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<title> TV - The violent babysitter </title>
Television is here to stay, that became evident decades ago. And a violent society, such as the one we live in today, is of course reflected in the world of entertainment. That's why it's getting more important all the time that we make sure that our children get a chance to defend themselves against violence on TV.
 When reading Ginia Bellafante's article on parental responsibility and violence on TV, "Locking out violence", I keep coming back to one sentence in her introduction that puzzles me. Bellafante asks herself: "... Who can guarantee what kids will do when parents are out of the room?" I think that an even more important question is: "How can I avoid leaving my children too often alone in front of the TV, the sometimes violent babysitter?"

Regrettably it's inevitable that most children of today get in contact with violence of some kind. And of course the main distributor of violence is television. Equally regrettable is the fact that many parents use the TV as a babysitter, leaving their children on their own with access to all sorts of more or less disturbing images, just a push of a button away, and with nobody around to explain what they actually see.
	Since I'm not a parent, I know it's very easy for me to claim that children shouldn't be left alone with the remote control at all. But evidently many parents, for instance after a day of hard work, quite simply are too tired to find something better for their children to do than to watch TV. And honestly, who can blame them?
	And in cases where the children come home from school hours before their parents come home, how can you avoid the never ending flow of violence to reach the children via television, apart from actually hiding the TV on a new place every morning?
	Most people in Scandinavia don't yet have the possibility to lock out violence technologically, but a few other suggestions come to mind.

Apart from literally forbidding children to watch certain violent programs, I also think that talking about violence is important. Depending on how old the children are, parents should try to inform them, every now and then, what the violence on TV is about, why it's wrong, why it's there and what effects violence can have on (especially young) people. It might even be good to explain the differences between the kind of violence that is shown on the news and the more "entertaining" or "innocent" violence that's a part of almost every movie shown today. It might also be a good thing to encourage children to ask their parents about things they have seen on TV that may have startled or confused them.
	Of course the point is not to frighten the children, but to give them a general idea of how violence works and why it should be avoided, both on TV and in real life. Naturally this doesn't automatically keep children from watching violent features on TV, but if parents never take a stance against violence in front of their children, then how are the children to understand that violence is wrong? 
	Still, there are other ways of avoiding violence on TV, with the parents in another room or even out of the home.

One of my good friends recently became a father for the second time. Before he and his wife had their first child he once told me that he never would use their TV as a babysitter. Well, he turned out to be wrong. Every now and then the easiest way of getting a moment to himself is to use the TV. But - he never leaves the set on just like that. If he has to leave his daughter alone for a while, he puts on a video tape with 'Winnie the Pooh' or something equally non-violent and nice and takes the remote controls with him as he leaves. This works perfectly well and my friend recommends it to all parents who are in need of the occasional one-hour break. And from what I understand, many parents are. 
	But speaking of breaks, why not try encouraging children to do something else than watch TV every now and then? 

It can sometimes be easy to forget that there in fact is a 'power off'- button on the TV-set. If parents are worried that their children watch too much violence and gore on TV - and they should be - they must remember that it's not only their right but also their responsibility to sometimes make their children take a break from watching TV.
	In fact, maybe the idea of actually hiding the TV every once in a while isn't so bad after all? 
	Books can also be pretty good babysitters, you know.
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