1.)
Introduction / 2.) Ratings, Censorship
and Negative Criteria / 3.) What SHOULD
Children See? / 4.) What SHOULDN'T Children
See? / 5.) Children and "Adult" Drama
Children and "Adult" Drama
Virtually all of the above applies equally to choosing a play for a child
audience and to deciding whether to take a child to see a play intended
primarily for adults. Children should not be taken to the theatre
"to be seen," even if their parents are going primarily for that reason.
If the child will not be able to appreciate a play--if she will be bored
by it, or will not understand it--she shouldn't go. Children do not
need any help deciding that the theatre is boring and they would rather
play Nintendo. However, if a play, regardless of its intended target
audience, meets the criteria I have mentioned above--or if it meets most
of the positive ones and violates few of the negative--children can attend
with good results. Fortunately it is usually the case that children
viewing "adult" theatre do so in the company of their parents and other
adults, who have presumably made a considered decision about whether the
individual child is ready for the play. Furthermore, children in
the company of mostly adults don't respond negatively to some of the things--like
sexuality and language--that can cause problems if children are surrounded
by their peers. Frequently it is only these automatic embarrassed/delighted
responses that keep children from understanding and appreciating "adult"
stories.
An important ingredient here, as indeed in any kind of theatre, is the
need to talk to children about what they will be seeing and about what
they have seen. Since practically any kind of story (other than the
extremely violent) that children can understand and process in a
healthy way is "appropriate" for them, it is obvious that discussing the
plot of a particularly complex story beforehand, or having an open dialogue
about sensitive issues before seeing a play about them can make an otherwise
"inappropriate" play appropriate. After viewing a play, if children know
they are allowed to ask questions and talk about their concerns, they will
bring to parents' and teachers' attention issues that have disturbed them
or that they don't understand. The responsible adults who make choices
about what children should see need to be informed about the precise nature
of the plays, films, television shows and video games in question.
That's another reason that applying positive, rather than negative criteria
is crucial. One cannot use positive without a real understanding
of the nature of a piece of entertainment. When an adult really understands
the issues and content of a play or film, and its structural and stylistic
characteristics, it almost doesn't matter if he makes the "right" decision
about whether to allow children to see it, because he will be well equipped
to deal with questions and concerns that may come up. It is almost
impossible for a child to suffer permanent trauma while viewing an entertainment
in the company of a caring adult who acts appropriately towards her.
On the other hand, adults can also make perfectly appropriate material
inappropriate by reacting to it in the wrong way. When a teacher
or parent becomes hysterical and starts condemning a play or film children
are watching or have watched--condemning it in earshot of the children--the
children can come to believe they have been injured, even when they have
not been. This applies to an equal or greater extent when the children
are the performers. I once directed a Middle School production of Li'l
Abner. (Actually, I've done that several times, since it's a
particular favorite of mine, but I refer to one particular production.)
The experience was an extremely positive one for everyone involved, and
the children felt proud of their achievements, and, more important to me,
they developed a strong and trusting bond with some caring adults (my colleagues
and I) in a school where this ability had been much challenged lately.
But a member of the School Board--whose children were not even in the school
system, but home schooled--reached the (in my opinion bizarre) conclusion
that the play was "inappropriate" for Middle School. He said it was
"rife with sexual innuendo," and that the adults who had chosen it had
acted irresponsibly and had put the students in danger. No one else
I ever met agreed with him--certainly not the rest of the School Board--but
unfortunately a reporter got hold of it and gave it front-page play in
the local newspaper. (It was a slow news week.) Suddenly children
who had been proud and happy with their success, and who had finally found
some adults they could love and trust, were told that their performance
had been "dirty" and their teachers had harmed them. It was patently
absurd, but that didn't prevent them from believing it, and an experience
that should have been totally positive was forever tainted. Even
if the complaints had had grounds, I think both the Board member and the
reporter acted irresponsibly. I should have been approached privately,
and censured if necessary. (As it happened, the affair never created
any trouble at all for me personally, because the parent community and
the rest of the School Board rose up in my support, and letters to the
editor made it clear where the fault lay, but by that time it was too late
to totally save the experience for the children.) Adults whose true
concern is children--and not some particular political agenda--approach
the issue of "appropriateness" with children's interests always paramount.
I realize that my idea of what is "appropriate" is in some particulars
at odds with the opinion of most parents and many teachers. I don't
claim to be a messiah, or to have all the right answers. But I think
it is important for everyone committed to the welfare of children to challenge
their set ideas about issues such as this, and to explore, experiment and
research these questions for themselves. Some will still disagree
with most of what I say, and virtually all will disagree with at least
some of it--the question of "appropriateness" is and always will be individual
and subjective. But the more we really understand our own attitudes,
and the less we let other people or algorithmic "ratings boards" tell us
what is good for children, the better we will serve them.
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Copyright © 1999 by Matt Buchanan