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> Any station can air some movie at 4pm featuring the good cops shooting the bad guys.

Here in the UK there are actually quite good limits on that. I'm not sure you would, say, ever see Starsky and Hutch (the film) on at 4pm.

> Or, for instance, it is easy to be watching some news report at dinner and being exposed to something beating the horror or gore movies by points.

Honestly; I'd say that could be beneficial more than damaging. I wouldn't, obviously, recommend showing it to kids. But if they end up watching something bad at least it's real and real people have probably died. Surely that sends the right message ("hurting people is bad")

> Here in the UK there are actually quite good limits on that. I'm not sure you would, say, ever see Starsky and Hutch (the film) on at 4pm.

I'm from Portugal and here is quite usual to see some Mission Impossible, van Dame or Schwarzenegger movie on at 4pm. Actually, most of the movies aired at Saturday and Sunday afternoons are something like PG-13.

Since here there are only 4 broadcast conventional channels, and many people don't have cable, it is quite easy for kids to be exposed to such movies.

>Even some very successful animated movies like Lion King end up with the bad guy being killed. Either intentionally or not, kids end up satisfied that the bad guy had what he deserved and that all become happily ever after.

This is something that I'm disturbed by. Did they really have to kill off Charles Muntz in Up and Syndrome in The Incredibles? Those guys weren't that bad.

I would keep my kid away from as much violent anything as possible, and gradually introduce critically renowned and age-appropriate entertainment as they grow up. Kind of like how I was raised I guess.

Don't get me wrong, I'm an adult who enjoys good entertainment like Sin City and Blood Meridian. I had read a lot of Mark Twain and Dickens as a kid, and those were thoroughly entertaining too. I didn't feel deprived at all. Parents just kind of suck.

Spolier alert, jerk!

I'm so sorry :(.

Turn it off. Largely due to crappy news and marketing. We went off cable 2 yrs ago. Public library dvds, netflix and amazon streaming, and the internet in general replaces it all.

Occasionally surprises that need explanation. YouTubing for wild turkeys. We came across a video which showed a male humping a decoy and having his head blown off a few seconds later. More about sex and death than I wanted to discuss with my 5 yr old but we got through it intact. ;)

I'm not really sure where I stand on this issue but I think the argument is along the lines of: watching violence is different than role-playing violence.

Right. In addition, we attempt to socialize young men that violence is supposed to be a technique of last resort and permitted in only a narrow range of situations. (This will not endear me to some teachers of mine, but I'll say it anyhow: in those situations, it is often morally praiseworthy.)

Grand Theft Auto and company, on the other hand, depict violence as riotously good fun which is self-justifying and an appropriate response to, e.g., boredom.

Yes. You should be playing Deus Ex instead. You have a choice there.

I just want to add this: I don't know wether role-playing violent games increases violence or not. I can imagine hypotheses where it decrease violence as well as increase it. I also can imagine situations where it might have different effects at different ages. Perhaps that's part of what leads to the polarized opinion. What if role-playing violent acts increases violence in children but decreases it in teenagers?

I think the point is to not assume that it is not automatically the same as watching a movie.