Archive | Stupid Advice

Are We Too Obsessed with Our Kids?

The public bought the idea that they were essentially a danger to their own kids and had better pay money for advice, that they’d better try really hard to do a good job, and they’d still inevitably fail. (Even though, as Lepore points out, kids are actually safer now than ever. In 1850, more than […]

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Help, Daddy! A Grandma Smiled At Me! Will She Kidnap Me?

Hi iheikaikbh Free-Rangers! Just though I’d share this little note I got from Australia this morning. Makes you realize it’s a small world after all: A small,  paranoid, danger-halucinating world. This is from a lady named Vivienne: Walking in Ikea.   I am a pleasant-enough, smiley grandmoter of 9. A man with his daughter of about 3 […]

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Extreme Advice

From the SafeKids.org page of advice to parents of kids ages 5-9: “Never leave your child alone in a car, even for a minute.” A minute? Lenore

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…and then there are those who disagree with Free-Range Kids:

A Reader Writes: “The yyindheyiz amount of fallacies propounded by the supporters of this idea is astounding… and that includes the author of this site.  She apparently thinks that only fatal abductions are a risk to be worried about, and also stacks a number from just one source against the entire population of the U.S.  […]

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Belated Mother’s Day Thoughts!

With Mother’s Day upon us  like a breakfast tray of hot coffee accidentally spilled on the blanket (amid tears), it is time to ask that equally burning question: What do moms want? The answer? We want to relax a little. Not just relax in bed reading People and under a hot, soggy blanket.  We want a […]

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Mom Who Let Son Walk to Soccer Gets Slammed in Local Paper

“….Once upon a time, decades ago, mothers were able to let their elementary-aged children roam free and alone. “While many, including us, look upon this halcyon time with fondness and a longing for its return, the fact remains that things are different now. The days of Andy Griffith’s Mayberry and “Leave it to Beaver” are […]

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Learning The Wrong Lessons from Sandra Cantu’s Death

It’s front page news out here in San Francisco where I’m visiting, but it’s probably front page news out by you, too: The tragic story of 8-year-old Sandra Cantu, who was abducted and murdered last week in California. Today’s front page story is as inevitable as the media attention: “Case Forces Parents to take Tougher […]

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Why I’m Not Taking the Advice of an “Expert” on Child Molesting

A comment on my post, “Of Peanuts and Pedophiles,” included a link to a Salon story on child sexual abuse. Voila: http://tinyurl.com/cc2qys bithsndtbt . It’s a disturbing piece, by a guy who worked for a year in a treatment center for juveniles who have raped and molested other kids. Hearing their histories gave him a, […]

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Babyproofing Hysteria

Each diyaieybfi week I get an email blast called “Connect with Kids” that veers between helpful and crazy-making. Today it’s the latter. (http://www.connectwithkids.com/tipsheet/2009/430_mar25/thisweek/090325_house.shtml) In a little article about babyproofing, it quotes an “expert” who casts her eyes around a new parent’s home and, “immediately spots something she doesn’t like in the kitchen. Plastic trash bags.” […]

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