Poll: Should children under 3 watch nature programs

Should children under 3 watch nature programmes

  • Massive overreaction

    Votes: 85 56.7%

  • Yes

    Votes: 64 42.7%

  • No

    Votes: 21 14.0%

  • Ban

    Votes: 27 18.0%
  • Total voters
    150
  • Poll closed .

NoobCannon

NoobCannon

NoobCannon

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(Poll please. 1. Massive overaction 2. Yes 3.no)


My 2 year old (almost 3) is a massive fan of Disneys Lion King so this morning seeing a nature program on about african lions i thought we would watch it together.

documentary was following a pride of lions around and inevitably they started hunting a zebra the rest you can guess. My child asked what are they doing and i told her how they eat, lions catch other animals for thier dinner.

Que missus walking in and throwing a strop because aparantly a 2 year old shouldnt be watching something like that to which i replied its nature and she shouldnt be sheltered.

So looking for gd to back me up or disaprove really!
 
Massive Overreaction.

Let the kid watch all the nature documentaries. They're all great. I mean, the only difference is that the violence in the Lion Kind is animated instead of real, but from what I recall there's just as much.

I mean, Mufasa's death scene is far more likely to have a lasting psychological impact than any documentary.
 
2? No way. What's the rush?! Jeez. Let her enjoy being a toddler (and the Disney movies she'll love), rather than let her watch her fave characters eat each other.

It's not about her being sheltered...she's 2. Surely there was 100 other things you could have watched together.
 
Of course you let her watch it if she is interested.

Its all about how you explain the programme to her. No reason that she shouldn't know that animals eat other animals from an early age just trust yourself to explain it matter of fact and there is no issue.
 
Further to my earlier point and building on what Placeholder said - the Lion King itself talks about the Circle of Life. You can use that to explain exactly what is going on for your toddler.
 
I agree, massive overreaction. It's healthy for children to learn about how the world and nature works and also learn about where bacon and burgers etc come from. They can't go through life being blinkered to that sort of thing.
 
Don't think age makes any difference here really. It's up to you as parents when you see fit to introduce her to new things. You know her better than anyone.
My oldest nephew is 14 but his parents have no problem letting him watch/ play some of the 18 rated titles. Obviously not all but no point sheltering him from all the things either.
 
You are not overreacting. She is. My son watches lions, tigers etc. The only ones he has issues with generally are crocodiles (its the sudden movements I think). The vocabulary element is brilliant too and it allows children to learn about what's out there in the big wide world.

Tell the mrs take a chill pill. At 3-6 they were all I used to watch. Another easy and fun thing do (my sons little obsession at the moment) is go in the back garden flick a fly/ wasp to stun it then stick it in a spiders web. Had hours doing that, lots of fun seeing things that ruin a plateful of dinner getting rapped up or chewed on and dragged to be drained :D
 
don't see the issue

I guess we try to shield kids from gratuitous violence between humans as we believe (rightly or wrongly) that it might influence them in negative ways, we also shield them from sexual content (or even knowing about sex) partly because of our prudishness as a society/embarrassment on the part of the parents and also partly perhaps from a negative influence perspective as they're deemed not old enough to fully understand.

However applying this to some nature show seems like just a knee jerk reaction from your missus.
 
Over-reaction but - one of my nephews when around 3 used to watched a lot of cartoon stuff with tigers in so I thought it a good idea to show him a video of someone who has pet tigers and it scared the **** out of him and he was quite unsettled for a couple of nights.

I'm not a fan of sheltering people too much from reality though even at a fairly young age.
 
Hmm I would say at 2 years old, it's a little too young... I get it, that this is the real world, and this is how it works... But I say let them enjoy the innocence when they're that young - It should all be talking lions, toys and cars at that age :p
 
I personally wouldn't expose my child to footage of animals scared, in pain and being torn apart while alive until their intelligence had developed enough For them to truly understand it.

This is a cruel and scary world. At least allow children a few innocent years.
 
Time for a poll?

Usual overreaction from women in this case for me.

Nature is nature, let it be and educate kids properly.
 
robfosters said:
I personally wouldn't expose my child to footage of animals scared, in pain and being torn apart while alive until their intelligence had developed enough For them to truly understand it.

This is a cruel and scary world. At least allow children a few innocent years.
Click to expand...

Pretty much this.
 
I thought this thread was going to be about the inevitable mating scenes.;)

 
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If they are interested in watching it and its not visibly upsetting them (seemingly just generated curiosity for her) then it's not a bad thing in any way. It's nature.
 
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