The violence is make-believe, of course, but with multimedia and advanced graphics, the line between virtual reality and stark realitycan become thin. The fundamental problem, however, is not so much what our children are watching, but who is watching our children. Guns, gangs, and glorified violence have filled part of the void left by the withdrawal of adults from the lives and activities of children. Negative social and cultural forces have become more threatening precisely because the positive socializing forces of family, school, religion, and neighborhood have weakened. This is not to place full blame on parents for the increased problem of unruly and unsupervised youth.
Many families lack the support network to control and guide their children.
In some neighborhoods, peer and gang influences can overpower the best efforts of dedicated parents. They need help. Children spend too little time engaged in structured activities with positive role models, and too much time hanging out or watching a few savage killings on television. Bored and idle, they have too much time on their hands, too much time to kill. The prime time for juvenile crime begins after the dismissal bell rings, from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m., when nearly half of such crime occurs.