The Gay Uncle spent five nights with his in-laws last week. (Yes, F-I-V-E. Send medals.) He enjoyed about three and a half nights of quality time during this period, some of it with his three nieces. But five nights means five movies. These screenings bring the family together, allow the G.U. to drink his in-laws’ good liquor for free, and keep him out of the scary bars in his b.f.’s small Southern hometown. Screening films also provides a modicum of peace in the house each evening; without them the girls tend to spiral out into whimpering and whining, depriving the adults of any…adult time. Since it’s the only reliable way to control for the “taste” of others (his father-in-law’s Netflix selections literally consisted of: Oceans 11-13, and Wild Hogs) he and his boyfriend placed themselves in charge of the video store runs. Now that the girls are approaching the double digits, and aspiring toward even higher ages, the Guncles felt it was time to begin sharing some of their favorite teen movies. They were careful to pick films that had only the most chaste sexual content, and absolutely no violence, gore, or killing. But there was plenty of what his mother-in-law calls “cussing”. This didn’t bother Gunc in the least. He doesn’t have a problem with kids hearing swearing, or even swearing themselves so long as they do it properly, and without being injurious to others. But his sister-in-law Lizzie and infamous brother-in-law Marty seemed to take greater issue, so much so that Marty began personally censoring even mild curses like “ass” and “bitch” by screaming “BEEP” or distractingly reaching over and attempting to cover his girls’ ears, tactics that were at once annoying and ineffectual. The G.U. felt that his own method of setting standards and just letting the kids deal was much more successful, a fact that was proven out when the movie ended. “That was funny,” Lizzie said to the girls. “But what did you think of all that cursing?” Brookie, Marty’s oldest daughter, shrugged. “We hear it all the time from Mommy. We hear it all the time from Daddy. We hear it all the time from movies. We just know not to say any of it.” Chalk up another one for the G.U.’s patented method of empowering kids with the tools to analyze and understand the world, instead of trying (impossibly, unsuccessfully) to insulate them from it.