From the playgrounds at school to the shows on TV, violence is everywhere. However, usually people are there "yard duties on the playground, cops on the streets, and parents at home "to regulate the violent acts that do occur. But what happens when no one is around to regulate the amount of violence a child is exposed to? Should the government step in and try to control this problem? Many people would say no and so does John Romano as he expresses in the essay, "It's a Job for Parents, Not the Government."" Parenting is about being able to control children's actions and what they are exposed to, or at least being able to talk with them about it, so that they don't grow up with an altered sense of what is acceptable and unacceptable in the real world around them.
In Romano's essay he writes, "If you don't want you kids watching, turn the darn thing off,"" but parents aren't always there to regulate what children watch every time the TV gets turned on. In some households, the parent(s) work full time just to make enough money to pay their bills and might not be able to afford a babysitter; this is especially true in single parent families with multiple children. In the essay, Romano mentions "latchkey kids whose single parents have no choice but to use the TV as a babysitter."" Parents tend to just use the TV and/or an older sibling (if applicable) to watch the children for the usual two to four hours after school until the parents come home from work. Romano notes that in 1996, people in the TV program industry set up a ratings system for all shows. At the beginnings of the show and throughout it, a little box appears in the corner that shoes how the particular show is rated. This mechanism for regulation purposes works very well "if the parents are home to see the ratings and to do something about it. What if the parents are away? While at work, on errands, or just on a vacation, parents need a way to regulate the shows and channels children watch while they are gone.