Sheltering Children

Thats...not what I meant. And I actually strongly disagree. I was talking about actual violence and "grown up things" for lack of three better words.

Ehh this thread just speaks volumes about how parenting is done in private and how there's no real quality control on how parenting is unless we improve as a society.

Ultramarine said:

Thats...not what I meant. And I actually strongly disagree. I was talking about actual violence and "grown up things" for lack of three better words.

Click to expand...

So ... you'd rather throw out a bunch of 18 year old kids, into society, with no knowledge about violence and adult themes and then expect them to not get into trouble? Or better, tell them simply "don't do it" then expect them not to do it behind your back when they encounter it in the real world. Yeah, smart.

Tell a child not to touch a hot stuff and the child will inevitably do just that.

Jay_37040 said:

Tell a child not to touch a hot *stove* and the child will inevitably do just that.

Click to expand...

I assume you meant that .... and it's true. Best way to learn not to touch the stove is to touch the stove. :P

Yep, sorry. It's early and my keyboard surely was rearranging the letters on me. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Human beings, by and large, learn by doing. And because of that we can get ourselves into all sorts of trouble. Thankfully, though, most of us do learn from our mistakes.

I am a person who is strictly against shielding children from life, and all that that entails. By sheltering our children we rob them of valuable lessons that will help prepare them for the time when they go out into the world themselves as adults. We see what happens when parents try to shield their kids from subjects like human sexuality. We end up with young adults, and often children in their early teens, engaging in risky activities that leads to life-changing consequences.

Jay_37040 said:

Yep, sorry. It's early and my keyboard surely was rearranging the letters on me. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Human beings, by and large, learn by doing. And because of that we can get ourselves into all sorts of trouble. Thankfully, though, most of us do learn from our mistakes.

I am a person who is strictly against shielding children from life, and all that that entails. By sheltering our children we rob them of valuable lessons that will help prepare them for the time when they go out into the world themselves as adults. We see what happens when parents try to shield their kids from subjects like human sexuality. We end up with young adults, and often children in their early teens, engaging in risky activities that leads to life-changing consequences.

Click to expand...

Actually, all life forms learn better from mistakes than doing something correct. Most of what you do correctly you see no output or reaction to it, and thus you don't usually realize it's the correct thing to do. But when you make a mistake you get hurt or your life is threatened in some way, even a little bit, well, for real mistakes. Basically, nothing happens when you do something right most of the time, but there are always consequences when you make a mistake, thus you remember more mistakes than good decisions.

KittenKoder said:

So ... you'd rather throw out a bunch of 18 year old kids, into society, with no knowledge about violence and adult themes and then expect them to not get into trouble? Or better, tell them simply "don't do it" then expect them not to do it behind your back when they encounter it in the real world. Yeah, smart.

Click to expand...

Uh, 18? What? While they fall under the technical term for children I would assume you knew I meant young children...

Jay_37040 said:

Yep, sorry. It's early and my keyboard surely was rearranging the letters on me. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Human beings, by and large, learn by doing. And because of that we can get ourselves into all sorts of trouble. Thankfully, though, most of us do learn from our mistakes.

I am a person who is strictly against shielding children from life, and all that that entails. By sheltering our children we rob them of valuable lessons that will help prepare them for the time when they go out into the world themselves as adults. We see what happens when parents try to shield their kids from subjects like human sexuality. We end up with young adults, and often children in their early teens, engaging in risky activities that leads to life-changing consequences.

Click to expand...

While this may mostly be the case, I was shielded from it, by my own choice when I was younger, because my 9 year old mind thought it was "gross." By not being told, I kept the general point of view for the rest of my life. And what? I have nothing to do with anything having to do with the topic. If you tell them how bad it is, and the consequences, that should be enough, if they are smart enough.

People shelter their kids from everything. One kid I babysat was not allowed to watch Disney movies because the mother said they were too scary. I watched Disney movies as a kid and I wasn't scared. There's even parents who only let their kids listen to the Kidz Bop versions of popular songs, even if the originals are already tame. There is way too much sheltering of kids.

I don't put much stock in debating/discussing things like this, since it's really hit or miss. At the end of the day it depends on the individual parents, and while it's easy to point fingers at the extremes, it's really difficult to grasp how parenting in our society is as a whole. I'm of the school of thought that things never really change, so when people say "kids these days" I take it as a load of baloney, presumably because adults today were just as rough and rowdy back when they were kids and young adults - especially in better economic times.

Esper said:

I'd guess it would be the strictly religious families who don't want their kids exposed to secular/pagan/etc.

From my own personal experience it's the very religious among people who tend to want to shelter their kids from anything scary or just anything about the world. I had neighbors who wouldn't let their kids watch The Lion King because, well, I don't know exactly why, but they were certainly old enough that I wondered.

Click to expand...

Growing up in a heavily Muslim neighbourhood of Sydney, there was always a handful of Muslim parents who did not let their kids do anything that they thought was "too Western". Some of the girls were not allowed to have male friends, and a few kids weren't even allowed to listen to music or play video games. There were people who resented my family for being Westernised. I always wondered if these kids managed to have fun, since they were missing out on everything.

My parents were pretty lenient compared to many other Muslim parents, but to a lot of people they seem kinda strict. Then again, some of my non-Muslim friends have stricter parents. My best friend is Catholic and his parents are even stricter than mine.

I didn't start celebrating Halloween until I was about 8 or 9 - probably because before that I went to an Islamic school where a lot of the kids were from countries where the holiday doesn't exist. Even then my parents and my older sister aren't big on it. My mum will pass out candy and my dad will watch the occasional Halloween movie, but that's about it. My parents are aware of Halloween's pagan origins, but they didn't want me to feel left out, knowing that transitioning to a mostly non-Muslim school was hard.

As I grew up in a household that was not religious at all (neither of my adoptive parents have a belief in God, and neither do I or my brother. By biological parents and brothers and sisters, on the other hand, do). I think the only time I ever attended church was to take part in a church club and then only because of this boy in my class who I was enamoured with. The funny things we do when we become infatuated with someone. I left because once they realized I was gay it was clear from their demeanor towards me that I was no longer welcome. My friend and I drifted apart from then on, but not because of my sexuality. We just ended up going in different directions in our lives.

I have not been a fan of religion since that time. And subsequent dealings with religious based organizations and having to deal with religious persecution just because of who LGBT people are has further cemented my aversion to any religion, no matter how "accepting" they claim to be.

I think, now that I think back on it, this was exactly the kind of thing my parents had tried to protect me from growing up. They obviously knew that I was gay, even before I did (or could accept), and did their best trying to shelter me from some of the harm that can be inflicted upon people like me just because of who we are. In a way I kind of wish they hadn't, because by sheltering me from it, I was ill prepared to deal with the hate and the bullying from some fervently religious people. Now, though, I've learned to deal with it, and am heavily involved in promoting rights for gay and lesbian and bisexual and transgendered youth, so that they hopefully will be better able to take on this bigotry head on.