THE mass murder of 16 people at a school in Erfurt, Germany last week by a student has once again brought up the debate over the contribution of violent movies and computer games to terrible events such as this. I have just returned from watching the movie “Blade II” and am thinking about this because, not for the first time, very young children are being brought to the movie theater with their parents to watch violent R-rated movies. If in fact, exposing children to violent, bloody films contributes to young people committing murder, assault and rape then I predict Saipan will be a very violent island in about 10 years.
“Blade II” is an extremely gory and violent vampire movie. An adult man with three young girls who looked to range from four to 10 years old were sitting in the same row as me. As I was watching the bloody images on the screen, I was appalled to realize that young children were seeing the same images. I found this fact to be more disturbing than the content of the movie. Unfortunately I have seen this occur multiple times in the last two years. In particular I recall young children watching “The Cell,” a movie not only violent but also portraying deviant images including sexual torture, necrophilia, and incest.
I consider exposing young children to violent movies to be a form of child abuse. Please think about the content of a movie and decide if it’s appropriate for children before making your family entertainment decision.YVETTE ALBRIGHT
San Roque, Saipan
