How they turn our children into bullies and braggers

Rasha Almaqaleh

We used not to allow our child to watch action cartoons where there is a lot of aggression and violence, even though they are considered ‘age-appropriate’. We thought that children don’t need such violent cartoons especially with all the violence that is actually going on around the world. Instead, they need to learn how to live in peace and harmony with each other. But then we have noticed that whenever our child played with other kids and they started to fight for some reason, he would be beaten and wouldn’t understand what was happening and what he was supposed to do to protect himself. Then, we found out that those kids watch those action cartoons and pretend to be those strong and violent cartoon characters. We started asking ourselves whether it was fair to prevent our child from watching such cartoons while most of the parents out there allow their kids to do so.  I was annoyed that kids learn from such cartoons that it is ok to use their physical strength against each other and how this could turn them into bullies at a very small age.

 And like many parents, when our child started going to kindergarten, we were so happy. Time elapsed and we were so proud to watch him grow, get adapted, and pick up a new language so fast. Then, we started noticing that our kid would come back every day from kindergarten asking us to buy him something he saw with other kids, like a Spiderman T-shirt, a Batman pair of shoes, or any other commercial stuff which companies fill the markets with to attract children and trick their parents to buy. So, we thought that we didn’t have to buy him things he really didn’t need. Therefore, we completely ignored his demands and kept telling him that he already had everything he needed.

One day I went to pick him up from kindergarten and as soon as one of the kids in his group saw me, he proudly said to me “I have a star-wars T-shirt!” I smiled at him and pretended to be impressed. A couple of minutes later, another kid, 3 year old, bragged that he had ten Euros! This immediately rang an alarm bell and on the way home, I kept thinking about all of my child’s repeated demands and whether it was not a good idea to turn a deaf ear to them. Then, we started observing this attitude among children and we figured out that kids boast and gloat all the time and how this affected our child’s confidence! Kids LOVE to brag about anything and everything and they tease the other kids for not having ‘cool stuff’, especially those stuff with cartoon figures.  I know that this happens in high school with teenagers but I didn’t expect that they acquire such attitude at this small age!

When we asked our kid what kind of present he wanted us to get him for his birthday, his answer was “a Spider man  figure!” That was a toy he once saw in a toy store. Those companies will do anything to get to our pockets. First, they create attractive non-educational T.V. cartoons. Once the cartoon characters become popular and our children become attached to them, they flood the markets with those characters toys, puzzles, T-shirts, pants, under wares, shoes, belts, watches, etc.  I noticed that if we get our child, say, a T-shirt, which doesn’t have one of those figures, we will go through a battle to get him to wear it. Apparently, he doesn’t count it as a good piece of cloth and he doesn’t see anything special about it that is worth ‘showing off’.


                        
Against our better judgment, we ended up allowing our child to watch the kids’ cartoons which we once believed he would be better off without . And we had to give him many of the ‘cool stuff ‘he asked for and weren’t really necessary. We noticed that his confidence has increased and that he could compete with other kids. I’ve come to the conclusion that those companies are not only messing around with our money but more importantly with our children’s personalities and their way of thinking and judging. As parents, we should be aware of the huge influence of such cartoon characters on our children and we should try to reduce it. I know that we cannot completely avoid buying such stuff for our kids, but at least we can teach them that their self worth comes from who they are and what they can do not from those ‘cool stuff’ they have.                                             



There is a proverb in Arabic that says it best: “you cannot clap with one hand!” So, without the help of all the parents out there, it’s not possible to create a healthy environment for our kids to grow, and we won’t be able to raise them in the best way possible. We are simply allowing those commercial companies to mess with our children’s heads and turn them into bullies and braggers. We have to bear in mind that if we decide to do nothing about it, our children will eventually grow and those two horrible attitudes will grow with them, too.