Games and kids -> fully OK?

Hi Guys,
I'd like to put a subject on the table, and may be people with experience in psychology could give some interesting opinions.
My son has 2 years old, we get along well and we play several stuff: toy cars, building blocks and... GTA4. I mean I play, he watches, and he tells me which cars to choose or whether fly an helicopter or ride a train or a boat (he loves motorized stuff). Now, I do my best to hide with camera movements most violence from the game. I accomplish that most of the time, but you know, it's GTA. The thing is that we enjoy a lot playing and I have the feeling that he knows it is just a game. But of course, I'm not fully sure of it, and I wonder if I might be putting unnecessary violence in his young brain (i.e. mostly car crashes, and may be one punch per session).
So two subjects here: first, Nowadays kids will grow playing games as we grew watching colour TV, so may be this will affect kids just as TV did with us, so far not too terrible. And all of us saw some TV violence when kids, and most of us are actually not violent. Or on a counterargument, these games are so immersive that they could have a special impact on young brains, and therefore, I should just play kid's games with my son. However, you know, kid's games are really scarce, and as I was saying, he really loves cars. He actually probably likes GTA4 because of it immersiveness, just like the rest of us.
Anyway, thanks for the opinions, especially if there are some expert's opinions there.

 

GTA4 has a mature rating of "18+". I know some parents who will not allow their 16 year old children to play these kind of games due to the violence and car crashing.

Here's the main question. If you were a 2 year old, could you tell the difference between violence in the real world and fantasy? Most likely no.

I would say no to GTA4 for the 2 year old and go buy a more safe game (there are plenty of fun motor games out there). Once, the 2 year old sees enough car crashing, hijacking, shooting, violence, etc. by accident. He'll think it's normal and might develop an aggressive personality at a young age.

That's just my 2 cents.

 

There are definitely more productive things you could be doing with your 2 year old. I mean...GTA4? Really? 2 years old....take him to the park or something. I mean...sheesh, you don't need a child psychiatrist to tell you that this isn't right. If you want to introduce your "very very very, still in a highly critical developing stage" young son to video games, at least tone it down several notches and do something like a Mario game. Of course, no stranger can tell a parent how to raise their children so these are wasted key strokes I guess.

 

Its been awhile since I took developmental psych but at that age seeing is believing. A child that small cannot tell fantasy from reality and to him GTA4 probably seems real. Will it affect him? to that I really have no idea...

My advice, I would not play the game in front of him just to be safe.

I'm not violent at all and my first memory of any game is Wolfenstein 3D, I think I was 5 or 6 but I knew it was not real.

 

Come on, you think we can always go to the park? Let's just say if you haven't had kids, it's not at straight forward as it sounds. Kids are born with a personality and desires believe it or not. They're not just a ragdoll that you program. You basically feed them data, and they process it themselves, with a little help by their parents. As a parent, you need time to do stuff for yourself too, and that time comes few and far between, so all work and no play makes Johnny a dull boy you know? So if your kid enjoys game time with you, use it to your advantage, just obviously keep it as clean as you can.

I have two sons 2.5 and 3.5 now. I play games around them, although I tend to try to pick ones with little violence. Portal was great. Battlefield Bad Company 2 they don't really know what's going on. And GTA IV, the violence is more mature. To them they mainly just see cars bumping around and driving all over the place. No different than Mario Kart. It's just the stabbing and beating other people up in a gruesome fashion that I take exception to.

Of course as a parent, use your own best judgement. I think kids can tell reality from fantasy. My 3.5 year old loves Power Rangers. It's violent, but he knows it's fake. He knows dragons aren't real, and that hurting someone else is not nice.

I'd say game on if he likes it. But good idea keeping the real violent bits out of it.

 

I would love to tackle this but yeah...I can see it going nowhere.

 

I would never let my son see violent games if he were 2 years old. At that age i would protect him and let him watch cartoons instead or something like sesame street where they learn to count and such. If cars and trucks is his interest, wouldn`t it be much smarter to watch car show, race, or one of them motor educational programs on discovery on the TV or something?

And just because someone is born with a personality doesn`t mean you can`t turn that little kid in to a monster if you do all sorts of bad things to him. I bet that many of the serial murderers could be normal functional people if they didn`t have to go through a tragic childhood. Little kids do what they see. If a kid see another kid hitting an adult and the adult doesn`t do anything about it, you can be shure that he will try to mimic the same.

