Something kind of funny has happened in the Holz household the last few weeks. Actually, a couple of things, come to think of it.
I’m not even exactly sure how this occurred, but about a month ago my family and I found ourselves watching NBC’s American Ninja Warrior one Monday night. I’m sure that the presence of Ninja alone in the title was sufficient to attract my son’s attention. Henry’s 7 years old today, and his appetite for feats of derring-do is very nearly bottomless. So it wasn’t a shocker to me that he found the insanely difficult obstacle-course competition on American Ninja Warrior immediately and forcefully compelling.
“We have to watch this!” he announced. And so we did.
What was surprising, though, was that my daughter Annabeth, who’s almost 5, was just as riveted as Henry was. In fact, it might have been more compelling to her. That was particularly unusual, because she generally acts as if the television doesn’t exist. She can happily play with dolls or make a fort in the corner of the living room while the rest of us watch something on TV.
But that first night, she was mesmerized.
The following Monday, we heard cries of, “Oh, American Ninja Warrior is on tonight!” as we finished up dinner. So we washed up the dishes and plopped down on the couch to see which contestants with the always-dramatic backstories would go on to compete another day, and which would get wiped out on the Ninja course’s many ruthless and unfeeling obstacles.
Now, from a Plugged In perspective, this action-packed competition is pretty good stuff. Though we noted a bit of profanity in our online review, I’ve yet to hear any this season. But perhaps I should have paid a bit more attention when Paul Asay wrote, “Are there any downsides to an upbeat sport that demands your very best effort just to give it a go? Well, the series sometimes actively encourages everyday ninja wannabes to keep up the practicing … by showing people doing some pretty dangerous stunts in public places like parks and bridges.”
After the second episode we watched, I heard Annabeth shout: “Daddy, come look at me! I’m doing a jumping spider!” The move she was referencing from the show demands that contestants take a huge leap off a platform in between two sheer, vertical walls—no floor—which they have to grip using only the pressure of their hands and feet. It’s a demanding athletic maneuver that has claimed plenty of victims on the show.
Well, when I went into the kitchen to see what Annabeth was doing, there she was, feet and arms sandwiched between the refrigerator and the wall on the other side, and she was climbing up—just like contestants did on the show. “I’m doing the jumping spider!” she announced with a massive grin of achievement. And so she was. In the weeks since then, she hasn’t lost her enthusiasm for the acrobatic move, and she keeps inching a bit higher up between the wall and the fridge—high enough that I’ve now begun telling her, “OK, Annabeth, that’s cool, but that’s probably high enough,” whereupon she falls with a smiling thud to the floor … and does it again.
Here’s thing that’s most surprising to me in this little anecdote: You never know where or how something in our entertainment media might influence someone who consumes it. Never in a million years would I have thought that my daughter would be the one whose imagination would be inspired by a dramatic, physical move on a reality TV show.
In retrospect, I should have seen it coming, because Annabeth is the most gleefully acrobatic of my three kiddos. But I didn’t see it coming, and now she’s climbing the walls. Literally.
I think it’s a good reminder about the power of entertainment to capture our imagination, to suggest ideas we might never have come up with on our own. In this case, it’s something benign (as long as Annabeth doesn’t climb too high, that is), something my daughter can be proud of and the rest of us can chuckle at good-naturedly.
Sometimes, however, the messages suggested and implanted aren’t so benign, and the imitation of them isn’t so playfully innocent—a lesson I think we’d do well to keep in mind the next time we hear someone insist that entertainment doesn’t really influence people to imitate it.
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