by Elaine Grant

Created on: November 04, 2008   Last Updated: November 23, 2008

No, I think it's absurd to have separate seating for children under 13 on airplanes so their parents can watch violent movies. The people who proposed this idea must be clueless about children's behavior or have repressed the memories of their own childhood. Violence is probably coded into the DNA. It is an important part of survival of the fittest. Learning to control and protect yourself from violence is part of education and maturity. Since children learn by imitation, it is important for parents, then the schools, to raise children in nonviolent environments where reason and love prevail. However, we know that it is difficult to maintain such standards because in reality we are aware violence has become dangerously prevalent in our society. So children should be taught how to cope with violence not hide from it.

To insulate children from the existence of violence in order to keep them innocent is like protecting them from germs. They need to build up an immunity for disease at an early age so their white blood cells can be equipped to fight illness in the future. A case in point the American Indians, an isolated population, died in large numbers when they were exposed to measles and smallpox from invading Europeans which were non existent in the New World. Part of my life was spent teaching and observing children. I was a second and third grade elementary school teacher for many years. Play period was, of course, the children's favorite part of the day, a chance for them to unwind. It was partly supervised play and free play. During free play it was inevitable that scuffles would emerge. To the teacher it would seem like serious fights and hot pursuits with sticks potentially dangerous to their health and well being. Naturally, it was the teacher's mission to protect and intervene. Ready on the spot she/he would ask, "Why are you fighting?" A child would invariably respond, "We're not fighting we're wrestling and playing. It's fun." The teacher, with the voice of reason, would respond. "Well, it looks like fighting. It's pretty violent, and someone might get hurt anyway. So break it up and play ball." Lately, I've been watching a group of young children mostly boys at play. They are tough not wimpy little kids who play all day in the large grassy field in the center of a square of apartments. They enjoy each others company, and they have invented many different games loosely allied to football. There is no intervention by parents, no specific rules to their

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