Why Do We Judge Parents For Putting Kids At Perceived — But Unreal — Risk?

Posted by CircuitGuy 7 years, 7 months ago to Culture
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"Children need to explore and experiment and be on their own sometimes in order to develop independence and responsibility and self-efficacy. By keeping them under our direct supervision at all times, we sacrifice that, and we narrow their world in profound ways."

"Here's an analogy: Imagine that parents suddenly have a phobia that their children are going to fall down and hit their heads and die while walking, running, climbing or playing sports. When such an injury or death happens anywhere in the country, it is covered 24/7 by the media; shows such as CSI: Head Injury Unit and Law and Order: Running and Falling Down draw big audiences. Some parents decide that just to be on the safe side, they're going to require their kid to stay in a wheelchair all the time. Gradually this practice becomes so widespread that it becomes standard, and schools and camps start requiring all children to be in wheelchairs at all times for safety reasons. Eventually, it becomes so unusual to see a child not in a wheelchair that people start calling the police when they see a child walking around, and parents are charged with criminal negligence for allowing their child to take such risks."
SOURCE URL: http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2016/08/22/490847797/why-do-we-judge-parents-for-putting-kids-at-perceived-but-unreal-risk


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  • Posted by evlwhtguy 7 years, 7 months ago
    The proposal you make would be laughable....except that it isn't any more! Such ridiculousness all stems from people putting too much faith in the "Regulatory State" and no faith in self reliance and individual liberty. one other reason.....too many attorneys and a lack of "The English Rule" in civil law.
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  • Posted by $ allosaur 7 years, 7 months ago
    I recall the freedom of the Fifties. I with a lot of other kids rode bicycles to school and this was before anyone thought we should wear helmets.
    My kids? Their school lacked bicycle racks and my wife insisted they be taken by car even when they could have taken a bus.
    After school I'd help a friend with his newspaper route and have money to go buy comic books.
    So I'd peddle blocks and blocks and blocks and blocks to a soda fountain/drug store. Anyone remember those?
    My mother would not worry about me unless I made it home by supper (or dinner in redneck sprechen). I liked supper. So I always made it home.
    When I was tricycle age, I told my mother I was running away from home.
    Mother said, "Bye."
    Kinda surprised by that reaction, I left. I did not take the trike because it was too hard to peddle uphill.
    I got about two blocks before I wondered how I would eat.
    When I came into the house, my mother said, "Hi." I went and found something to do until suppertime.
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    • Posted by $ Radio_Randy 7 years, 7 months ago
      I went on a "walkabout" when I was about 4 or 5 years old. I crossed the "street that should never be crossed, alone" and wandered about 1/2 mile from my house (in Spokane, WA).
      When a nice police officer pulled up to me and asked me if I was lost, I told him no. I got into his car and directed him right back to my house.
      My mother was ecstatic to get me back home...until the officer left. That's when I (and my behind) learned that the "Leave It To Beaver" show was fantasy.
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      • Posted by LibertyBelle 7 years, 7 months ago
        When I was about 5, and one of my brothers was
        about 3, we moved from the woods in Roanoke
        County to Augusta County, because my father had
        gotten a job in Waynesboro, (Va.) We lived on a
        blacktop road, and my brother started leaving home and going down the blacktop. In one case
        (I didn't see this, I just heard about it), our father
        went down and switched him home; that is, he
        followed him, switching his legs. I still wouldn't
        let a child of mine that little go on a blacktop
        road alone. I think I would give him a spanking.
        Better a temporary pain on the buttocks than
        permanent death.
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      • Posted by $ allosaur 7 years, 7 months ago
        I recall when the oldest of my little brothers approached our mother with some bratty crying fit.
        Mother said, "Oh, you want something to cry about?"
        She gave him three sharp pops on the rear and he ran off screaming, "Whaaaa!"
        Mom continued to do whatever she was doing as if nothing had happened.
        I made a mental note to self like "Do not go up to Mom crying unless to can show you need a band-aid or have a bruise."
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    • Posted by dukem 7 years, 7 months ago
      As a child in the South of the late forties and early fifties, I have those memories, and they sustain me now when I see what has happened and what is going to happen.
      I recall the integration of the schools in the mid fifties, and how the adults worried about it and the kids just accepted it, and there were few problems where I lived.
      Castigating the Fifties is a spectator sport now, but I am so glad I grew up then and have my head screwed on straight, to recall a phrase.
      One does not miss freedom until it is gone (said lots of ways), and I dearly miss it. And will continue to miss it as we continue losing it.
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  • Posted by freedomforall 7 years, 7 months ago
    Can anyone stand to listen to NPR's statist propaganda for longer than 10 seconds?
    For decades NPR has been preaching socialist rubbish, encouraging teachers to train little comrades, and pushing morality in this meddling direction, but now the public is supposed to be to blame.
    Meddling statist looters.
    Ignore everything that NPR vomits out on the airwaves and you will be infinitely better off.
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    • Posted by Dobrien 7 years, 7 months ago
      0-10 seconds is to long for Never Play Radio.
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      • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
        I love NPR. I have the app, contribute, and my wife gets a clients when she goes on it. When I've met the hosts at events, they're down-to-Earth. I've been listening since I was a teenager. I lived in FL then. In some ways it hasn't changed that much in 25 years.
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        • Posted by Dobrien 7 years, 7 months ago
          In Minnesota it is a festering boil of myopic altruistic garbage spewing PC.
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          • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
            Check out WPR. I don't know MN Public Radio. Maybe WPR is better. Everyone I've met at WPR has been smart and friendly. I don't think they need to be gov't funded. But the people and they produce are good.
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            • Posted by freedomforall 7 years, 7 months ago
              Smart and friendly. That's the description many who met Bill Clinton gave for him, too. Appearances are sometimes deceiving. If you want a chance at individual liberty, CG, stay away from the source of statist propaganda. When you feel the temptation, sign in to the Gulch instead.
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              • Posted by $ Snezzy 7 years, 7 months ago
                If you met Bill C, you would like him. He is very good at being likable.