 

Well, that is exactly my question. And, how do you know they cannot tell. They can tell that a crash of a toy car is fake. And they can tell that a crash on TV is fake. My son used to get very impress with the main crash in the Cars movie. Not anymore, he knows it is fake after watching it several times. And the generic question is: Should i avoid Disney-like movies such as Cars, Toy story, among several others, because their characters fall from buildings, are hit by cars, loose arms, etc.? Given your opinion, I should, cause they cannot differentiate it from reality, right?

 

Alright, I thought I did pointed that out: I do take him to the park, and the beach, and so and so, and among several other things, I play GTA.

 

Well, I think it's pretty clear that you should either do something different with him or make it clear to him that what's he seeing is only fantasy. You could also introduce him to old adventure games (Monkey Island, etc.).

I laugh whenever the media suggests "X game" turned someone into a killer. It's only the parent's fault if the kid couldn't differentiate real world and fantasy violence.

 

So do you think that watching Tom and Jerry was bad for our generation? Should our parents have prohibit it?
This is when we should think this out of the box. Video games are new and particularly impressive only for US, not for the kids. For us Tom and Jerry were new, and we spent hours watching their violence, but we are fine as adults. Isn't Tom and Jerry just as GTA4? Of course, as I said, by avoiding hard violent acts.

 

Well, only if you don't have good arguments. I mean, I am asking for opinions.

 

Well, in my opinion, Tom and Jerry (cartoon animals) look less human than the human characters in GTA4. Also, a 3D game also looks more realistic than a 2D cartoon. I am just mentioning a few key differences and how a 2 year old might perceive the world around he/she.

The movie "Cars" like you mentioned before is a good example of this. They are animated cars with faces and hands, but they sure look less human than you or me.

Also, we are talking about a 2 year old infant here and not a 6 year old child who should have some knowledge of what is right/wrong or real/fake.

Basically, it's your choice in the end and how you want to raise your kid. Personally, I would go with a more child-friendly game.

 

There is a HUGE difference between a mouse hitting a cat on the head with a hammer and a virtual detailed man hitting another guy with a baseball bat with blood flying everywhere or a car running down screaming people.
There is no blood on T&J. There is no one dying in the cartoon. The music is all cheerfull

Shure, if you avoid everything of the violence in GTA4 there is no danger. If so, then why are you asking us this?

 

Sigh. This forum is the absolute ***WRONG*** place to ask about parenting questions. 95% of the people here don't have kids, and a good 60% are probably < 21 years old who think they know what they'd do when they have kids but have no clue what it's really like.

Of course the response will be "oh dear, you let your kid see you play GTA IV" when they themselves probably watched much worse on TV or their parents playing games.

No offense to anyone, but sorry, been there. Thought I knew what I'd do when I had kids, but it's not cut and dry in any respect.

I grew up watching Tom & Jerry, Bugs Bunny / Road Runner, and a number of other "violent" cartoons and I'm no worse for wear nor are everyone else my age.

 

I was 5 playing Doom, and Mortal Kombat, probably the worst of the bunch back in the day, of course I had a really well rounded upbringing, lake every summer, sports, great schools, good morals. And I think that made the difference of knowing reality to the images I exposed myself to on the screen.

Regardless, I played alot of mario and ninja turtles and I too watched power rangers. You should hook up a super nintendo and get him to play classics, get him playing the games rather then being a spectator, he'll probably enjoy it ALOT more then just watching which im sure he likes, but playing is so much better. Expose him to Mario. Then when he's doing that it frees you up for some GTA time to yourself.

 

A 2 or 3 year old will not be able to figure out a game controller. However, I did get some kids educational games that after I spent some time with them they did figure out how to operate it somewhat on their own. They have their own simplified controls and is educational too not to mention encourages logical thinking. In a year or so I'll probably put an old computer out for them to start using and learning with mouse/keyboard and some simple kids computer games.

 

As long as you don't expose him to the more violent parts of the game, I think you'll be fine. At that age, true he might not be able to determine the morality of it, but as long as you sit him down as he gets older and clearly spell out how aggression in games in fine, but there are moral codes to abide by in the real world, he'll be fine. Spending time with your son and building a secure relationship where he can ask you questions is more important, and if you guys like to play games, there is nothing wrong with that.

