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Just after Ava was born, I took the older two girls to Toys R (I don’t know why they encourage kids to write backwards – I can’t even find that letter on my keyboard) Us to let them pick out a toy each. It was kind of a ‘find something good to play with so mom can focus on the other kid’ trip. After picking out their toys, we were walking past a set of three televisions mounted high on the wall. I was looking straight ahead so I didn’t run over an unsuspecting child with my cart, but my children seemed to be enthralled by something else. I followed their dumb gaze to the televisions, where before I could say “holy Toledo, Batman!” the Joker had sifted through half a dozen people with a machine gun! Before you think I’m bashing the movie Dark Knight, hear me out. We just bought dinky cars and Polly Pocket dolls at a childrens toy store. Then a bunch of people were shot.

I jerked the cart a bit to get my kids’ attention, then asked them to look for their names on the personalized cup rack.

I thought about what was happening, and decided to ask some questions. A stock lady was organizing the Dora inventory, so I sauntered up and politely asked if she knew who decided what movies are played in the store. She responded enthusiastically “Oh, I think it’s Brian (or whatever his name was) in the media department – he loves Batman!” So I decided to go have a chat with Brian. Brian had about five people in his line, so I wheeled my kids into the small area with the video games, etc. and waited my turn.

“Hi Brian, how’s it going? Hey, what movie is that?”

“Oh man, that’s Dark Knight! It’s a hot new release. That’s the best movie in a long time!”

I could tell that Brian liked Batman.

“Cool. It looks like a great movie for your living room… but not exactly for a childrens toy store. I just happened to look up as the Joker was mowing some guys down and I don’t really find that appropriate for my kids here.”

Brian turned around. So now I have people in line behind me waiting, and I’m being ignored. I raised my voice a bit.

“Gee, thanks for hearing me out on this one… Really feel like I got my point across!”

I started to walk away and felt that more should be said, so I went back and asked to talk to a manager. The manager “came down” to see me, and after listening to my comments and telling me that “marketing” chooses which movies are played in the store proceeded to tell me how Dark Knight relates to my childhood.

“You remember 20 years ago it was perfectly fine for the roadrunner to blow up the coyote. Well, this is the progression of that mentality.”

I should have asked him if marketing gave him that answer. I told him that that line he was drawing was pretty thick, and I could only loosely see the connection between a cartoon animal fabricating creative ways to outdo the other cartoon animal (and I say “outdo” because the coyote never dies). He said they’re allowed to play any movie rated PG or better. I realized I wasn’t going to get anywhere with him, so I thanked him for his time and walked out of the store.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been thinking a lot about this little incident. I still strongly feel that the Dark Knight is not appropriate for a childrens store, but now I’m not so ignorant about the movie after watching it myself. Because parents all have different ideas of what their children should be exposed to at which age, I can’t just say “this is bad” or “kids shouldn’t watch this”. I think a more sound argument should be the fact that they will play a PG movie. What does PG stand for again? Parental Guidance. That would assume that I, as a parent, have somehow guided my children to watch this movie. My argument is that I in no way led my children to watch this movie. I led them to a toy store, not a movie store.

If you have seen the movie, I think you’ll be able to mentally pull some images that you would find frightening at the least. Take some of those images and imagine them as posters on the walls at Toys R Us. Two Face in the hospital bed. The Joker with a knife in a few people’s mouths. In the bank with bodies littered on the floor and a few masked men with machine guns standing over them. And lastly, imagine your son just picked out his new toy from the shelf at Toys R Us, then he glances up at the tv to see a boy about his age being held by Two Face with a gun pressed to his temple.

Would you guide a child there?

Let me know what you think.