                If you met the person who helped us on our farm and also helped herself to a lot of our stuff, you would like her, too. Some crooks are Really Nice Friends until you cannot figure out where you put your chainsaw that you thought was right there in the garage. And you thought you had 20 rabbits, but half of them are gone, and the "friend" says she was cleaning the pens and they "ran away". And your medicine cabinet is strangely empty of the strong prescription painkillers.
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            • Posted by Dobrien 7 years, 7 months ago
              I will check it out Thanks for the recommendation but I have to say I am not a fan of today's PC liberals.
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              • -1
                Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
                "today's PC liberals"
                I've gone round-and-round asking term2 to explain what PC is. He patiently explains, and I end up knowing nothing more. Is there a premier for people who don't believe in it? Maybe I am a PC liberal. I do not know. I ranted a little about it here: https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...
                I think I just disagree that PCness even exists. Thanks anyway, even if I never get it.
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                • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 7 months ago
                  Political correctness exists. It's the attempt by liberals to change the definitions of anything historical they disagree with. Why? Because liberals do not believe in universal standards. They want to be able to make things up as they go along and only apply standards when it benefits them.

                  Examples:
                  Racism. Racism by any objective standard is treating someone else differently simply because they look different. Racism by PC standards is white entitlement and black oppression. It is the cause of the BLM movement. Real racism was the beginning of the labor unions, who were facing competition for road construction contracts. Real racism was the beginning of abortion and Planned Parenthood via Margaret Sanger.

                  Honesty. Honesty by any objective standard is equating reality with reality. Honesty by any objective standard exists regardless whether or not there is a law to punish dishonesty. Honesty by PC standards is quite simply if you don't get caught, it's okay. And it's not even that, really, it's whether or not you get convicted. Honesty by PC standards is embodied in the Clinton Foundation.

