I understand that people feel that if they are "passing on tradition" they feel justified in both entertaining and teaching their children with folk songs considered by many to be age inappropriate. I also don't think anyone owes me, or anyone else, an explanation for their parenting decisions and choices, as it isn't any of my business.

That said though, I also believe that passing on "traditions" mindlessly, without giving it some serious thought. I'm really against people parenting on autopilot, not challenging anything, and just doing what feels good/right at the moment, and is easiest for them.

As parents, we should always be questioning and examining what we are passing on to our children (and through them our grandchildren and future generations). We should be advocates for our children, not apologists.

I believe as parents it is our duty to take the time to reflect upon and discuss the ways we intend to raise our kids, and not just do it on the default setting. We often need to challenge the authorities who claim to know what is best for everyone's children (especially the authority figures in our lives, like our own parents), and the status quo. We have to do advocate for our kids in their schools (I'm seasoned enough in the parenting role to know there is no such thing as "a good school"), at the doctor's office, with parents of their friends, with adult members of our own families, etc.

To expound a bit further on why I'm opposed to singing violent songs to babies and children--I feel the world is deeply rooted in violence, and that as an adult and a parent, I want to actively work to change that for as many people in my world as I can. So I made a choice early on as a parent to never allow any children in my home to play with toy weapons, under any circumstance. I don't think I made a more controversial parenting choice than that one, because initially it would always leave the boys totally bewildered, disoriented, and at a loss for how to play without them, and it really pissed off the other parents, especially the mothers. I stood my ground, even at Christmas and birthday times. It sure wasn't easy, but I did it.

Now, I could have gone along to get along with other parents, family members, and the boys. It would have made my life a whole lot easier when the kids were small, because once I said "no weapons play" I had to work to get the boys to play in more positive ways socially. Which sometimes meant having to direct the play until they "got it" rather than being able to tell them to "go play". Some boys never did get it though, and would go sit off by themselves and sulk, rather than engage with the other kids. But they were few and far between, and I always had kids underfoot, and wanting to play at our house.

I even had one mother suggest, in not very pleasant terms, that I was scarring her son for life because I wouldn't allow her son to play with a toy machine gun he had just gotten on the way over to our house to play.

Each to their own, as they say. Some parents' traditions are worth challenging, like weapons play for boys was for me. I wasn't trying to tell Eldorado Girl how to parent her child. I was just sharing how I parented my kids when it came to the singing of age appropriate songs as lullabies.

I know I don't feel calmed and soothed listening to murder ballads or drinking songs. So I didn't sing them to babies and children. I think the fact that Eldorado Girl wanted to ask for other people's opinions shows that at some level, she too is wondering just how appropriate her choices are. I wouldn't expect her to get much resistance if any to her choice in this forum. But I think it would she would get a very different response in a forum about parenting.