And this is from a developmental psych point of view, seeing as I just got out of that class. And no I'm not a parent, just stating my opinion.

 

My 8 year old niece plays and watches me play gta 4 and I think it's fine but it depends on how you play it. When we play we don't do missions and usually just explore the city by taxi or heli.

 

Yeah, big difference. I too think that playing something like that with a 2 year old is not a good choice. GTA is a violent game, at least wait till your son know whats going on, so you can explain the difference between the game and real life(5+ years old I guess?)

 

My mom was one of the "you can't play/watch/listen to [thing] until you're [age]," types, that's what introduced me to BitTorrent and other forms of piracy in the first place.

When I finally won the argument that a game was not going to turn me into a criminal, the excuses changed from "you're not old enough" to "I'm not going to support the publishers of that filth by buying it." Try to say you'll buy it with your own money, parents say that all your decisions reflect on them since you're under 18, and by allowing you to buy it, they're still implicitly supporting the developer. Instead of arguing with a brick wall, I torrented GTA. I torrented The Matrix as well, because R-rated movies are oh-so-horrible. I torrented Blink 182 (perhaps this will give away my age, and yes I know I should have been punished simply for my bad taste in music) because god forbid I hear the "F word" even though I was using it myself.

I have now graduated college, am steadily employed, and do not go around beating people with a baseball bat, stealing cars, or selling coke out of my trunk. I don't think that everything that's illegal should be, but I bet I'd have those opinions whether I played GTA or not.

Apparently I understood the meaning of harmless fiction before my parents did. I will not be the same way with my kids, because there's one thing I've taught myself by being one. Parents don't ever stop you from doing anything, they just stop themselves from finding out you've done it.

A two-year-old won't be able to act on any "violent impulses" your GTA'ing instills in them (and in all likelihood won't understand it), and by the time they're able to, they're also able to understand the difference between a game and real life. Forbidding them from playing at that point is just insulting their intelligence.


...but, of course, my parents allowed my brother (six years younger) to do whatever he wanted at whatever age because "he's already been exposed to it by his older brother." Leave it to me to fight for all his rights as a kid, hypocrites.

 

Honestly, every child is different and each individual child will respond differently to video games. My parents wouldn't buy me GTA Vice City, but I managed to play the games elsewhere. Since the OP's child is two I doubt he will even remember anything that he sees. I'm not encouraging/discouraging anyone to show their children graphic games at a young age, but realistically they're just not going to remember it. I recently found out that when I was around five or six my dad used to give me small sips of his beer every now and then. I definitely don't approve of his behavior at that time, but realistically no physiological or psychological harm was done to me and I wasn't even aware that such events ever took place.

Just use your good judgments and observe his behavior and reactions. By the sound of it OP you probably have a good handle of things and I'm pretty sure after a few trial and error runs you'll better understand how your son tolerates graphic video games.

And remember people. Psychology≠Science

 

That's just because the government has burned a certain sense of "morality" into your mind that it's not ok to drink until a certain arbitrary age, which has no basis in science or even psychology, and which is a tenuous at best stand-in for something resembling "responsibility."

People of all ages drank alcohol as a matter of course back in ancient times and thought nothing of it.

 

I agree. At the age of two, most children have hardly formed the basis for rational thought, if I recall correctly from my psychology courses. At this developmental stage, most children look are still fully reliant on their parents for intellectual stimulation. If your child was a bit older and growing bold and independent, I would say let him see the game. But at the age of two, he will have just as good a time watching Sponge Bob as he will watching you play GTA. If it were my two-year-old, I would probably pick Sponge Bob, and think twice before playing GTA.

Aw, don't be so cynical! This forum is a fine place (in my opinion) to ask parenting questions, so long as they are vaguely related to notebook computers. The answer to the OP's question certainly isn't clear-cut, and the exact answer will always be impossible to pin down. But there are definitely arguments to be made!