                  Religion. Religion by objective standards means actually living what you believe and believing in universal truths. Religion by objective standards involves a third party as judge and arbiter of truth. Religion by PC standards is where people appoint themselves as judge and arbiter, twisting and changing their views based on whatever happens to be popular or seemingly beneficial at the time.

                  Education. Education by objective standards means the process by which one acquaints himself/herself with reality. Education by PC standards is nothing more than picking and choosing which information to present as reality, relying on the ignorance and subservience of the student. Education by objective standards means allowing people to independently confirm truth, knowing it to be what it is. Education by PC standard asserts the stance of the ivory tower and that all knowledge must be disseminated at the benevolent whim of the elites.

                  Journalism. Journalism by objective standards mean reporting on what happened. Journalism by PC standards means selectively choosing to ignore stories that don't match with one's personal views. It also means presenting editorial as "fact". The worst cases of PC journalism are when the news purveyors actually ignore the truth and present bald-faced lies as truth. This is what the mainstream media has largely devolved into.

                  To summarize, to be PC is to choose to ignore reality and to instead insist that reality is what one wishes it to be, not what one is. To be PC is to engage not only in self-deception, but to then present that deception to others.
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                  • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
                    Thanks for the long msg. On many of these the non-PC and PC versions sound the same.
                    Racism is treating people differently because of how they look. The PC-version is entitlement and oppression. Those are similar. Maybe you're saying the PC-version dwells on racial identity politics. That's something I'm strongly against.

                    Honesty In your view PC = dishonest.

                    Religion: PC people appoint themselves to be judge and arbiter of religious issues, you say, whereas no PC look to a third-party. I am very PC about religion by your definition.

                    Education - I don't understand, but I think you're saying PC is letting your cultural biases influence your view of reality. By this definition, almost no one tries to be PC, but everyone is a little PC. The same is true about your view of Jouranlism

                    "to ignore reality and to instead insist that reality is what one wishes it to be"
                    This is a common behavior. I think we're adapted to fall into this trap unless we use critical thinking. PC, by this definition, is ancient.
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                    • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 7 months ago
                      PC isn't anything new per se, in that you are correct. Just like its underlying principle, it's nothing more than a fancy name for deception. Allow me to clarify slightly, however, as I may have under-emphasized the fullness of the deceit present in today's PC world.

                      Racism. Racism is inherently seeing someone as lower than you are because of appearance. Followers of political correctness attempt to blame others for being racist when they in fact harbor deep bias and resentment - especially toward blacks. See Dinesh D'Souza's latest "Hillary's America" for a very eye-opening expose' on the Democratic Party. If you can remain a Democrat after seeing the history of racism in the Democratic Party and how that history continues today, you can in no way call yourself an Objectivist. And I'm dead serious here.

                      Honesty: spot on. PC'ers are dishonest because they choose to adhere to the worldview that their perception is and determines reality rather than the other way 'round.

                      Religion: It isn't that people don't get to choose their religion, it is that PC-ers view religion itself and the underlying standards thereof as if they are constructs of man rather than God. It's inherently contradictory - regardless of one's view of religion. If you believe in God, you don't also get to believe that man gets to overrule God when God's rules are inconvenient. It isn't in forcing people to choose religion, it's in the way that religious mores are adopted and preached.

                      Education. It's far more than a cultural bias. It's an outright attempt to control and indoctrinate based on the PC-ers' fantastical view of the world. Common Core is the ultimate in PC education. In mathematics, the method by which one solves the problem is now more important than arriving at the correct answer. Also in mathematics, if one doesn't use the most obtuse, ridiculous methods for counting and solving math problems, one is graded down - regardless the fact that standard methodologies are at least 10x faster and more intuitive. In History, teachers no longer teach concepts like the Constitution or the American Revolution, but now spend more of their time teaching about all the imagined wrongs perpetrated on other nations by America. In English, instead of reading great works of literature and poetry with an emphasis on traditional values, students are now forced to read modern-day stories espousing progressive mantras such as homosexuality, liberation theology, and recreational drug use. I can go on and on. I have several children in the public schools and their homework just makes me want to scream sometimes.

