Children’s programs between two terms… Changes affecting values, habits and ideas

Rabbi Riahi

Amman– in front of a small screen; The child Hossam Jalal (9 years old) sits with great attention and concentration, without even realizing it, he embodies numerous cartoon characters, which he sees as a symbol of strength and courage. Hossam spends a lot of time with cartoons, because they are the only way to entertain him and make him happy, especially when his parents are busy with him.

Hossam loved television, so nothing attracted him anymore and he gradually imitated everything he watched, especially those scenes containing violence, magic and supernatural powers, but watching those programs began to affect him negatively and lose his innocence, in addition to increasing his nervousness , so he became an aggressive person who leaned more towards evil characters and sympathized with them.

Between the past and the present there is life, the lack of simplicity, kindness and depth that children today live with cartoons that attract and fascinate them with their visual and audio effects and merge them with their characters, separating them from reality and indulging all their senses.

And after these programs were previously fertile ground for cultivating many good values ​​and ideas that a child needs in shaping his personality, today they have become rich material for instilling toxic and negative ideas that are not suitable for all children.

The real danger is that parents do not take the time for their children to sit down with them and listen to them, because with their constant preoccupation they forget the children’s need for entertainment and entertainment, so they turn to cartoons and electronic games, maybe they find in them something that pleases them and simulates their imagination .

As for Heba Muhammad (32 years old), she criticizes children’s programs that differed from the time because the cartoons were simpler, and we learned from them how loyalty and how good always wins over evil, besides raising awareness. only stories and fictional stories, but they carried values ​​Noble and deep in feelings and events.

Heba points out that she really misses her childhood and those beautiful memories she lived with her favorite characters, among which are the owner of the long shadow Remy, Bill Sebastian, the noble boy Maruko, Lady Lady and the faithful animal friend. . he says; She was overwhelmed by a feeling of nostalgia for those days, as if she was running away in search of many things that she missed and no longer exist. By returning to those programs, she regains a part of her innocence and memories that remained engraved in her heart despite the passing of all those years.

In addition, Abu Hamza shows that he is in constant disagreement with his wife, and the reason for this is cartoons, and her ignorance of the magnitude of the danger that threatens their three children as a result of sitting in front of the house for a long time. on TV, explaining the great change he sees in his children’s behavior because, according to him, they have become more and more isolated, neglecting their homework and staying up late, late at night.

As for the impact of this on their health, Abu Hamza confirms that his young son always complains of headaches and is absent from school all the time, feeling lethargic and unable to concentrate. Therefore, the solution was to set strict laws that would regulate the chaos, give everything its due and allow them to watch television for only an hour a day, while keeping an eye on the value of the content shown.

And Umm Ziyad compares her grandchildren to her own children, saying that there is a big difference between cartoons in the past and cartoons recently. Many values ​​are distorted, in addition to the fact that some programs contain inappropriate words that children pass to each other. She emphasized that children are affected by everything they see, whether negative or positive, so it is necessary to monitor and guide them and talk to them in order to correct some of the concepts and ideas they pick up through these programs.

According to Umm Ziyad, she began to notice in her grandchildren the extent of their interaction and harmony with the scenes of magic and sorcery and their belief that the fairy comes at night to give them gifts, indicating that cartoons in the past appealed to adults before children because of their deep content. and they contain wisdom and lessons that we still remember today with love, nostalgia and longing. .

Psychologist and pedagogue Dr. Musa Matarneh believes that man by nature strives for everything that is old, but also feels nostalgia and longing for it, no matter how old he is and how many years have passed, stressing that each generation has its own culture, principles and ideas which he takes from several sources such as family, school, and more recently television and cyberspace.

In the past, according to the bishop, cartoons were a means by which children were taught human values ​​and morals, on which their personality was built, and made them aware and engaged. The presented ideas respected the child’s mind and environment, while entertaining and making him happy. Today, however, there is often a lack of purposeful content and necessary educational content that would protect the generation and raise it properly, primarily taking into account their psychological well-being and the information and experiences they store.

These distortions of values ​​and customs sound the alarm in order to reduce the risks that haunt today’s generation, and among these risks is the incitement of violence, so the child will enjoy these scenes and get used to them because they justify violence and make it normal in everyday life and sometimes show it in a humorous and interesting character, which makes it faster and easier to accept, and also forces the child to be tolerant towards the hurt and lose the ability to sympathize with the weaker ones.

Also, watching cartoons for a long time affects the child’s concentration, health and academic success. Therefore, Matarneh advises that it is necessary to create a balanced life for these children that teaches them discipline, responsibility and time management, so that they can pursue different activities such as sports, reading, intelligent games and creating friendships with their peers.

For her part, sociologist Fadia Ibrahim shows that children’s programs, series and films, or what is said in parentheses as children’s media or their own media, whether visual, audio or written, greatly contribute to the education and formation of their values, concepts and principles about things around yourself. This medium for children is a source of child education after family and school, regardless of its content, whether it is education or entertainment and leisure.

The form of the material presented to the child is proportional to each time period in terms of content, form or technique. Old children’s programs were like people’s lives and the nature of their lives is easy and simple. It deals with emotional and dramatic topics that can sometimes lead to the transmission of negative and sad feelings of the child. The most valuable focus on which is the value of good and evil.

According to Ibrahim, the past generation was very impressed by this content and attached to it to a great extent and longed for it and remembered it in all its details, and this is natural because what was presented was suitable for the mind. , the consciousness and perception of children at that time, but now the materials produced for children are larger, more widespread and developed to attract the child’s attention and control over his mind and behavior as a result of the extraordinary technological development in the field of cartoons. or children’s films.

The most important and most dangerous thing is that the contents of the programs provided to children in the past were private, i.e. they respected the privacy and values ​​of some societies and could be monitored and controlled, and now there are no special children’s media, for example in Arabic a region that takes care of its values, customs and traditions, today everything takes on universal values ​​and opens up to them without borders, and the state or family can no longer control or control the content related to children in the light of the growing and accelerating digital revolution, according to Ibrahim.

According to Ibrahim, recently there has been a lot of talk about negative values ​​that are not suitable for Arab societies, which are instilled through international films intended for children, such as Disney’s, and these films have been stopped in large numbers. Arab countries, as well as violence or electronic films and games intended for children that contain scenes. A large amount of violence can affect children’s psyche, thinking and behavior and they can become more violent.

Therefore, we must be aware of the importance of this topic and systematically work with a clear and strict strategy of countries to preserve and protect the minds of children from abnormal trends that are inappropriate to our societies and values, and we must compete in creating anti-Arab content for children that preserves the character and values ​​of our societies and uses technology and benefits from it to trade quality and abundance in the production of Global Children’s Information.

Ibrahim also says that parents should have a certain level of understanding and awareness to guide their children in choosing appropriate media materials and use them at appropriate times and hours without affecting their learning or their mental and psychological health, encourage them to read and instill positive social values ​​in them, and to talk with them about the dangers of some content for children, which are not commensurate with our religions and values, and warns them not to follow them and not be influenced by them. This topic should also be discussed with students in schools as a kind of awareness and guidelines to preserve the greatest amount of healthy education for our children.

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