Seriously, last ECCC someone tried to bring their kids in to the late-night ‘how to photograph models in latex’ panel. I just can’t imagine what it must be like to be a person who not only thinks that’s a fine idea (it was even listed as 18+ only) but thinks it’s such a fine idea they should spend a solid five minutes angrily arguing with a volunteer about it.
(good panel though!)
Make a rule at the conventioans and prevent them from entering …?
Even at the bigger cons which have enough staff to police it, it’s a damned difficult thing to do. You can’t card everyone at the door, panel rooms have to be turned over as quickly as possible (and you can’t force that kind of liability onto your volunteers), people are in costume or just look really young, and that’s even ignoring the seemingly infinite technical issues that every convention is plagued with, etc. etc.
Not saying you’re wrong, it’s just not as simple as “telling them they can’t”. The kind of people that would bring their kid to a hazbin panel aren’t the kind of people that will give a shit about the inconvenient convention rules in the first place.
Which brings me to my suggested solution: Make a rule about it and give every volunteer a cattle prod.
There is a large gap between needing to card someone because the might be younger than 18, and someone bringing little kids. With the little kids you can point to the 18+ sign and just refuse entry.
Also we should stop acting so prudent about sex in regards to teenagers.
If the attendees are not expecting to be involved in a sexual activity and a teenager is old enough to experience sexuality, acts mature, otherwise walk around without supervision and makes their own choices to visit such panel. What harm is their really?
With actual kids there is no doubt, they stick out where they don’t belong.
I would draw the line, i would look at wether or not there is doubt, and give benefit of the doubt to whoever acts mature.
Wait, you think they care if the teenagers get in? We’re talking about the elementary school kids.
Eeh, more complicated than that. Enforcing age restrictions is an obnoxiously complex issue, even though by all reasonable measures it shouldn’t be.
The #1 priority of a con is protecting its panelists & volunteers, and while keeping the panelists comfortable is a critical aspect, enforcement of the conditions they need for adult panels can be a logistical nightmare. It’s why so many cons are moving away from having any adult oriented panels at all, and it’s really sad to see that the most reasonable solution is to just not have them.
You can card everyone. You’re already carding their ticket.
Just state at purchase you must be X to enter.
And at the door.
Then when people enter: “ID and ticket please!”
I’m getting the feeling there’s a bit of dunning-kruger going on here, and that it was unfair of me to be quite so glib about this in my initial comment. A short overview of why it’s Not That Simple:
There’s the huge issue of both ‘volunteer personal liability’ and ‘convention liability for enforcement.’ You can’t have your volunteers handling 250-500-1000 people’s IDs (one hazbin panel was in a 2000 seat room and still overflowed whoops), and the con really doesn’t want to take on the liability that would come with enforcing ID checks. It’s why cons with beer gardens have outside (usually facility-provided) staff to manage them, they don’t just use their own crew, you actually need training to deal with that. And then, if the con is enforcing age requirements they open themselves up to be sued for failing to enforce it (and causing ‘emotional distress’ to a panel viewer that was uncomfortable, this is a real example I had to deal with, it was even more stupid than it sounds) or lawsuits for unfair discrimination when someone who looks 14, but is in fact 20, is denied entry by a frazzled and overworked volunteer.
And then logistically: you don’t want your volunteers fielding all the complaints at the door, people won’t be able to get in or you’ll run out of volunteers. This isn’t a concert venue or a club, these things are huge and are the most complex crowd management scenarios that exist after Disney World. There’s no expansion of a line like you get with security checks outside of panel rooms because convention centers are designed to make movement of people from spaces as efficient as possible. Introducing artificial bottlenecks into spaces like that will not only impede foot traffic and violate fire codes, it can be actively dangerous. Introducing excessive foot traffic for avenues not designed to handle peak loads like that sets up a perfect crush situation, and it absolutely has to be discussed with the venue beforehand to see if it’s even legal.
These aren’t insurmountable problems, but they are large problems that come on top of a million other ones. A convention’s resources are much better spent managing problems, not creating new (and potentially very severe) ones for themselves.