                      Journalism. Again, it's far more than mere bias, it's open dishonesty. It used to be that journalists reported on what was going on regardless of who was involved or being exposed and regardless of whether or not it played into what was acceptable to the elites. Of all the facets of life, journalism is the one most affected by and thereby reflective of what effects the nonsense of PC has had on our culture. No longer are journalists willing to skewer any political office-holder, now they openly take sides, frequently choosing to ignore even major stories (like the Clinton Foundation's pay-for-play with the State Department) in favor of minor stories like word-mincing or nude exposes of candidates' spouses.

                      The problem is that PC should not be a common behavior! It shouldn't be an acceptable behavior at all - let alone the one by which a nation founded on the principles of equality, property rights, personal responsibility, and opportunity is run! The PC mindset is a mindset of willful deception and the propagation of deception.
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                      • Posted by LibertyBelle 7 years, 7 months ago
                        As to education, public education should simply
                        be abolished. Government is force. Its justification
                        is to protect man from force (including fraud) and
                        violence. Whatever has nothing to do with these
                        functions is not a legitimate government function. Also, education (especially the educa-
                        tion of children) teaches thought processes, and
                        that is something the government should defin-
                        itely NOT be in charge of. Because it ultimately
                        must lead to government thought control. I don't
                        think that it is reformable from within. It should
                        simply be taken away from government, and
                        privatized.
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                      • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
                        I still don't get the racism one. PC people, in your model, are racist. I assume non-PC people are often racist too. So PC and non-PC are often the same on this issue. Or is PC just another word for racist, and non-PC

                        I understand the religion one, but I am PC (by your definition) about religion. I believe humans overrule gods. I call this humanist, but I can accept other words for it. This one makes sense to me.

                        I don't know if it relates to PC, but it absolutely blows my mind the extent people go to to politicize an education standard. I see none of these problems with Common Core. I'm not qualified to evaluate its merits, but the politicization of it is amazing. But that's getting off the topic. Assuming those bad educational practices were happening somewhere, why does one word/philosophy tie them together? It sounds like a disjointed list of bad practices.

                        I see the bias in Journalism, but I don't see it as new, needing a word, or driven by an overarching philosophy. Many media outlets are corporately owned, so they're often going to reflect the interests of managers of corporations and their customers (including gov't). I guess we could call them "elites", although I resist that b/c it implies there a clear group of people who are bad imposing this problem on the good guys. Journalists are just people, with the normal foibles of being human. They probably try to report just the facts. It's easier to condemn corporate bias than it is to produce pristine facts-only journalism. I have come to accept that it's produced by humans who need to write a story or need to sell ad space to companies, and I'm just mindful that no one outlet will give me the whole picture.

                        Other people have patiently tried to explain it to me. I get the concepts of racism, humanism, crappy education, and bias in journalism. I don't see how they're tied together. I do understand the definition from the 90s where people say "growth opportunities" instead of "failings". When people use it in this new sense, it goes right over my head.
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                        • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 7 months ago
                          CG, you're either cute and naive, or you refuse to see the Democrats for what they are: deceiving liars. Now I'll accept the argument that twenty years ago there may have still been some Democrats who had honest but differing opinions about things, but nowadays, the Democratic Party doesn't allow those to get elected. There are nothing but Progressives/Socialists left.