Part of me wants to say it's wrong to allow young children to play violent games or watch violence/profanity on T.V., but I think you're right. It's about balance. You reward your child for a job well done, but you don't reward him for misbehaving, do you? By having both experiences and understanding them, a child can form a more realistic perspective. The real world, after all, has just as much senseless violence, profanity, and foul imagery as it does justice and traditional morality, the things most parents try to put in front of their kids. And I believe that the sooner kids understand this, the sooner they can become independent thinkers. Many children are much smarter and more perceptive than their parents give them credit for; even at a young age, they suspect that the world isn't all fruit pies and flower fields. They will form their own moral values and opinions about the world regardless of how tightly their parents try to control what they perceive. The question is, how early is too early?

Hehe. You have a point, but psychology is definitely getting more scientific. Heck, they even use the scientific method now!

Maybe the government has failed me, but I don't feel that way at all. I don't drink at 17 simply because of a conscious choice to avoid the health risks. But come on, ancient people? There is some scientific evidence that alcohol hinders brain development and function, and I find your denial of that a little strange. There would be more, I'm sure, except once people realized what the effects were, they couldn't exactly grab a bunch of eight-year-olds to conduct an experiment with.

 

I completely agree with you about your morality comment and that's how I feel, but the reason I disapprove of his actions isn't related to our social views on alcohol and how school and government have shaped our thoughts on alcohol and other "bad substances".

I just don't know how the alcohol may have effected my body at that age. It just goes back to the fact that all children are different. Maybe one kid could sit down and drink a can with no issues at all whereas another will take a sip and start feeling sick. In my opinion, it's just not worth the risk.

@Tthursday It is becoming more scientific as time goes by, but it's still in its baby stages. I've taken a couple Psychology classes and it's all just surveys and theories. "60% of children will be at risk of ADHD if they don't do such and such". In my opinion an example of "Real Scientific Psychology" would be Pavlov and his findings on conditioning. Now THAT is something that can benefit humanity and progress the scientific community.

 

I think aylafan just hit the nail. I grew up watching Tom & Jerry and the Looney Tunes. While these are violent cartoons, their context was not on the emphasis of the violence, but rather the comical context (greatly helped by appropriate comical music).

Taking everything into account as long as you avoid the violent scenes and have a pleasant music (you can have the radio station all the time?) it should be 'ok', but certainly there are better options for 2 years old kids than a GTA title. Remember that we are products of our environment and that the early years can predispose us to many of our 'adult' behaviors.

And on the bright side... at least you're not playing God of War 3 with them ...

 

lol at this thread... sigh.

He/she is your child. Raise it the way you think is best. Let us just hope he is smarter than you and in 20 years doesn't have to ask a question as asinine as this on a notebook forum.

-1,

this is the dumbest thread I have seen yet. Is this a forum for tech or parenting?

 

Hey man, he has the right to ask 'cause this is the gaming section and he has a gaming question.

Also, asking here is far better than asking Jack Thompson or watching Fox News reviews on videogames

 

haha true! I am not sure why anyone would watch Faux news. I mean you would have to be smart enough to realize the propaganda that is at work on that station.

 

Play burnout paradise i baby sit a 5 year old boy now and then(also work part time in a nursery) and he just like to crash.However he also plays games with his dad like just cause 2 but again there just into the whole get in veichle and blow stuff up.I dont about you guyz but children have wild imagination you give them a toy car and they pretend it is blowing up and doing flips Ect. Really its no diffrent from the games IMO
Also

 

I have a bachelor's degree in psychology, and I am starting my masters this fall. There have been some good posts here, that I agree with.

However, I would e careful about letting my child play (or watch) GTA 4 for two reasons:

1) A two year old child is still learning alot abou the world in which he or she lives in. Alot of this learning comes from modeling :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_cognitive_theory#Observation_of_models

2) If you let your child take part in violent video games at an early age (still "removing" the most violent scenes) you will set a precedent which might be difficult to change later. Som argue that a two year old is too young to comprehend the game (which I disagree with), but as the child matures, more and more of the game content will be available to the mind of the child. Let's say you continue this trend, would you let your six year old child play Battlefield 4 with you? At which point would you deny him watching you play violent games? I would say the sooner the better.

So there is my 2 cents. All in all, I would discourage you from playing violent gmes with your son and either (1) play them while he is sleeping, (2) make sure he is doing something else or (3) play a more suitable game.

PS: I have to add that for parents that wish to play games with their children, I would recommend something like the Wii, or Xbox kinect. If you and the child are moving around, and playing together at the same time, more opportunities for positive interaction and bonding can occur.

 

osama bin laden played GTA4 when he was 2, true story.

