How do you explain smutty pictures of your children's favourite characters?

[Guyliner]

Dd is 8 and into superheroes. When she googles her favourite female characters she's often confronted with fan art from men way way old enough to know better. How do you explain the hyper sexualisation to your children when you see it to children or do you ignore it?

I've started saying it's from men who think women should look a certain way all the time but hope I'm not making it worse by being honest. She's not stupid and that there is a marked difference between the female and male character representation is obvious.

I once took her to a comic book store when she was 5 and the only 2 posters of Wonder Woman and Super Girl were of them engaged in sex acts.

I don’t anything about the comic book “scene”, but if it as sexualised as you’re describing, I’d be very selective about what my child experienced. For example, I wouldn’t be allowing an 8 year old to google her favourite comic book characters.

Aren’t there any books she could look at, which are specifically for children?

I do that now, but even so we occasionally have issues still. Like today we were googling images together in safe mode and looked up "harley Quinn colouring pages" for us to print out for her and these were in the first page of results. And it's for bloody coluring pages! You would think that would be safe.

I was looking up Superhero costumes with her recently and they were all pornified ones.

My question is more how do you explain it when they do see it rather than how to avoid it I guess.

Bronies for example, why the hell have they felt the need to ruin My Little Pony's search results? Can't they have a non related horse fetish?

Like PP, I wouldn’t want to be explaining it to an 8 year old so wouldn’t be allowing her to look them up. You make it clear that she’s seen this stuff more than once. Once can be a mistake. Find the pictures for her and save them.

Lol

Sorry but if you are googling Harley quin you are asking for trouble.

My 8 year olds had no idea who Harley Quinn was

And we managed my little pony without Google being involved at all.

Sorry but if you are googling Harley quin you are asking for trouble.

She likes her from the DC Superhero Girls show.

I've just googled Harley Quinn colouring pages and got nothing like you described.

Sort it out OP

I didn’t allow my 8 year old to google stuff like that. Computer time was spent with me sitting next to her.

You make it clear that she’s seen this stuff more than once. Once can be a mistake.

I make it clear that I looked up Halloween costumes once with an 8 year old and also tried to look up colouring pages. It's not exactly crack den parenting

If any of you genuinely think your child never has access to the internet without you then are being very naive. My child's Catholic Primary have said they can't ban all search words as it makes it impossible for the children to use the internet, and NO a teacher doesn't sit there with them. There's one in the room.

Even if you take specific characters out of the equation they may well see a crappy men's mag with a woman in a bikini next to their Peppa Pig annual at the petrol station. How do you discuss the sexualisation of women with young children?

I didn’t allow my 8 year old to google stuff like that. Computer time was spent with me sitting next to her.

Yeah I literally said I was sitting with her.

Just let her watch her programme and don't let her watch suicide squad harley quinn wears the tiniest of pants that is zoomed inon. Get her into marvel their female characters are not reduced to their pants

I think you can report the results if they escape the safe search criteria, but you might get rsi by the time you've finished.

DS is 5 and has occasionally asked why a female character is wearing what she is and I've said that the illustrator is very silly and those clothes aren't at all practical for the fighting or the jungle or whatever and asked him what he thinks she'd need instead and he usually comes up with armour, a coat ect. I'm probably going to have to come up with a better way to deal with it as he gets older though.

In the meantime, for colouring pages, I usually find a batman/star wars website of colouring pages aimed at children and let him look at those to pick rather than Google.

I never needed to discuss the sexualisation of women with my dds when they were 8. We discussed it when they were in their late teens, 15 or so.

@Fazackerley

scroll down a bit

We discussed it when they were in their late teens, 15 or so.

So you discussed it after they'd already been exposed for years and after kids in their classes will have already started dating? Why would you leave it so late?

I google image searched Harley Quinn colouring pages then selected kids as a filter. I did still get the boobs picture but really quite far down so probably on the third page.

Not sure about bronies - I googled my little ponies and just gone rainbow dash and her pals.

I do still get the point OP is trying to make. My DD is six and mad for Teen Titans Go - particularly the Raven character. Before I realised that Team Titans and Teen Titans were different I google image searched and cane up with raven fan art that was quite different from what she has seen.

OP, I would make very little of it indeed. I wouldn’t make it about men either. I would simply say that those are pictures some grown up fans have drawn and they aren’t for children.

I think you can report the results if they escape the safe search criteria, but you might get rsi by the time you've finished.

DS is 5 and has occasionally asked why a female character is wearing what she is and I've said that the illustrator is very silly and those clothes aren't at all practical for the fighting or the jungle or whatever and asked him what he thinks she'd need instead and he usually comes up with armour, a coat ect. I'm probably going to have to come up with a better way to deal with it as he gets older though.

In the meantime, for colouring pages, I usually find a batman/star wars website of colouring pages aimed at children and let him look at those to pick rather than Google.

@FlaviaAlbia thanks. I'd should report the results I never thought about it tbh. Obviously, if it was something terrible I would but not just something that's NSFW. I suppose because they are coloring pages it sees them as safe?

I've given answers like yours to dd when she was younger but she's getting older and I know kids at school talk about "sexy" and things like that. I just feel like ignoring the obvious seems a bad idea.

Because dating doesn't have any thing to do with the media sexualisation of women. They are two completely different things. Maybe they worked it out for themselves. They certainly didn't grow up on the internet, luckily.

I agree, I haven't worked out how to handle it yet so I'm watching with interest.

It's a lot to put on them when they're so young but on the other hand, you don't want it accepted as normal. I'm not sure where the balance is.

@passmethecrisps is there an easy way to switch your filter to kids? I think my filter is always set to safe even for me as I'm logged in to google in this account.

OP, I would make very little of it indeed. I wouldn’t make it about men either. I would simply say that those are pictures some grown up fans have drawn and they aren’t for children.

My fear is that's allowing the bad side to filter in though without some kind of targeted response.

Because dating doesn't have any thing to do with the media sexualisation of women.

Of course it does! You don't think the way girls are treated in relationships is affected by the media's sexualisation of women?

Ignoring it when it's staring you in the face is a bit like ignoring racism I think. You're sort of saying it's OK.

Just don't Google stuff with your kid. google it yourself and print out the suitable ones. Ok?

is there an easy way to switch your filter to kids

Go here, click to turn on safesearch and then click save. You can lock it to safesearch as well, if you want.

www.google.com/preferences

@Guyliner Unfortunately these pictures are Harley Quinn (except the ones without clothes on) if you've seen any of her comics you'll know her clothing shows a lot of top boob. It's the same in the suicide squad comics.
Maybe try googling "DC superheroes kids Harley Quinn"
That might bring up the kids Harley 🤷🏻‍♀️