Tragedy linked to kids' show

My children are 9 and almost 11. They love (or loved) Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, Rurouni Kenshin, Harry Potter and Naruto, especially Naruto.

For those of you unfamiliar, Naruto is a young ninja in the manga written by Masashi Kishimoto. The anime of the series is shown on Cartoon Network every Saturday night. My children and I consider watching the show a family tradition, we get everything we need to done and gather around the TV set in the living room, at least one of us with popcorn. So when I checked other mommy sites on the Web today I was horrified to read of a recent death linked to the show.

According to The Associated Press and other news agencies, 10-year-old Codey Porter died after his friends buried him headfirst up to his chest in a sandbox. The other friends told the police they got the idea from watching the show and wanting to imitate the moves of one of the characters who uses sand as a weapon. See story here http://www.kgw.com/news-local/stories/kgw_031008_news_boy_buried_sand.3e9857b9.html.

When my son first started watching anime, I told  him that what he was watching was not real and that the minute he started acting it out, he would be done watching it. So far, to the best of my knowledge, he has never acted out the moves of any of his favorite animes. But things can go terribly, tragically wrong when kids get together and sometimes rules are forgotten. Perhaps it's time I restated those rules to make sure the kids are as clear on them as I can make them. What about you? Do you know what your kids are watching?

Parentista C