As I uploaded the new LAST BOOK READ crappy webcam graphic, I realized that I never really commented for you on the previous throne holder, Killing Monsters by Gerard Jones. Killing Monsters was a joy. The subtitle should present its thesis well enough: Why children need fantasy, super heroes and make-believe violence. It talks a lot about cultural items dear to me - video games, comics, cartoons - and even some I didn't expect to see defended, like horror movies, goth affectations, and gangster rap.
If I had to poorly summarize Gerry's book (and I can call him Gerry, because I've known his name since he was writing Justice League back in the early 90s), I'd say that children embrace violent media because it safely represents aspects of the adult world that they need to internalize and understand. It can be as simple as fighting or as complex as hate. And as the adults around them, it's our job to guide them through that with as little stress as possible. Instead of freaking out when a 14 year old gets into Eminem, we should talk about the lyrics and try to figure out why it's interesting.
A couple months ago, I let my third grade neighbor pal play Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. And I winced every time he directed Tommy Vercetti to beat a cop to death so he could take the cop's gun. Now, he knows that killing a cop is wrong, but he also knows that he's playing a non-real video game. If I had stopped the game and launched into a tirade about how killing is wrong and he's too young to play such a violent game, I would only have succeeded in making him nervous about his personal choice to "kill" the "cop." I would have added my own adult anxiety to his burgeoning pubescent problem of coming to terms with the nasty realities of the world. Not the least of which is the concept of death in the first place.
Killing Monsters is the educated, researched, logical response to every brimstone mouth-breather crying to sanitize Saturday morning and eviscerate video games. One of the more interesting points in the book shows that juvenile crime actually increased during the years in which cartoons were produced solely for harmless, comforting, family values. You remember those years: the era of the Care Bears and the Smurfs. Obviously you can't draw a direct correlation between those two events, but it certainly throws a Monchichi wrench into the arguments of those saying we need to do the same today.
Gerry also mentions Pokemon a lot. Here's another choice element: Pokemon hit the big time almost exactly after Columbine. A nation of young kids threw themselves into a ridiculous anime property with its own secret language because every adult around suddenly started looking at them like they were loaded weapons. Holy fuck, it makes a lot of sense.
If you're at all concerned about kids and their violent games, or violent imaginary play, or violent action cartoons, or violent music, read the book. It's not a whitewash, I promise you. It doesn't simplify everything to the black and white of the religious right tactics. It doesn't wholly exonerate the Eminems and Dragon Ball Zs and Street Fighters of the world. But it does offer an antidote to the doomsayers and an alternative to just sitting around being scared to death of your kids.
Oh, and the new book I read? White Oleander. Yeah, it's an Oprah selection, what of it? It's a very sad story, and I can't imagine that the movie version is half as good. I would imagine I'm about the seventeenth male worldwide to read the book.
