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Author Topic: Son Admires Villains  (Read 1297 times)

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Änσnymσus

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Son Admires Villains
« on: February 18, 2023, 11:35:58 AM »
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    • My 18 yo is going through a phase (I hope) in which he admires villains....mostly their intellect and craftiness.  I try to discourage it but pointing out the intelligence of Lucifer for instance and it's not registering with my kid.  He gets mad and storms off.  He's mostly into Batman, Marvel, and Eggman villains.  I know.....stupid right?  He also thinks Elon Musk is cool and he loves tech.

    Anyone have experience with this and what did you do?
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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #1 on: February 18, 2023, 12:23:34 PM »
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    • Quote from: Änσnymσus on February 18, 2023, 11:35:58 AM
    My 18 yo is going through a phase (I hope) in which he admires villains....mostly their intellect and craftiness.  I try to discourage it but pointing out the intelligence of Lucifer for instance and it's not registering with my kid.  He gets mad and storms off.  He's mostly into Batman, Marvel, and Eggman villains.  I know.....stupid right?  He also thinks Elon Musk is cool and he loves tech.

    Anyone have experience with this and what did you do?
    :laugh1: Yes.

    Get him a job where he can put his energies into something productive, useful, and real. Having responsibility for others is usually what men need in order to overcome their temptations.
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    Offline Matthew

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #2 on: February 18, 2023, 12:30:58 PM »
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    • Perhaps the villains are the only male characters who haven't been emasculated on-screen. It's not the evil he's looking up to, it's the "cool" factor that surrounds them, the masculinity, the ambition, the excellence, the WINNING, etc.

    There is a real dearth of male role models these days. And don't feel offended; boys need role models IN ADDITION TO their father, older brothers, etc.

    Get him some better male role models -- show him that good Catholics can be brave, strong, masculine, "based", etc. and you'll have a strong Catholic for life. Fail, and you'll lose him forever.

    Good Catholic books (biographies) help. Movies are NOT going to be much help.
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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #3 on: February 18, 2023, 12:31:03 PM »
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    • Douay-Rheims Bible
    When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child. 
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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #4 on: February 18, 2023, 12:39:07 PM »
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    • Quote from: Matthew on February 18, 2023, 12:30:58 PM
    Perhaps the villains are the only male characters who haven't been emasculated on-screen. It's not the evil he's looking up to, it's the "cool" factor that surrounds them, the masculinity, the ambition, the excellence, the WINNING, etc.

    There is a real dearth of male role models these days. And don't feel offended; boys need role models IN ADDITION TO their father, older brothers, etc.

    Get him some better male role models -- show him that good Catholics can be brave, strong, masculine, "based", etc. and you'll have a strong Catholic for life. Fail, and you'll lose him forever.

    Good Catholic books (biographies) help. Movies are NOT going to be much help.

    This makes so much sense.  Unfortunately his father died and he didn't have the benefit of having him in his life.  My son does work fulltime and he does every chore I ask.  But he's emotionally immature to say the least.  And his free time is spent collaborating online (Discord) with Mindcraft enthusiasts.  Me and another family member are discussing the possibility of sending my son to live/work on a farm for a year where he would be surrounded by many hard-working Catholic men.  Some are young enough that he could forge friendships with.
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    Offline DigitalLogos

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #5 on: February 18, 2023, 12:47:46 PM »
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    • It's hard not to these days when villains are written as the ones holding to traditional values :laugh1:
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    "Be not therefore solicitous for tomorrow; for the morrow will be solicitous for itself. Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof." [Matt. 6:34]

    "In all thy works remember thy last end, and thou shalt never sin." [Ecclus. 7:40]

    "A holy man continueth in wisdom as the sun: but a fool is changed as the moon." [Ecclus. 27:12]

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #6 on: February 18, 2023, 12:49:01 PM »
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    • Quote from: Änσnymσus on February 18, 2023, 12:39:07 PM
      Me and another family member are discussing the possibility of sending my son to live/work on a farm for a year where he would be surrounded by many hard-working Catholic men.  Some are young enough that he could forge friendships with.
    This sounds like a very good idea!

