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We Have Ruined Childhood

nytimes.com

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Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#21

Post by koolba »

That’s a hell of a clickbait headline for a supposed paper of record. I don’t even disagree with the premise. It doesn’t make it less disgusting though.

That aside, the weight of this sits on the parents, not society. Parents dump their children into scholastic programs and extra curriculars not because of the results, they do so because they’re lazy and refuse to do the tasks themselves. They think it’s difficult to discipline children and would rather pay someone to watch their child scribble with crayons while they sip a latte then spend an hour actually reading to them.

This also leads to them feeling like the time a child spends “doing nothing” is a bad thing. Far from it. That’s when a child learns to be bored. Show me a child that’s never been bored and I’ll show you one that’s never going to be independent. The first step of independence is occupying the space between your ears.

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#22

Post by tlb »

jacobolus wrote: post #13
forkandwait wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's add "affluent and white and fortuitously non alcohol addicted" to "1950-1970" and I think you nailed it.

Not being alcohol addicted is not “fortuitous”. Fortuitous means purely by chance; accidentally; without any known cause.

It also means "Resulting in good fortune; lucky" in which sense the word fits perfectly. https://www.wordnik.com/words/fortuitous

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#23

Post by fzeroracer »

FillardMillmore wrote: post #16
forkandwait wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's add "affluent and white and fortuitously non alcohol addicted" to "1950-1970" and I think you nailed it.

What does being white have to do with predominant parenting practices? If you would like to point out differences in parenting practices by race/wealth/class and possible causes for said discrepancies, then please do so.

I mean, considering the era they quoted, I would say that black people might've had a bit more trouble raising kids than white people in the 1950s-1970s for reasons I hope would be incredibly obvious.

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#24

Post by jcranmer »

Causalityl wrote: post #10
protomyth wrote: post #5

Well, if you report 24x7 hate and danger, scare the crap out of people, and report that there is danger behind every tree, then yes, childhoods are ruined. Things are getting safer and the only way you would know it is go look at the CDC stats. Kids need time with their friends away from parents. I'm so glad I was able to grow up in the (sadly last) "be home for dinner, be back by dark" generation.

Indeed. There is no better example of a failure to do basic math than running active shooter drills when 98% of child gun homicides happen outside of school hours.

Columbine, Sandy Hook, Parkland, Santa Fe, and Red Lake are the mass shootings of my lifetime to take place in schools. Virginia Tech and another community college also saw mass shootings, if you want to include tertiary education.

Note that three of these are in the top 10 (and 2 in the top 5) if you rank them by deaths.

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#26

Post by neverartful »

Scoutmaster wrote: post #14
protomyth wrote: post #5

Well, if you report 24x7 hate and danger, scare the crap out of people, and report that there is danger behind every tree, then yes, childhoods are ruined. Things are getting safer and the only way you would know it is go look at the CDC stats. Kids need time with their friends away from parents. I'm so glad I was able to grow up in the (sadly last) "be home for dinner, be back by dark" generation.

I recently became a Scoutmaster. That's what I'm trying to do: give the kids the same opportunity we had - freedom to explore the outdoors. Confidence to take care of themselves and not need an adult to do everything for them. To give them opportunites to build character.

Kudos to you -- much respect. I was an adult leader when my son was a Scout and I went on a number of weekend campouts and 1 week of Scout summer camp. One of the big challenges I saw was to get the boys to leave their electronics behind. Nevertheless, we had some really fun outings and the boys were able to enjoy the outdoors.

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#27

Post by leggomylibro »

esotericn wrote: post #2

Is this exclusive to childhood? It feels to me, though this could well be a socio-economic bubble thing, that people are just scrambling everywhere. Hyperfocused on something; anything. Maybe it's their career; maybe it's their cause; whatever. But the innocence of just living, existing; hanging out in this beautiful world we call home; seems to be fading for many. Happiness must be now, not future, otherwise future…

I agree, a better title might be something like, "We Have Ruined Life". But I guess that's a tiny bit melodramatic.

Still, start with the subtitle - I'd be surprised if you don't relate to it:

"[A]an hour of free play is like a drop of water in the desert. Of course they’re miserable."

With just those sentences, there's nothing to indicate that the author is talking about children, and the article continues as it started. It says that children are more depressed than before, but who isn't? It says that suicidal ideation and attempts have increased among children since 2007, but that also sounds like something that adults have shared.

It points to the lack of a safety net and a lack of help for parents, but is that lack of stability really unique to parenting? Doesn't it suffuse every part of our lives, including our families?

I'm curious - does anyone here feel like you could actually rely on communal structures for anything in a time of need? Anyone in the States?

On a personal note, this sort of lack of a shared community is why I'm moving soon, although I don't seriously expect anything to be better in a different location. People are people everywhere, and maybe that's our problem - when our reward systems get hijacked to divert more and more of our time to the highest bidder, we end up collectively helpless and anesthetized.

Didn't Marx once say that "religion is the opium of the people"? Well, religious participation has been dropping like a stone lately - maybe twitter has supplanted that role. And to think that we used to use the term 'holy war' as an ironic way to talk about how people wasted their time with ideological internet arguments - it's not so funny now, is it?

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#28

Post by l33tbro »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #17

I have three school age kids and I'd put the difficulties of modern parenting into two bins: 1. Increasingly, both parents work full time and don't/can't rely on family for child care. The "and" is critical here, because in the past you might have had a single parent or dual income parents, but also had grandmothers and aunties as support. An increasingly mobile workforce, and smaller families mean that familial supp…

What would you say your typical response is to 2.a.? I'm anticipating this a bit when I do eventually have kids.

Also, please elaborate on the insane competitiveness. This entire subject fascinates me (and others?) greatly, as I really want to have the best grasp I can of what I'm in for.

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#29

Post by protomyth »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #20
protomyth wrote: post #5

Well, if you report 24x7 hate and danger, scare the crap out of people, and report that there is danger behind every tree, then yes, childhoods are ruined. Things are getting safer and the only way you would know it is go look at the CDC stats. Kids need time with their friends away from parents. I'm so glad I was able to grow up in the (sadly last) "be home for dinner, be back by dark" generation.

And yet there was "danger, scare the crap out of people" then too. Don't take candy from a stranger. Razor blades in apples… Unless it's a difference in degree, that alone is not what has changed. To be sure we seem to be a more fearful society then we were then.

"Unless it's a difference in degree"

Let your kids play outside by themselves or walk to school, and get reported to Child Protective Services. It is very much a different world these days.

Re: We Have Ruined Childhood

#30

Post by mattrp »

koolba wrote: post #21

That’s a hell of a clickbait headline for a supposed paper of record. I don’t even disagree with the premise. It doesn’t make it less disgusting though. That aside, the weight of this sits on the parents, not society. Parents dump their children into scholastic programs and extra curriculars not because of the results, they do so because they’re lazy and refuse to do the tasks themselves. They think it’s difficult to…

With five kids of my own, I can certainly say that an hour of play would reduce the perfectly groomed worlds of most people to rubble while leaving them in tears. That’s not to argue against play it’s just that you have to accept that it’s not quite something you can post to Instagram.
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