                          I'll be blunt: YES - if you subscribe to PC, you are a racist. Are there others who aren't necessarily PC who also are racist? Perhaps, but they aren't forming political parties. Here are some examples of PC policies and how they specifically target blacks:
                          1. Abortion. Margaret Sanger (founder of Planned Parenthood) wanted to exterminate blacks. She talked to the KKK about how to get blacks to have abortions and paid black ministers to okay abortions to their congregations. The vast majority of PP facilities are in predominantly black neighborhoods. And Hillary Clinton has openly praised Margaret Sanger.
                          2. Minimum wage hikes. The group most affected by minimum wage hikes are blacks and youth (especially black youth) who can no longer find jobs. And because they can't find anything productive to do, they join gangs and get involved in illegal activities and wind up in jail.
                          3. Rent controls. These create slum districts which are disproportionately populated by blacks. Even Barack Obama in his book admitted that these were the modern-day equivalent of plantations.
                          4. Unions. Believe it or not, but unions were created when white-owned road construction companies were getting underbid by black-owned companies so they passed a law a hundred years ago mandating minimum wage standards for road construction crews. The entire intent of Davis-Bacon (which is still on the books, BTW) was to remove price competition by black-owned construction companies.
                          5. Welfare. This one has probably done more to contribute to the disintegration of the black family than anything else. Welfare pays single mothers, enabling the men to avoid their obligations as fathers. And the single largest factor in predicting future incarceration is growing up without a father, of which 2/3 of current US black households do. Blacks point to racial profiling and police brutality, but their real problem is not having fathers in the home.

                          And all of these policies are pushed by Democrats, not the least of which are Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson.

                          "I see none of these problems with Common Core. I'm not qualified to evaluate its merits"

                          I am. I have children in high school, middle school and grade school and I've seen the homework - even in a Red State. It isn't teaching any more. It's babysitting and obfuscation. People wonder why our math and science scores plummet and why we have to import engineers and scientists. If you had to base your math experience off Common Core, you'd give up math too! I have several friends who home school. They can get done in about three months in math what takes a middle- or grade-schooler nine months to learn in public schools. There is something very wrong with that.

                          "It sounds like a disjointed list of bad practices."

                          Yes, they are all bad practices, but they aren't isolated or happenstance. They are intentional and part of a broader initiative to control and indoctrinate the youth. It's much easier to control the uneducated.

                          "I see the bias in Journalism..."

                          Don't try to over-analyze. That there is bias in journalism is the result of Political Correctness.

                          "Journalists are just people, with the normal foibles of being human."

                          They start out as that, yes, but then they ascribe to PC and they adopt their foibles rather than seek to be objective. They know they are biased and they consciously choose to editorialize when they should be reporting.

                          "It's easier to condemn corporate bias than it is to produce pristine facts-only journalism."

                          Precisely. Most modern journalists are lazy. They are entertainers more than journalists.
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                          • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
                            "you refuse to see the Democrats for what they are"
                            I'm really lost. I thought we were talking about PC. What's that got to do with political parties? I don't read that many political articles, so it's like a I need a dummies guide to PC.

                            "Here are some examples of PC policies and how they specifically target blacks:"
                            I read the examples, but remember I don't know what PC means, so it's like me giving you a list of five Gelul policies that specifically target middle-aged geeks. You don't know what Gelul means or what why you should care which groups it targets.

                            "I've seen the homework"
                            Common Core does not dictate specific homework questions or even styles of questions. But this is off the topic. Sorry I started that. Regarding school problems, the only time I've ever been a party to a lawsuit was with my kids school, so I know something about this. :( My kids are now in the public school. It's working very well, but I've learned it can change on a dime. I have no illusions that it will keep working well.

                            "That there is bias in journalism is the result of Political Correctness."
                            Remember, I don't know what PC, so this has no meaning for me. I see bias as coming from human foibles, not a new ideology. Many of the media are corporate owned, so you they tend to know people who see things from that view. So we get a slight right-wing bias to mainstream news, not because think tanks masterminded an ideology adopted by journalists but just because of who owns them, who they tend to know in their networks, things they care about, etc.

