X-posted in joyologie

[thedarksiren2]

I try not to load my LJ with such things, as they're generally just forwards which are immedicately deleted. BUT...a friend sent this to me today, and I thought it was marvelous:

TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED the 1930's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!!


First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.

Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, no video tape movies, no surround sound, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms...WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them!

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!!

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL!

And YOU are one of them! CONGRATULATIONS!

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives "for our own good." And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave their parents were.

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?!

"WORRYING does not empty TOMORROW of its TROUBLES,
it empties TODAY of its STRENGTH."

Oh yeah, when I have kids, we are so digging up worms and making mud-pies!~;) We are gonna get scraped knees, swallow flies while riding our bikes, cut off all barbie hair and make them into men (hmm...I wonder...nah, nevermind! LOL) Hell, I am a firm believer in helmets, but I once rode my brother's BMX straight into a brick wall and managed to survive. Yeah, my legs and back hurt for a good long while, but I survived, and learned not to sneak off with my brother's bike, especially when it HAS NO BRAKES! LOL

OK, enough of this madness...back to papers.

Comments

[symbioid.livejournal.com]

I've read in an anarchist paper about an approach to parenting that allows the child to develop and learn. If you're kid is going to touch a hot stove and you see them reaching for it, let them touch it and get a blister. It harms them only briefly, but they then truly understand the consequences. That's not to say you shouldn't inform the child, but let them, after knowing the facts, to choose what they will do, and thus give them a sense of responsibility for their actions, whilst simultaneously not "nagging" at them... Honoring their own wisdom.

This almost sounds like one of those things where they'll say something like: Kids today don't know what records are...

heh. I chuckle at that. More like Adults today don't know that a good segment of modern music uses fucking records in their live performances...

nightnight.

[thedarksiren.livejournal.com]

heh, yeah. See, I know that, but then, I pay attention to music in that way!~;)

Actually, I just like the message that people are too sterile, and kids don't really seem to get to be "kids," if that makes sense. I mean, I had such a blast chasing snakes under rocks, hanging from the 10' branch upside-down, hunting for lizards and riding my bike on giant mounds. I grew up with three older brothers, so I had some major role-models in the gettin' down*n*dirty portion of life, but damn if those memories aren't strong.

My sister flipped out on me a few times when her daughter and I came indoors all dirty. I seriously thought she was going to have a heart attack when she saw how dirty Leah's hands and feet were. Why? What's the point in that???

I'm not saying don't teach kids proper hygiene, or don't tell them about hot and cold, as in your example. I simply don't think kids should live in a sterile, unimaginative world. Life is filled with risks, and the way in which we learn to face challenges and conquer those risks is through trial and error. If you protect your child to such a huge degree, they won't learn those things early in life...

meh, I'm getting on a soapy-box. LOL

Thanks for your input, as always.
~8)

[ras-sinister.livejournal.com]

While I, too, found this snippet to be rather heart-warming and entertaining (even though I was born in 1980, I went through a lot of these things myself), it still strikes me as kind of stupid and possibly even dangerous.

There's a huge number of little anecdotes and lists circulating on the internet just like this one. They were all written by Republicans or reactionaries and all play into the same critical combination of universal interests: nostalgia, self-righteousness, distaste for the politically correct, etc. They all boil down to the same message:

"Hasn't the politically correct, lawsuit-filled, safety warning-labeled, dolphin-safe, CFC-free world of today produced kids who are irresponsible, foolish sissies compared to us?"

I know I didn't put it exactly right just now, but I think you know what I'm talking about. It's something any reader can identify with (including me) and have a chuckle with, and seems pretty innocent on its face. But it's a coded message. Reactionaries are called to arms by nostalgic writings like these, and it's as obvious to them as it is to me - like a dog whistle, and the reactionaries are the dogs.

Now I propose taking this little nostalgic trip a step further:

TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE MILLENNIA B.C. AND THE FIRST AND SECOND MILLENNIA A.D.:

Remember when little girls were taught to shut up and marry whatever filthy buffon their fathers told them to? And then continue to shut up and spread their legs whenver they were told to and then take care of all the kids? Believe it or not, they got through all this and never had to cry rape! Imagine that, that our great-great grandmothers lived through this!

Remember when little boys were forced to become cannon fodder for their feudal lords as soon as they were big enough to swing a cleaver? And nobody complained back then!

Remember the good old days when you could be sent to jail for not going to church? Nobody ever whined about separation of church and state! Boy, our ancestors knew how to deal with life's hard knocks much better than we do, didn't they. Wouldn't it be better if kids today grew up more like their ancestors? Chasing down gazelles on the savana and butchering them with their bare hands, eating them raw? Those were the good old days.

Anyway, back to reality. They have a point, but the point is kind of ridiculous. How far back into history do you want to take the kids of today? What kinds of risks do we want to expose them to? How old-fashioned are we willing to get?

Now it's all fun to read, but it's inane and meaningless. And it plays into the hands of people who want to criminalize things we hold dearly and persecute us for being different. This universal nostalgia for the good old days when men were men and sheep were scared is the strongest asset these reactionary forces have.

[thedarksiren.livejournal.com]

I see, and appreciate whole-heartedly, your point. However, I think you know me well-enough to see my personal point in posting the "fodder," as it were.

I don't claim to know everything, nor do I yearn for much of the "days of old." What I wish for is that people be allowed to live to some extent, and not so much in fear. Some of my best memories of childhood involved getting dirty, scraping my knees, busting my tooth on the concrete while riding a Barbie van like a skateboard...no, I didn't like the consequences, but I learned from them.

