lifetip #6

lifetip #3

It’s Just Profit v. Humanity

Embracing Children for Who They Are

“Contrary to what some parents might believe or hope for, children are not born a blank slate. Rather, they come into the world with predetermined abilities, proclivities and temperaments that nurturing parents may be able to foster or modify, but can rarely reverse…” (http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/05/embracing-children-for-who-they-are/)

While I agree with the overarching moral behind this article (that parents should accept children for who they are and encourage them to be the best they can be), I am very disturbed by:

(a) the fact that we are still talking about this whole acceptance-of-the-“not-normal” as if it were a novel idea (I thought we had covered that in the Postmodern era),

(b) the fact that, apparently, parents who try to force “children to follow a prescribed formula ” still exist (everyone who has every worked with or raised children know that if you try to force them to do anything, it will most likely backfire), and

(c) the fact that these authors are grouping together homosexuals, the “deaf, dwarfs, autistic, schizophrenic, transgender, … prodigies or have Down syndrome, as well as those who were conceived in rape or became criminals” into one category as if all the above people have congenital diseases that prevent them from being viewed as “normal.”Really guys? Really??