                            "Most modern journalists are lazy. They are entertainers more than journalists."
                            Maybe you could get involved in journalism some way. The world needs people doing things right, so being excellent often pays. If you already do a blog or something like it I would read it.

                            I'm starting to think PC just means bad stuff. It's kind of like the word crap. Many things people describe as PC policies, I'd consider crap policies.
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                            • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 7 months ago
                              So I'll try to simplify:

                              Being PC means not only deceiving one's self by refusing to accept the way things actually are (in reality), but ascribing to the notion that somehow if one can get enough others to buy into a similar deception that it makes the deception morally acceptable.

                              PC is way more than human foibles. It is embracing a lie and promoting that lie in the hopes that others' adopting that lie will make one feel better about living a lie.

                              If that doesn't help, I'm sorry, but there's not much clearer way for me to put things.
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                              • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
                                "if one can get enough others to buy into a similar deception that it makes the deception morally acceptable."
                                So it starts with some fact someone doesn't like. Maybe the fact is that their business is making enough money to keep the lights on but will never be saleable and lead to the exit they had planned. Or maybe they have an incurable disease. Instead of responding to that reality, PC people select people who don't recognize the reality. Then that group refuses to be around people who say otherwise.

                                For example, my company once worked with a startup struggling to get rid of the bugs and commercialize a medical technology. They had early adopters volunteering to try it, understanding it in the alpha testing stage. I said, "You need to get feedback from the market. You're heading into the Valley of Death. Once we get all known bugs fixed, investors will lose patience before we can commercialize it." Their co-founder said not ever to say Valley of Death. I said I was happy to be proven wrong. I said my company had no equity in it, but we just wanted to see him get a favorable exit. He just insisted we never say aloud, even with only the cofounders present, any mention of a funding gap in getting the technology to market. They eventually ran out of funding, and I don't think they even sold the IP to another firm. I'm not sure if they got any salvage value of it. After they failed, I asked a former employee of theirs if the co-founders were just lying to their vendors and potential acquirerers or what the deal was. He said they wanted what they were saying to be true and they surrounded themselves with people who agreed. They forbade people around them from saying the truth. Your word for this is they were being PC.

                                Of course I've also seen examples where I thought people were deluding themselves and they succeeded. These people, though, weren't PC. They listened to criticism, even if they did not accept all of it. PC, by your definition, is when you insist people around you not even say aloud some idea. I stay way from PC. There are so many projects in the world, there's no time even to be involved with the tiniest fraction. There's no need to spend time working on projects with people who can't even discuss the thorny issues.

                                The only PC-like practice is I follow is I insist people not talk about problems that they have no recommended action for. The action might be stopping a project. That's fine. But if they're simply talking about how bad something is without a single action we can take, that's just kvetching.

                                This is the first time I've had an understanding of PC is and why it's even a word.
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                                • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 7 months ago
                                  Your getting closer, but you're missing the whole "politically" in the politically correct. Your business example absolutely is a case of someone not willing to confront reality, but they weren't trying to push an agenda to gain power. They deceived themselves (and their investors), but their failure didn't really affect too much.

                                  A better example of PC is the gun control debate. All the facts show clearly that "an armed society is a polite society" (Heinlein). Yet you still have many progressives like Hilllary Clinton calling for federally-mandated gun control. Why? Because they aren't interested in reality. They want power. And they know that they can't get the level of power they want without being able to control people.

                                  Another example? Trying to use Title IX to tell schools they have to allow children to select their own gender. Children (and especially teens) have enough problems growing up and trying to learn while their bodies change - they don't need these kinds of distractions. But that isn't the real goal. The real goal is to destroy the traditional morality that studies continue to show leads to significantly higher probabilities of being productive and self-sufficient - two things the government doesn't want!

