A reader emailed us this Marie Claire article going viral, “Inside the Growing Movement of Women Who Wish They’d Never Had Kids.” She thought that part of the reason these moms are so unhappy could be the overwhelming pressure we put on them. Maybe if no one was shaming (or arresting) moms for not watching their kids literally 24/7, they’d feel less stuck. This is not to say that mothers had it easier in other eras. They’ve always had to do so much. It’s just that today, there’s a level of hypervigilance that can be oppressive. So Sarah Treleaven writes:…
Author: lskenazy
A 14-year-old Iowa girl, “Nancy Doe,” took some racy pictures of herself — one in a sports bra and boy shorts, one bra-less but with her hair covering her breasts — and texted them to a boy. For this, the Marion County prosecutor has threatened to brand her a sex offender. As Robby Soave explains on Reason.com (a site I write for, too): The trouble began last March, when two boys at Knoxville High School were caught using the school printers to print inappropriate photos of their classmates, both male and female, which had been obtained via texts and Snapchat.…
How we live reflects what we think is important, obviously. So here’s a question about the connection between home design and parenting: Dear Free-Range Kids: I am interested if you have noticed the similarities in our society of hyper-vigilant parenting and the “open concept floor plan?” I love watching those Do It Yourself and home remodeling shows. Inevitably, a family will request an open concept floor plan so they can “keep an eye on the kids” while the mom is in the kitchen. . Being the parent of two young children, I’m wondering if these families have not yet discovered…
Here’s a note from a reader who used to design educational toys. But first, let me say that when I went to the Toy Fair here in NYC a few years ago, I was amazed at the way EVERY SINGLE TOY had come up with a way to describe itself as educational. If it was colorful, it was “stimulating the visual cortex.” If it was heavy it “demonstrated gravity.” If it existed at all and you could touch it, it aided in “hand-eye coordination.” And of course, all those things are true. But they are equally true for things that…
File this under The Law of Unintended Consequences, or, more precisely, Force-feeding Young Children Academics Backfires. It comes from an article in the Washington Post by Nancy Carlsson-Paige, author of Taking Back Childhood: …The pressure to teach academic skills in pre-K and kindergarten has been increasing since the passage of the No Child Left Behind act 15 years ago. Today, many young children are required to sit in chairs, sometimes for long periods of time, as a teacher instructs them. This goes against their natural impulse to learn actively through play where they are fully engaged—body, mind, and spirit. Play…
No matter how you feel about gun control, this case is disturbing: A high school student who made an anti-gun-control video for class has been ordered to undergo a 5-hour psychiatric evaluation. Frank Harvey, a senior at Manville High School in New Jersey, says he did the project for a college readiness class last year. As he told New Jersey News 12, “It was assigned by the teacher.” The teacher now says she cannot recall assigning it. His video featured news stories of people who had used guns to fend off home invasions, and some political cartoons that lampooned gun…
. All hail The Onion and it’s “Today Now” show! As the host notes of this story, “It’s the moment that every parent with a 20-foot long snake fears most, and one you can’t possibly predict.” (Sorry about the 30-sec ad before it…which I don’t even understand): . . .
Wondering just how OCD our culture can get when it comes to child safety? In a recent post by a woman worried sick about everything she ate, drank and did while pregnant, she mentioned an article that actually explained “How to Use Mouthwash While Pregnant.” It tells pregnant women to stop using any mouthwash with alcohol in it, as “alcohol affects human development and can cause irreparable cognitive, physical, and neurological birth defects.” YOWZA! That makes it sounds as if rinsing with about a tablespoon of mouthwash is going to turn your kid into a turnip. And THEN it has…
Readers — Have you heard of this program? Is there a way to counter its draconian decrees? Dear Free-Range Kids: I have been a volunteer for many years at my church, but now we have a new pastor, and he brought with him this child care worker training program called “MinistrySafe.” While it is just a set of online videos, and the church is paying for it, it is filled with nonsense statistics about stranger danger. All this seems like the “stranger danger” nonsense that my own generation had to grow up with. It’s no wonder Gen-X is so…
The next time you are having issues with your school (or neighbors, or ex) about letting your child walk home, please print this out. Point by point it explains how walking is not just healthy and fun, it’s actually safer than insisting children NOT walk. This comes to us from Michael Lewyn, an associate professor at Touro Law Center, where he teaches environmental law, property and wills. His scholarship can be found at this page. His passion is below: WALKING IS LESS DANGEROUS THAN NOT WALKING by Michael Lewyn . As readers of this blog know, children who walk more…