Ah, parental authority. Growing up, my parents made sure that we didn’t question their authority and were pretty strict with us. Now, a choice that every parent faces is how to be authoritative while being loving. Do you choose to punish more than explain? Etc.
I’ve often erred on the side of caution, explaining why something is wrong or how choices could be made differently. I suppose it’s because I’m a teacher at heart, and I want the kids to understand deductive reasoning and how to dissect any situation so that they can make the right choices.
Like NOT wearing this outfit in public.
One of the television shows we’ve allowed our children to start watching lately (with parental supervision) is the CBS show “How I Met Your Mother.” Now, while quite a bit of it – particularly the parts involving Barney – is very sexual and not age-appropriate, we watch the episodes first to make sure there isn’t a potential issue. Plus, there are a lot of good life lessons in the show which make for good discussion points.
Unfortunately, sometimes things go awry.
One of the episodes we watched lately featured Robin (one of the characters) as an actress on a Canadian children’s show. The whole point of that episode was how blatantly sexual many parts of the children’s show were. In fact, the big highlight of that show was the girls singing “The Beaver Song.”
Click here to see the clip if you’ve never seen it (obviously it’s safe for work).
A few days later the children were playing and singing the song.
“Please don’t sing that song,” I told them.
“Why??” asked my daughter.
“Because it’s not appropriate,” I told her.
“But it’s about animals,” argued my son.
“It’s not really about animals,” I informed them, putting on my most stern face. “It’s really a grown-up joke. So please don’t sing it.”
See how both girls have beaver puppets? Yeah, that didn't help.
They shared a puzzled look. This was when I realized that perhaps I don’t have as much parental authority as I thought.
“But Mommy,” continued my daughter, “It’s a sweet song about friendship. They said it in the show.”
“It’s not, pumpkin,” I reinforced, “Just trust me.”
They didn’t trust me.
“But I LIKE the song!” continued my son.
“I’m sure you do, but it’s not something you could sing at school. So STOP. SINGING. IT.” At this point I was doing that evil ventriloquist thing through clenched teeth to make a point.
I didn’t make the point.
“It’s about BEEEEEEAVERS,” explained my daughter, who clearly thought I was mental.
“Look, a beaver is a slang term for girl parts,” I informed them – thinking my clear and open honesty would end the argument right there and then. I thought that they would understand I only wanted to keep them from an awkward situation outside of the house, and thus my parental authority would be withheld.
Nope.
“MOMMY THAT’S RIDICULOUS!” exclaimed my son.
“YEAH!” my daughter chimed in, “WHY WOULD IT BE CALLED THAT??”
I sighed. This was clearly not going in my favor. I wasn’t about to explain that it probably had something to do with beavers and chewing wood, and wood is slang for — oh, forget it.
“Look, just stop singing it!” I hollered, “Or you’ll be in trouble.”
Dang TV.
I blame Barney