Honestly? School. I think school is a huge example of this. And the way schools are organized today is something we can live without. Other than that, I think that kids, naturally depending on the age level, are more capable of taking care of themselves than we give them credit for. I know of people who have been taking the subway into Boston by themselves since they were fourteen, largely to hang out with other people of the same age, and they all turned out fine.
That's the only way I've ever known school to be. But I was ignorant to the alternatives you mentioned before. Again, I'd have to understand more about it and the results it produced before I can give much of an opinion on it. That being said, obviously there are alternatives. Homeschooling is another one. The parent has every right to seek a different way to educate their child. I think the situation with the subway is less about trusting the child and more about paranoia of society. It's argued that crime hasn't gotten worse over the years, it's just more covered by the media, so it looks worse than it is. Regardless, parents are far more restricting than they used to be, just because they are afraid their kids will get snatched up or something. Justified or not, it's not about trusting the kid.....it's being scared of how the world is. Hell, when I was growing up I used to walk to elementary school nearly 3 miles away. Sometimes by myself. For Halloween we'd travel waaaaay far from our neighborhood and be out past 10. Now parents drive their kids around and they are done by 8.
I'm finding the "living in a utopia" thing to be a little insulting... but whatever. What you say here... does and doesn't make sense to me. In that I think it's largely dependent on a child's age. A four year old isn't going to be able to have much beyond the simplest of conversations about anything, let alone how the household is run. As for older kids... again, if the kid's just asking why to stall for time, then I think that any conversation you're going to have should probably be about something else, like why it is they feel so strongly about not doing what you asked them, not why they should do what you asked them.
I understand, but I wasn't really sure how else to word it. Trust me, those conversations have taken place. More than once. I used the utopia reference because you seem to have this belief that if you just sit and talk things out that everything will come together and total understanding will occur between adult and child. And that's simply not realistic. Granted, it may work with some kids, but I promise you it will not work with all kids and all situations. Just like the whole "because I said so," kids often have the equally frustrating "Because I don't want to."
I've only met one person who came out of a school like that and couldn't read very well. Then he tried to take college courses, and taught himself how so he could keep up. At this point he's actually not allowed to read because he's been known in the past to be two hours late for work because he was too busy reading a book and forgot about the time (luckily he runs his own business).
Good deal. I'm sure there are plenty of instances of something like this happening. On the flipside, it's said that 14% of adults are currently illiterate, the number on children that can't read is higher. Most of those people's stories aren't as rosey as you're friend.
What do you mean by violent acts? Because I'm talking about teenagers shooting and stabbing each other over money and drugs.
Yup, so am I. I'm also talking about what they've coined around here as the "Millard Gang." It sounds funny for me to even say it. The Millard area here is a completely suburb, upper middle class area....completely. And yet they have a group of kids that go around doing gang level stuff. Not quite as bad as what goes on in LA and such, but bad enough.
I'm not sure kids really learn like that, but then it depends on the age you're talking about. I don't entirely disagree here, although I think it's best to deal with any social interaction with a certain level of gentleness. Not that you shouldn't stand your ground, just that you shouldn't be rigid and harsh and actually try to understand what's going on in the other person's head and dal with it/confront them about it. I'm not accusing you of anything, by the by, because I've never seen you in a social situation with anyone. I'm just stating my opinion on the subject in general.
Again, and I'm sorry if this sounds like an insult, but we're back to this ideal world you have. Not all kids are going to react the way you hope they will. There are times when you have to bring down the hammer and be rigid. You can only talk so long with a kid who simply doesn't care about the logical reasons behind anything, they just want to do what they want to do, and that's it. It's no big mystery. There's no big underlying cause to figure out....that's all there is to it. As one of the other posters said, there is no silver bullet solution.
I've never advocated for kids getting away with things when they do wrong. I just think that if a kid wants to do something that doesn't infringe on the rights of others and isn't inherently self destructive, then they should be allowed to do it. However, I think our definition of "not self destructive" is too narrow, because we're scared of kids running amok when I know from experience that they probably wouldn't.
What experience teaches you that kids wouldn't? And the addition of the word probably lends the the assumption that you're not 100% sure.
I understand all of this. I'm not unfamiliar with employment. Also, that last comment I thought was slightly condescending.
In any event, my point was that a job is a completely different dynamic than school or home. I don't see how making kids do things they don't want to do for the sake of making them do it prepares them for the work force, because the fact that getting a job means you'll be performing various duties in exchange for money is very clear up front when you apply for a job, and if you're not cool with that you can look for a different job.
I have a sarcastic wit that, unfortunately, works it's way into my daily conversations. People that know me understand it's not personal. I wouldn't expect you to know about that first hand....so don't take it personally. I disagree somewhat that getting a job means that your duties are clearly stated up front. That's not always the case. Your "major" functions are clearly stated up front, but not only does your job almost always contain "other duties as assigned" it also has the potential to change as time goes on. For example, I was hired on at my job as a LAN Administrator. Basically a desktop repair gopher. It morphed into also being a Network Admin, a Server Admin, Remote Office Installs (travel), to just being a Server admin for Exchange Email Software, then to IIS, then Lotus Notes got thrown in, etc. Not all jobs are that dynamic. But kids had better be prepared for it, or they need to keep looking for a job that's more static.
I actually don't see how that's not being a kid's friend. If my friend asked me to do something that would be an inconvenience to me and eventually to them, and not an immediate inconvenience but a major, long term inconvenience, of course I would say no. However, I do agree, there are aspects to the role of parent that have to take precedent at times, but they and the role of friend are still not mutually exclusive
I think for the most part we agree here.