                                  Really, if you hear a politician talking, you should almost immediately start hearing PC. Look for the agenda they are trying to push and examine whether or not the agenda leads to more or less freedom for the People. If it leads to more government and more regulations, it's PC nonsense.
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                                  • CircuitGuy replied 7 years, 7 months ago
                • Posted by freedomforall 7 years, 7 months ago
                  You don' have to stay a liberal statist, CG. But its difficult to break the addiction when you are surrounded by temptation from the mainstream media and statist looters like NPR.
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  • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 7 months ago
    When I had children, they were supervised to an extent, as they learned to take care of themselves more and more freedom was allowed as their common sense and sense of right and wrong grew. In my day, there was little homework compared to today. As soon as we got home, we'd be gone until supper time. When a couple we knew was over attentive to their youngsters, we would taunt them wit, "Hey Sam, when are you gonna take them out of the wrapping paper?"

    Every generation has seems to get more and more protected until you find a kid standing alone looking puzzled because someone forgot to tell him what he's supposed to be doing.
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    • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
      "Every generation has seems to get more and more protected until you find a kid standing alone looking puzzled because someone forgot to tell him what he's supposed to be doing." (emphasis mine)
      That kid has grown up and is now a young adult struggling with "adulting". They actually have a verb for operating without hoving parents.
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  • Posted by DrZarkov99 7 years, 7 months ago
    Overprotected children aren't introduced to life's hard lessons: good judgment is the result of experience, which is the result of bad judgment. Without discovering the result of bad judgment through minor scrapes and bruises early, the development of intelligent exercise of caution is hindered. This delay can lead to catastrophic results through reckless behavior later in life.

    There are children that are naturally prone to risky behavior, while others are cautious by nature. I was one of the latter, and had far more liberty than my comrades, who were mystified that I had my own house key, no curfew, and allowed to handle my own finances while still a young teen. My brother was quite reckless, and needed close supervision, which my parents diligently provided, much to his frustration. Parents should be allowed to make such decisions, as the state tends to a "one size fits all" approach, treating all children as stupid and reckless.
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  • Posted by Dobrien 7 years, 7 months ago
    The only miracle that I believe in , is the love I felt as father immediately after the birth of my children. As a couple my wife and I choose what we were comfortable with , in regards to our kids activities by using our own common sense and experience.
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    • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
      "common sense and experience"
      I don't know. My common sense and experience are out of step with mainstream though. Maybe we need more science, more dispassionate look at the perils. Things I did would be considered very dangerous now.
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      • Posted by Dobrien 7 years, 7 months ago
        I wasn't talking about your common sense and experience as I could care a less . "Things I did would be considered very dangerous now" by who and who cares what they think?
        Be responsible for your own decisions and actions.
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        • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
          "I wasn't talking about your common sense and experience"
          Whose sense do we rely on if not our own?
          "who and who cares what they think?"
          The only reason I care is when I help my kids ride the park on a Saturday where I played, it's like Children of Men now. It's unfortunate. There's still another park where kids play, with more parents nearby than when I was a kid, but at least some kids still ride their bikes there and find kids to play with. It's becoming a rarity.
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  • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 7 years, 7 months ago
    I am not a parent but I can just imagine the thoughts I put my parents through as a kid...never came home with out a cut or a scrape; but that was life, it was normal and everyone of us take risks every day...again, that's life and to experience it takes on some risk.
    I can see the progression of this paranoia with a tattooed warning notice at the exit of every vagina stating, entrance into this world may cause death...
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    • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
      " but that was life"
      It was when I was a kid, but it's not anymore. It's sad on multiple levels, but the thing that hits me the most is that my 6- and 8-y/o kids would not feel comfortable to walk down the same street in Madison I did, knock on a friend's door, and find some random game to play. It would be a crime now if I let them do it. But it was an every-day thing just few decades ago. We watched TV when there was kids programming, but there usually wasn't, and we went to the park or hung out in some friend's basement. Now people see a 7-y/o as need constant hovering supervision. They must learn to go out and do things for themselves, take kiddie risks, face kiddie consequences.

