Comic Books - A Negative Influence on Youngsters

To be honest, I had not heard of this being an issue in our society. This is probably the case because my parents were born in the 1950s, and both sets of my grandparents have passed on. I guess this topic of conversation never made it to the dinner table!
I always thought of comic books dealing with superheros, ladies needing rescuing, and the eliminating of some ferocious beast or enemy. I also remembered the beloved Archie & Friends collection as well.



To hear about these comic books depicting images of abuse, cruelty and x-rated material is mind blowing. Personally, I do not find this topic appealing. From my own knowledge, however, I do recall boys being more prone to reading comic books as opposed to their female counterpart.
A main point I continually read, had to do with comic book reading and juvenile delinquency. Boys who read the violent stories often ended up as a delinquent. With this correlation at hand, many people came to the conclusion that these comic books promoted vicious behavior. What reminded me of this issue, were the shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton. The students who went on a rampage shooting teachers and fellow classmates at random, were stimulated by a video game. Video games today seem to be the new-age version of the comic book. Usually, there is some sort of story behind the video game, or at least a goal one wishes to achieve. There are many violent video games on the market, and boys tend to be the ones to navigate towards them.

Anything violent - comics, video games, movies, etc. - will always be available to children. I'm not sure if eliminating or banning them is the answer. I also feel as though lecturing them about the possible negative outcomes can be useless as well. Children are going to find out for themselves if they like something or not. Parents are not always able to hide their kids from harmful things. I think explaining and showing students the potential harmful effects of any type of material is a way to get their attention. But the question still remains, will this draw them more towards the material, or less? My only solution is to continue to think of ways we can teach our students to make intelligent and ethical decisions about certain issues in our society.