“Hazbin”, not “Habbo”
hazbin hotel is an adult cartoon musical tv show about the daughter of satan trying to establish a hotel with the aim of rehabilitating the souls of sinners so they can enter heaven.
it’s an excellent show! a lot of fun with a bunch of famous actors doing the voices/songs ;)
Can anyone provide any actual evidence that says this kind of thing makes children’s lives worse? I was pretty uncensored as a kid and I’m honestly really grateful for it, i feel like it helped me adjust to the adult world well before my peers.
Honestly the things that got to me as a kid more than anything else was violence and the news. I recognized stuff like family guy to be fake and silly, but seeing and hearing about people getting killed or severely hurt in media and the news was sometimes traumatizing.
Nobody said it makes a child’s life worse. They’re not even talking about that.
It’s about kids being in places made for adults.
Like bringing a kid to a bar.
Do the tickets to these events say that they’re adult only?
Like, a concert ticket in the alcohol section (which is only because they can’t be served) will specifically prohibit under-21s. I guess I’m just curious why an event would “exclude children” without going so far as to actually exclude them.
There’s tons of kids running around at breweries.
Given, that makes the atmosphere different for sure
It’s not only for the children’s sake but also for the adults. Adult spaces are adult spaces meant for adults. Adult spaces bring people peace of mind when they know there won’t be children around because they won’t need to worry about a child’s needs or behavior (and children can sometimes behave terribly). Having spaces that are child-free also mean adults can enjoy sharing in sensitive topics that children should not be privy to.
I was also pretty uncensored as a kid and think I turned out fine. Watched the grudge around 13-14, shows with nudity and swearing and murder between 10-13, etc. if I didn’t like something I turned it off.
On the other hand friends of mine had helicopter parents which had even a few Disney movies on their list of banned movies. They had many issues with nightmares and bed wetting growing up, and a few mental health issues later into adulthood.
I think the issue is the label “18+”. It’s clearly arbitrary. In many countries women’s breasts have little to no stigma attached to them and are freely shown in media allowed for children. Even more so for sexual innuendos and themes. On the other hand, things I’m sure you would consider “cartoon violence” are outright banned or just not considered children’s content in these same places. (In America we normalize showing guns to children, but in places with more gun control a gun on TV can be shocking).
So when you (and not just you, many people have this same sentiment) say
Kids (talking 10 and under) shouldn’t be subjected to media or adjacent media that deals with 18+ adult themes. Period.
You’re appealing to a very very narrow definition of 18+ defined by your upbringing, time period, and region. To the poster before yous point, it’s pretty clear that kids are adaptable and are much less negatively affected by “adult themes” than we fear monger about evidenced by my earlier point that kids around the world are raised with wildly different standards as to what’s “18+” and they are all able to grow up into functioning members of society.
Now from what I gather about Hazbin Hotel it’s a pretty adult show, I’ve never seen a frame of it, but after looking it up it’s rated 16+? And people online are saying it could be fine for 13+ with adult supervision?? So how nasty can a panel get? (Edit: sorry I thought it was an “adult” adult show. This is just a YA show, seems like a lot of todo about nothing. Maybe the children were loud and it got annoying). I really don’t know. Maybe the show is extra gross but I’m not defending this particular instance, just the topic of this one thread.
Well, i would say I’m pretty well adjusted as an adult. I guess it’s not the easiest thing for me to argue because someone who isn’t could say the same thing. I don’t think it had much of an effect on me when i was really young because it was just one of those things people said would make sense when I’m older. Adults seemed to like this thing, but from my point of view back then they also seemed to like going to the store and filling out paperwork. It didn’t really affect me because it was not something i understood, so i just ignored it. Once it got to the point where i started having those feelings myself around 10-12 years old, i had already had enough context from my parents and through osmosis that a lot of those 18+ themes made sense, and they didn’t become alien or scary. I was able to go through those changes without any real shame about it because it was just a part of life. I definitely feel like if children are around that sort of thing then the parents are obligated to provide some context and help them develop a more healthy view of those themes (because the media alone definitely won’t cultivate those) but kids being around those themes i don’t think is inherently bad.
wtf is a hazbin hotel panel?
A panel is normally a question and answer session involving the artists that made a particular piece of media.
Hazbin Hotel is an adult themed cartoon that has gained popularity recently.
So, the parents who bring children to hazbin conventions know what they’re doing.