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    Offline St Giles

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #7 on: February 18, 2023, 12:56:43 PM »
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    • Quote from: Änσnymσus on February 18, 2023, 12:39:07 PM
    This makes so much sense.  Unfortunately his father died and he didn't have the benefit of having him in his life.  My son does work fulltime and he does every chore I ask.  But he's emotionally immature to say the least.  And his free time is spent collaborating online (Discord) with Mindcraft enthusiasts.  Me and another family member are discussing the possibility of sending my son to live/work on a farm for a year where he would be surrounded by many hard-working Catholic men.  Some are young enough that he could forge friendships with.
    There's a manly idea. He needs to learn to forge stuff in real life.

    Peer pressure goes a long way. Monkey see, monkey do. This is probably why it is so hard to be a good Catholic these days, because we are surrounded by non-Catholics, or bad Catholics who appear like they are doing well, but they also do things that we would normally think aren't ok, but if they can get away with it, maybe I can too...(wrong!).

    I have to admit, it's hard to feel tough when we have to let God take all the vengeance and exacting just punishments, but God's will be done, it's one less thing I have to worry about.

    Another way to look at it: are you going to take the easy way out (living sinfully, loving evil, self indulgence and vice like everyone else) or are you going to be one of the best, 1 in 100 million, a perfect saint, an heir to God's kingdom rather than an heir to an everlasting stinking hell hole?
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    "Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect."
    "Seek first the kingdom of Heaven..."
    "Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the day of judgment"

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #8 on: March 18, 2023, 09:12:02 PM »
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    • UPDATE FROM OP:  It was a phase.  He's into Irish folk music and the A-Team now.  LOL.
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    Offline WorldsAway

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #9 on: March 18, 2023, 09:21:59 PM »
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    If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you [John 15:19]

    Offline SimpleMan

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #10 on: March 19, 2023, 01:51:07 AM »
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    • Quote from: Änσnymσus on February 18, 2023, 11:35:58 AM
    My 18 yo is going through a phase (I hope) in which he admires villains....mostly their intellect and craftiness.  I try to discourage it but pointing out the intelligence of Lucifer for instance and it's not registering with my kid.  He gets mad and storms off.  He's mostly into Batman, Marvel, and Eggman villains.  I know.....stupid right?  He also thinks Elon Musk is cool and he loves tech.

    Anyone have experience with this and what did you do?

    My son (age 16) comes to me sometimes with stories such as this, and I always use them as "teachable moments", to instruct him in such things as the end never justifying the means, that mortal sin is the worst thing in the universe, that some acts are intrinsically evil, and so on.

    Unless one lives in a bubble, there will always be examples of evil, and the only thing to do, is to show where the evil lies, and why and how it is evil.  Out of the clear blue sky, my son brought up Thomas Aquinas (I'd been summarizing the Thomist method of propositions, arguing both ways, and so on, in our English homeschool class when we were discussing how a debate works), and I have right here in front of me The Pocket Aquinas, which I'm going to find some way to work into our class.
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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #11 on: March 19, 2023, 09:11:06 AM »
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    • Summer jobs…
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    Änσnymσus

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #12 on: March 19, 2023, 09:11:31 AM »
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    • Too much tv and not enough praying. 
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    Änσnymσus

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #13 on: March 19, 2023, 09:11:52 AM »
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    • And most of us are guilty of this. 
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    Änσnymσus

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    Re: Son Admires Villains
    « Reply #14 on: March 20, 2023, 02:23:36 PM »
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    • You could get him to admire a brave young hero who by age 21 had already commanded over a dozen battles of the Vendee. To top it off, he died at the hands of an enemy soldier whose life he had just spared. When is some trad Cath publishing house going to put out a teen-lit book about Henri de Larochejacquelein? If there's already a book, Google's not letting it through its search results.
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