Spent today with an old friend of mine with the unique ability to often say exactly what I want to hear. Which is then, naturally, not what I want to hear.
At the Chapters Saturday (weird that I didn't mention this before) a mother and son were browsing through the comics (no, they weren't at the spinner rack.. fine! They were in the "graphic novel" section, are you happy?) looking for Batman comics- and I was taken aback at how I couldn't think of anything really appropriate to recommend to them. The kid picked up a copy of The Killing Joke- a book whose author (Alan Moore) says went too far with its violence- I helpfully suggested that that book was a little mature.
At least I didn't offend the two, which is always a risk when I get involved in these things (re: 'not my business' things)- but the mother replied that he's older than he looks- which is good, he'd almost have to be older than that- and that the kid already owns the Brian Azzarello(!) penned "Joker" book.
With THAT little tidbit I mentally threw up my hand and said "well in that case, sure, get The Killing Joke"
Along a similar vein I picked up a free Toronto Star today, thanks to the convenient newspaper deilivery service of people not taking their papers out with them and just leaving them be on a seat to make a mess, with an article concerning a photo series by artist Jonathan Hobin called "In the Playroom"- it takes scary scenes from the news (aka the status quo) and playfully recasts them with children, the aim being to illustrate "that kids see the scariest things that are out there... if you see it, they see it." and "to tear down the illusion that, in a media-saturated world, children can be sheltered."
The best ones are "The Twins" two kids sitting by some jenga looking two towers, the one kid is a blond haired blue eyed firefighter while the other kid is darker coloured with a sinister look, holding a plane aimed at a tower (as a side note, the kid with the sinister look looks awesome), and "A Boo Grave", which took me a second to get as Abu Ghraib, that recreates that one famous pic that was released of the tortured prisoners with that one jackass soldier as a Halloween thing (if you don't know what pic I'm referring, google "A Boo Grave", check out the image, and you'll know EXACTLY what picture it's reffering to.
It's the age old parenting question: how soon do you stop sheltering yout kids? Do you shelter them at all?
And of course, what constitutes sheltering?
Certain groups are upset with this artist and possibly more so the parents of the kid models used for the pics- but I have absolutely no problem with the content of these pictures, and I think it's a good reminder of a harsh reality for parents.
If I stop to think about it I do have that normal personal stigma pop up against "show parents"- which for a high profile gig like this, I'm sure was an issue. But that's maybe a separate concern.
Fortunately, this isn't something I'll have do deal with anytime soon, but I imagine the best thing as ever is to just be an involved parent who can explain things to their kids and put things in the proper context until the kids are able to put things together on their own.
Too bad about all those kids that just won't get that far. Maybe any kid has the potential to get that far and they've just been failed by their parents and teachers. There're kind of too many variables to know for sure.
Back to the Chapters though: that kid that is older than he looks- apparently his favourite character is the Joker. That's kind of a red flag people.
He should become a Ben Reilly fan, like all decent folk.
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