"This is one thing I didn't expect to be banned from my son's pre-school."

My son loves doing this, and their pre-school just took it away.

Banned: Batman, Superman and Captain America. Never to be allowed through the doors. The most hallowed of heroes for four and five-year-old boys (and girls) – blacklisted.

And the reason – that these caped crusaders, these saviors of the world, these timeless good guys are making our kid’s violent. What a load of garbage.

My son’s pre-school, a delightful oasis of painting and playing has just banned superheroes from their once-a-term dress up day. Hoards of tiny boys dreams of embodying their favourite masked man for a day shattered.

It’s a big call for parents, the fact is that most boys under six don’t actually have anything else to dress up in. For a lot it is superheroes or nothing. It’s the equivalent of Elsa costumes being banned for girls. A scandal of epic proportions. The edict set many of us into shock.

You think I’m exaggerating but honestly what on earth were we going to dress these little guys in? It isn’t like many of us can just race to the sewing machine to whip up an alternative to the shiny polyester garb that fills our dress up boxes. We were stumped, and so were the kids.

The big day arrived and a mish-mash of semi-enthusiastic firemen, “office workers” and ferocious beasts swarmed through the gates. Five minutes in and a four-year-old dressed as Olaf pushed a green dinosaur into the sandpit.

Of course there are dark and scary elements in some superhero movies, but I am not advocating parents show their kids Iron Man movies or any of the grisly Batman films. There is no way I would let my kids watch these.

But they don’t need to see these to be obsessed with super heroes. Studies have shown that superhero play can empower kids. It teaches them concepts such as right and wrong and good and bad. It allows them to enter a world with magical powers, where they can fly and soar and defeat the bad guys.

It’s a world that fades soon enough to the harsh reality of the daily horrors we see on the news every day as adults. Why diminish that fantasy world? Why as adults are we so hyper aware that we try and control every aspect of our children including their imaginations?

Let ‘em be kids for as long as we can because before we know it they too will have entered our world of terrorism and missing children and we will be wishing we could return to the days that we thought the bad guy out there was as simple as a five-year old dressed as Superman.

Do you think the pre-school is in the wrong by banning super heroes?

Super-heroes aren’t all bad, in fact, they’re fighting against bullying. CLICK THROUGH the gallery for awesome Marvel anti-bullying covers…

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