3 1/2yr old and Ninja turtles? AIBU?

[Lndnmummy]

Ok, wise ladies of mumsnet i need you. Am i being unreasonable to think that my 3 1/2yr okd is too young for these bloody turtles? I hate them and we went from thomas the tankengine to super heroes and ninjas and swords almost overnight.
AMBU and PFB? My dh (who i normally agree with on most things and who I think is a pretty good judge) thinks I am being way to preciaous and OTT but i loathe these aggressive turtles.

Help!! Thoughts please

I wouldn't let my three year old watch them either.
He comes home from preschool talking about spiderman and I was surprised three year olds would be watching them.

Hm, It is tricky as they are definately subjected to it at nursery/school regardless of what your rules are at home. It just happend so fast. One day it was peppa (annoying she is) and thomas and the next it was these damn turtles.
Thanks for all your input, i know i am precious. But they are so little and so impressonable.

Going to go against the tide here a bit and say that he's your DS, if you don't think they're suitable don't let him watch them. I have a nearly 3yo DD and a 19mo DS, I'm quite picky about what I let them watch. They certainly do get to watch a fair bit of TV, but I record the programmes I like them watching and don't let them watch other stuff. I've recently started watching Disney films with DD, I'm happy with their content.

I would agree that Thomas and Peppa might be a bit babyish now, although I would have thought the turtles were more for 6yo+. What about the Octonauts, Tree Fu Tom, Sportacus, Swashbuckle? You could record them and put them on when he asks for the TV, I find once the TV is switched on mine are quite happy with whatever is on! Sarah and Duck is the total favourite in this house, but maybe not so suited to an action loving 3yo boy.

Having said all of that, my DC don't go to a nursery or childminder, it is easy for me to supervise their viewing. Somehow, DD still recognises Peppa (she's on my banned list, I think she's an obnoxious pig!) so the peer pressure to watch this might kick in when she starts nursery in January!

They're not that impressionable.
If it's any consolation, my eldest son used to love Turtles, power rangers and anything connected to martial arts. He studied 2 martial arts as a child, one to black belt level. He's never been in any trouble whatsoever, or showed any aggression or violent behaviour.
Just as a generalisation, little boys (and some little girls too) love to wrestle and play fight. Apparently it's a good thing to let them do it, within limits of course, because they learn how to control their strength and aggression that way.

Thomas can be a bit evil, what about the story where one of them refuse to come out of a tunnel as he doesn't want to get wet. So they brick him up

Give me kickboxing turtles

Thomas can be utterly awful and quite dystopian. Too much 'Be useful', it's all 'be useful' 'be useful or you'll end up on the (literal) scrapheap'. The current (useful) trains can even see the fate that befell the older trains once they stopped being useful. It's all very communist. 'We must all work and be useful for the benefit of our unimpeachable overlords. Or. Else.' Actually I don't think my DH would have a problem with them preaching communism. I'm gonna ask him tonight.

Luckily the insidious messages of Thomas most likely soar above the heads of the target audience. Hopefully they just take home the lessons of helping each other out and being nice and sharing without realising that the trains in this show are nothing short of slave labour.

Neither DH or I (or DD) care for the new cartoon but both of us were fans of the 80s/90s TMNT. Who is everyones favourite Turtle?

Doesn't Thomas the Tank mock obesity though?

(fat controller?)

Still giggling at aggressive turtles

It's all very communist.

Interesting, I read it as quite feudal/uber-capitalist, not communist. There's no sense that the proletariat have a stake in or will share any rewards from the railway - just do as the Fat Controller says, maximise profit or you are literally dead.

Oh! Just found this gem in a blog:

And yet despite stagnant living standards the people/engines of Sodor appear content. Indeed it is unclear if they get paid at all?—?instead they seek meaning and joy in a Stakhanovite desire to be “really useful engines”. The great trick of Sir Topham is to employ engines who essentially evoke the image of the New Soviet man in the service of a proto-capitalist, semi-feudal enterprise.

OP, sorry, derailed a bit...

Agree with Thomas being a little darker than expected. Favourite turtle was always Donatello :) my dd likes Michaelangelo and ds1 favours Raphael :)

My 2.10 yr old is also obsessed. I don't think I'd let him watch it if he was my first, but his older brother is really into it and I can't seem to work out a way to let him enjoy it without his brother.... Ds2 seems to have totally bypassed the Peppa/Ben & Holly/CBeebies stage purely because he is so influenced by his older brother. And yes, they act out the sword fighting and hitting each other, and I worry that that is caused by what they're watching...but maybe they'd be fighting each other anyway? I think if I could I'd just not put it on the telly for ds2, although the interest would remain I expect.

I don't let my 5yr old DS watch TMNT, I thought it was targeted at 8yrs or so.

Transformers Rescue Bots and Messy goes to Okido are his favourites.

I always found/find that the programs with hand to hand combat are the worst for encouraging playfighting that goes too far. So we never did Power Rangers in this house as amongst my son, nephews, mindees, playing Power Rangers always ended with actual fighting and violence and tears. Anything with a weapon seemed ok as they understood the 'pretend' element - i.e. this is not really a gun or a sword so we can't hurt each other with it.

I am very amused by the idea of a communist Sir Topham/Fat Controller though.

Yabu.

Turtles are great. There are alot worse things out there. At least you aren't stuck watching in the night garden...

I don't let my nearly 5 year old watch them, programs like that def have an impact in his behaviour

I loved teenage mutant ninja turtles (their full and proper name) as a child. They are heroes in a half shell! (Turtle power!) I have grown up into an reasonably well adjusted adult woman and am sadly not a ninja.

Let him watch it and if you notice behaviour deterioration maybe stop him watching it? Possibly I'm not the best judge. I only have a nephew and he wants to be a mermaid, or Elsa. I have a Leonardo onesie, I am nearly 30