Spoiler

pfft, you hypocrites, I dont like people that overly sensor there kids, it does more harm than good in the long run.

 

Get a Wii, play Mario Kart There are also a ton of games like Crayon Physics and such that can still let him set things in motion that isn't killing people, or even jacking their ride.

I know I'm having a heck of a time teaching our 2 year old that he doesn't get to hit his 10 month old little brother, and that he can't just take whatever he wants because he wants it, even if he "trades" his little brother for a different toy. GTA's mode of operation would seem to support what I'm trying to teach our kid not to do

I agree with you oan001 in people not giving kids enough credit. Just because they can't communicate well doesn't mean they don't grasp complex or subtle concepts. It's just that at this age, which complex and subtle concepts they grasp become the bedrock for all of their future interactions. They're literally learning how to be people at this age.

I wouldn't say "don't play GTA you're a horrible parent!", but I would suggest that kids are soaking up a lot more information than most people would think they are, and you want to make sure it's the right information. So even the action of pulling someone out of the car so you can drive it can stick with them.

 

Letting kids do whatever they want isn't a good idea either. kids need some structure. There is no way I'd let a young child watch movies with lots of violence, swearing, and other things. I mean realistic violence. Gangs, wars, bloody and gory stuff. once the kid hits preteen and teen years though, I feel it's ok to move into more lenient territory, based on what the kid wants to do. if he's into the war stuff, then Call of Duty is an ok option, but I'm still not going to let the kid watch Saving Private Ryan, or go anywhere near GTA. I'd also rather get the kid more into Airsoft or paintball than playing video games all day.

 

I must say, this is one of the most unfounded, idiotic statements I have read.

You missed the entire discussion here, and dismiss it as boiling down to parents being "overly sensitive".

Nice trolling, moron.

 

I completely disagree. I think he has an excellent point that people are just trying to play the blame game. What video games was Adolf Hitler playing?? Seriously, video games dont make people violent.

I grew up playing violent video games and watched "R" rated movies from a very early age of 4-5 and a lot of them gave me nightmares, but they never made me want to go on a killing spree.

I now have a son, he recently turned 3 and we played call of duty black ops together a lot. In the end I decided to sell my xbox360 not because i was worried my son was going to grow up and kill people but because i was more concerned about what others would think when he is running around saying head shot.

"playing war" is not a new concept to ANY generation. 2000 years ago, kids picked up tree branches and pretended they were swords to stab at each other. I use to pretend tree branches were guns and so on. What do you think nerf, airsoft, paintball, or even waterguns symbolize? your shooting people -- just watch kids in a park, they will even play dead when they are hit ... they are playing war, just on a much smaller safer scale.

Why are video games and movies blamed when its in our nature to be violent? Why cant humans just be human? i dont know...

 

I'm going to disagree on what you just said about video games and violence. I recently had a 5 year old kid threw a plastic toy bird at me and throught it was funny. Guess what he was playing? Angry Birds. I don't even think it's a violent game either, but it seems that the 5 year old kid think it's okay to throw things at people because he saw it in a game.

So, your statement is not entirely true. Every situation is different and the outcome is not always the same.

Anyways, back to the main topic... In short, just discipline your child and try to raise him or her in a good environment.

 

You certainly got a point there. By the way, I think this is "a" good place to ask this just because everyone here knows GTA4. None of my colleges does (we are geeker than we think).
Now about your statement, may be we shouldn't prohibit watching things to kids of any age, as long as they can tell that it is not reality, just as they do with their toys. And again I want to take us out of the box: PC games are NEW only for us. For kids it will be just like playing with toy cars. So why do you think a kid will be able to tell that toy cars are not real, but not that PC virtual cars aren't. I mean, violence in movies and video games is purely aesthetic, which is entirely subjective. (now, this is not something I necessarily believe, but I really would like to discus it with someone knowledgeable)
Still, don't worry, I do avoid violent parts of GTA, but crashes are still fairly strong. Also, my son has all the discipline he needs (schedules) and he is particularly non violent. i.e. people is often surprised because he actually pets our cat (instead of biting her). I just wonder if we really need to censure them. Or, if it is only about guidance. Now, I do agree with TV age rating, but only because kids watch TV alone. I mean, would it be wrong for them to see violence or *S-word censured*, as long as their parents are with them supporting them?.
Thanks for the ideas by the way.

