the amount of TV that the kids see.  That being said, there is some pretty repetitive programming that goes on in our house and we are always looking for ways to avoid seeing yet another episode of Tooupee and Binoo.  Naturally we were thrilled when another parent told us about Teletoon Retro so we could expose the minions to all of the cartoons that we grew up with.

The antics of Bugs Bunny, Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner and their slapstick undoings became fast favourites, particularly with Jack, and have become a part of our Sunday night before bath and bed.

Wile E. Coyote - contemplating the gravity of the situation...

The other night we sat down to watch a half hour of cartoons before story and bed time.  In a half hour of programming (which is more like 20 minutes with commercials) we saw two "suicide gags" in the classic cartoons.  I'm not talking about dropping an anvil on someone's head or falling off of a cliff.  I'm talking about skits ending with the main characters taking a gun to their heads and killing themselves.  Our jaws dropped.

When I began researching these incidents I found out that many of these "gags" have been edited out of TV, but apparently someone at Teletoon Retro decided to let this slide, twice, at a time when many young kids are still up.  Why these were ever deemed funny is a mystery to me.

So where do you draw the line?  Are anvils and pianos okay but guns not?  Pre-screening every show before they are allowed to watch it seems a little helicopter parent for my liking - at the same time I don't exactly want them to witness anyone (cartoon or otherwise) playing russian roulette.

Realistically I know that my children have as much access to a gun as they do to anvils and dynamite - zero.  I also know that they grow up in a world where they will have fire drills AND safety drills on what to do if someone with a gun enters their school.  These are discussions that we will have with them, that their teachers will have with them.  I'm just not sure if I want this education coming to them via Porky Pig.


Are we stuck in the bubblegum sweet world of TreeHouse until the kids get old enough for us to really explain to them why that is bad?

What is a happy medium between cataloguing and pre-screening their doled out TV time and giving them carte blanche to watch violent TV?

I have been nominated for Voiceboks 2014 Multiple Parenting Blog Awards - If you have a moment to spare: Click Here Now and cast your vote for Multiple Momstrosity #27, it's the little heart icon that pops up in the top right hand corner that registers a vote NOT clicking on the photo.  If you follow any of the other blogs or enjoy them like say HDYDI (#21) you can vote for them too - you can vote for up to five different blogs daily.