Hate to go OT with this but...
Gimme a break man.
They give these games MA17 ratings for a reason.
You let your 4-year-old watch you play Left 4 Dead (Im assuming that's your "zombie game) and games like UT?
My buddy's 6-year-old got up one night and saw him playing L4D by accident, then had nightmares for a week.
He also got sent home one day from his school and his parents called in as his teacher overheard him talking about headshots and killing people. He was talking about "his daddy's game" counter-strike which he was sneaking glimpses at through his bedroom doorway when he was supposed to be asleep at night.
Also reminds me of the time me and a friend went to see Freddy vs. Jason and the theater was full of parents with their 10-year-olds, who spent most of the movie yelling "KILL HIM KILL HIM" at Jason's current victim on screen.
The amount of ignorance in parents these days amazes me.
I must be getting old or something.
You must also be getting very WRONG. You have no idea how I raise my sons or how intelligent they or I myself are. You also have no idea how strong my moral compass is, or how much I love my children. You have no clue how much I examine, and reexamine and self analyze every decision I make in regards to them and what they see and hear.
I take the time to explain things to my children in painstaking detail. I talk to them
on their level and do not let a topic go leaving them confused or scared to ask me more .
They are both caring, empathetic, understanding little boys when they need to be and they are also rough and tumble little super hero monsters when it's time for that.
My 4 year old son can explain to you why Captain America is a real hero and the Punisher is a scared and hurt man who probably cries a lot when he's alone. He even understands why Spider-Man jokes and taunts the bad guys, to try and cover up his own fears and uncertainty. ( Mama was an awesome example 'cause she tends to smile when she's nervous, so we used that as a basis for explaining why Spider-Man is funny when he's fighting.)
I know when to draw lines, and when to start questioning my son's understanding of what he sees. My love of video games has given me plenty of time to explain them to him, and how fake they are. He knows that gun in real life are horrible scary things to avoid. He doesn't think I'm running scared shooting at zombies, he KNOWS that I am playing my zombie GAME. He understands "pretend" and "real".
I dunno kid, you can generalize whatever you want. Think whatever you want, but when the day is done, my kids are fine. They're my only reason to take life seriously, and when I do I'm very thorough. I educate myself on anything I need to and pass it on to them. I don't act as some default filter blocking the world from my kids, I act as a teacher and translator and protector when my and my wife's morals dictate.
I'm not Jack Thompson, but I'm also not some overworked, absentee dad who only talks to his kids in short curt sentences, while trying to carry on with my personal life. My kids ARE my personal life.
I've been home EVERY night at bedtime and so far, ZERO nightmares.