 

Please, that kid is misguided by his parents! May be they are violent, may be they fight with each other, or treat him without respect. Angry birds is a detail within his behaviour. Otherwise you could expect every kid that is playing that game to behave the same way.

 

This doesn't make much sense to me. So, you expect your child to act like the characters in GTA4 because you allowed him to watch it daily? It's well within his behavior?

 

Gah, I hate comments like, take them to the park, play paintball, fly a kite, whatever. The parents here know you do all that stuff. There's nothing wrong with video gaming either. Anyone who has kids know there's only so much you can do with your kids all the time. You need time to do things for yourself too. And stuff that doesn't cost money, and isn't so dependent on the weather. I'd rather play video games with my kids than sit them in front of movies all day.

 

I never said video games are to blame for murder and aggression. This is not the subject in this thread either. The OP asked about opinions of letting a 2 year old child watch GTA IV. If you want to start a discussion on this matter don't use arguments like "I played Doom 10 hrs every day and turned out fine". Ofcourse noone is going to post saying "i'm a serial killer, iplayed lots of Doom" or: "I am a serial killer and never touched a computer" for that matter...

The point is that there is no evidence that links violent tv games to murder, but there are adverse effects like increased aggression after viewing certain types of violence.

However, some kids can watch violence till their eyes bleed and not be affected, others not. It is a combination between predisposition for aggressive behaviors and the surrounding environment such as social interaction with peers and family which determine whether someone will turn out a killer or not.

Even though there is no direct link between violent video games and violence, saying that watching violence can have no negative effects on a child is quite ignorant. It is like saying "If it doesn't breed violence, it cannot be bad".

I think the main difference between a child playing with toy cars and playing/watching GTA is the following: Playing with toy cars the child is in total control to act out any scenario he wishes to. In GTA there are rules that must be obeyed. The car cannot suddenly become a plane, it can only drive on the ground etc. In GTA there is already a context provided for the child, whereas playing with a toy car the child decides the context for himself. It would be my guess that it is more probable that a pedestrian gets runover in GTa than in real play.

In my opinion, YES: children do need to be censored, and they should not be exposed to the mature content you speak of.
"S-word" and violence are a part of our adult world and have no natural place in a childs world view. I speak here ofcourse of "S-word" and violence as it is portrayed in popular culture. Ofcourse chilren bite, fight and do more or less horrible things to eachother from time to time, but there is NO reason why they should be exposed to the more brutal, cruel and systematic forms of violence which often are portrayed in in games, movies and tv-series rated 18+.

 

Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold played Doom all the time & we all know how did that turn out ... leaving the jokes aside ... I won't pretend to be a psychological expert but common sense wise if there is even the slightest chance that something like that may adversely affect my child I wouldn't take the risk ... I don't have a child of my own but still I agree with many of the poster who said that you just can't go out all the time sometimes you are dead beat from working & all you want to do is have a relaxing gaming session ... just do it when the little dude is not around or choose an appropriate game genre

 

Don't mean to put worthless information but I highly reccomend trying something fun, creative, and interactive. I think my first choice when I have kids will be gardening. If you stick with games like GTA, ask him if he knows this is really fake. 2 year olds almost always tell the truth, so if he says no or something like that, just move on to better games for children.

 

I think exposing your young, impressionable child to a game as vile as GTA4 is terrible parenting. . .

because everyone knows San Andreas is way better!

 

You'd better keep your kid locked in a closet then, god forbid he go to school!

They will be exposed to everything anyways, attempted censorship is counterproductive, yes I would let my 6 year old play Battlefield 4. Maybe by the time he's 12 he'll be decent for me to play against

 

There is a middle ground between locking them in a padded room and showing them snuff films when they're 2.

 

He did say "slightest chance that something may adversely affect his child."

 

I'd let my child play battlefield 4, seeing as it doesn't exist. There's a difference between censorship and good parenting. I'm not one to ban something, I'd rather explain to them why something is wrong than let them figure everything out by themselves. Would you give your six year old alcohol because "He'll be exposed anyways?"

 

I mean regarding that topic which isn't any compromise of the child freedom ... I may have mis-said it ... What I mean is that it aint worth it

EDIT:Also, you missed the part of "something like that" ... I didn't say everything