I could go on and on with my reasoning, and hell, we could even go into why anti-bacterial soap is simply a marketing ploy which is, in fact, useless once the top is popped and exposed to air for a few minutes; not to mention the fact that all these soaps and lack of contact with dirt and such things is actually weakening our immunity to many bacteria, causing more harm than good.

Not to say i am against good hygiene. Quite the contrary - remember, if thou must waft, WAFT WELL!!! ~;)

I guess that, in watching my sister raise her daughter, hearing stories of how my brother raises his kids, and also simply witnessing a fellow student here fret about every little detail as if it were the end of the world...it just saddens me to think that people are missing out on so much LIFE worrying about dying.

Does that make sense?

[ras-sinister.livejournal.com]

Makes perfect sense. People do worry an awful lot. Some of those things are worth worrying about, and some are not.

Antibacterial hand soap has no use outside of hospitals. Not only is an oversanitized world wrecking our immune systems, but overuse of antibiotics is promoting the spread of antibiotic-resistant germs. Of course, the vast majority of antibiotics used in this country are routinely added to animal feed, but antibacterial soap certainly isn't helping the situation at all. I say, if you want to sanitize something, stick to good old bleach or alcohol - bacteria will never be resistant to those.

Like I said, I agree with the idea that life is inherently risky and that we need to accept a certain amount if we want to thrive, or even have any fun. But yeah, believe me, this piece is total right-wing propaganda, and I find it humorous that they refer to kids who survived the 30s-70s as being a single generation. And I would certainly beg to differ about how great those generations were. The time since the industrial revolution has fucked up the human race beyond repair, not to mention the planet. People of the 30s-70s, just like the people today, lived a life of such comfort, ease, and safety that it would have been unfathomable to their ancestors. They weren't great risk-takers and innovators. The real risk-takers and innovators all lived thousands of years ago, before recorded history.

Damn, it's hard to type here because the cursor is the same color as the background and I can't change the appearance to my default one.

[jjjiii]

This is a most astute analysis, but I still find favor with most of the specifics mentioned in the original, and agree in its basic spirit that life is inherently risky and that you should live life boldly and accept those risks rather than retreat from all of them.

But still, there's smart risks and there's stupid risks. Stupid ones are easily avoided and don't return any great payoff. Smart ones require some skill to avoid and return some kind of payoff, even if it's just a feeling of victory and a boost in self confidence. Some of the specifics I found questionable:

1. lead-based paint is a hazard that is easily avoided and there, and don't really teach children any valuable life lessons. This sounds, if you read between the lines, like a coded message to allow industry to have the right to poison everyone with no liability.


2. not wearing seat belts is probably fine 99% of the time. I've never been in a car accident after making it through 30 years of life. But I still don't want to get in an accident without a seat belt. I've seen films of dummies enough to know that it helps.


3. parents siding with the law. What, like they're all anarchists today? Come on! No, the reason you always maintain your child's innocence when they're accused of a crime is because the criminal justice system is so fucked up, you can go to jail for shoplifting or a little pot possession, and be turned into someone's bitch and come out with AIDS and major psychological problems. Again, this is like a coded message that protesting the law and the government is bad and wrong, and good patriotic citizens implicitly trust the government to do everything right, and never question it.
4. I like how even the author of this piece admits that they "only" lost "a few eyes" along the way. EVERYONE knows someone who knew someone who lost an eye due to some stupid childhood misadventure. One girl in my neighborhood lost an eye when her siblings were playing frisbee with some LP records and one nailed her right in the face. It's like they implicitly seem to think that it's OK if some people lose a few eyes as long as the general population comes out "fine". Like "survival of the fittest" means you're supposed to let people screw up and get killed for the good of the race because if they were protected and taught how not to die then their stupidity would contaminate the gene pool. As though helping each other and defending each other and learning not to get ourselves killed isn't one of the things that gave homo sapiens an evolutionary advantage.

But I do think kids should be allowed to play all day without any real supervision and learn to take care of themselves, make decisions, and understand that there can be consequences from which there is no shelter.


In conclusion, your counterpoints are well taken, and your insights are quite insightful. Well spoken, sir.

[ras-sinister.livejournal.com]

The lead paint thing is what really gets me. The author probably didn't realize it, but it's certainly a classist and possibly a racist problem. The reason people are fine today is because they moved out of their lead-painted homes back in "the good old days," and most of those houses are now in neighborhoods thought of as "ghetto" or "poor," and certainly house a lot of minorities today. Those old houses didn't go away, and neither did the lead. And now 20% of all children in Cleveland have severely elevated lead levels. Lead poisoning has been directly linked to so many of the behavioral issues that the author would call bad that I can't help but laugh at the fact that the irony is lost on whoever wrote this.

[jjjiii]

I totally agree that children these days live lives that are waaay too sheltered and they suffer developmental problems (mostly mental and social but also physical) from not being allowed to actually do anything. But I find it weird that there seems to be so many "missing children kidnapped or found dead" stories on the news these days. It's like CNN and MSNBC and Fox woke up one day and realized that they were missing a vast untapped segment of the news consuming audience, and if only they started reporting missing children all over the place, they'd triple their ratings.

[thedarksiren.livejournal.com]

There were just as many back then, I think. But like you said, the media suddenly realized another ratings scheme, and OMG...millions of children are missing!

I am glad you got the basic gist of why I posted this. It wasn't so much to say I agree with everything in it...I don't...but to simply remind people that children are resilient beings, and learn more through experience than through books, video games, television, etc.

[jjjiii]

Yup yup!

[erinnicole93.livejournal.com]

I dunno, I had a pong machine that kept me pretty much indoors for the span of the 70's... before that i was busy playing with dolls.