      I didn't get the tattooed warning thing. I'm only 41. Don't tell me kids aren't doing it anymore, hey. In a few years I don't want to hear my kids are just texting instead and not interacting in the physical world. OTOH, I don't want to hear if they're scamming (hooking up, or whatever they call it now) either.
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      • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 7 years, 7 months ago
        Just think of the difference between now and the times of our forefathers: At 8 years old most had a skill and worked, had learned Latin and Greek, were ready for college, some, were recruited as Generals in the army at 10...but today, kids this age can hardly read English and you'd be lucky if they could take the garbage out on their own without being reminded.

        The tattoo thing was a mimic of every stupid, "it's Obvious" warning label we find on everything these days, taken to the next level.
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        • Posted by $ dballing 7 years, 7 months ago
          "most"? I think maybe "some". Certainly most of the ones who were going to get an education. But I think by far "most" 8 year olds in the time of our forefathers knew how to work around the farm, or whatever, and that was largely it.
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          • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 7 years, 7 months ago
            "Most" was the characterization given by David Barton in a video on the "Foundations of Freedom" series.
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            • Posted by $ dballing 7 years, 7 months ago
              shrug it seems unlikely to me, but I certainly haven't done any research to make that the hill I want to die on. :-)
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              • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 7 years, 7 months ago
                Nice response...sounds like it comes easy to you, you've had much more success and practice than I.
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                • Posted by $ dballing 7 years, 7 months ago
                  I've died on too many hills I shouldn't have. That's what does it to ya. :-)
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                  • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 7 years, 7 months ago
                    Hmm, are writers extra hard on themselves or to the conscious is it just a normal regret that comes with the territory.

                    Personal question: do you get competing versions of a story, a thought or just the articulation of it, in your head prior to, during or after writing?
                    For me, it gets confusing and often the best version gets lost in translation from the mind, brain and pen to paper. I'm always second guessing myself.
                    That's why I wrote my first book...just to prove to myself I could do it and remain consistent. 100K sold must say something although I remain unconvinced.
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                    • Posted by $ dballing 7 years, 7 months ago
                      All of the writers I know are definitely their own worst critics, if that's what you mean.

                      I definitely relate to you "the best version was somewhere between my brain and the paper/keyboard, at which point I spend some time usually trying to recapture what I lost in translation (sometimes successfully, sometimes not).
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                      • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 7 years, 7 months ago
                        I guess I'm in good company at least.
                        About the only "trans-human" like improvement I would be tempted to employ is a USB from the right side of my brain direct to the keyboard or perhaps we might be able to do that with manmade quantum entanglements between the mind and the screen.

                        You'd only need to think and it will be written...on second thought, maybe that's not the best idea after all...laughing...
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  • Posted by $ Abaco 7 years, 7 months ago
    Sure. Why do you think many more die from the measles vaccine than from the measles? It's because we're afraid of hazards that are overstated to sell product or that aren't even there in the first place (tetanus being an example). Americans are very afraid.

    As a parent the one thing I will say in a non-joking manner on this topic is that we, as a society, have decided to coddle those who would victimize a child. We are starting to be told to try to be understanding to the ghouls (see recent Solon Mag coverage on this). This does result in a more dangerous environment for kids. Other than that, I say let them learn some lessons on their own.
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    • Posted by lrshultis 7 years, 7 months ago
      Please do a little research when you make idiotic statements like in your first sentence. Just look at a little history, though the your all government is bad paranoia will keep you from this link:

      http://www.nvic.org/vaccines-and-dise...

      And look up how things went when religious beliefs stopped the vaccination programs in some African countries.

      Besides the 1 or so per 1000 death rate from measles, there were other not so nice things that could happen, like blindness.
      Let me know if you find any info about death from the vaccine that comes anywhere close to the death rate from measles.
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      • Posted by $ Abaco 7 years, 7 months ago
        Oh...I've done plenty of research. I've been in the middle of research groups so well known that I don't name them here (because you'd get all wound up). So calm down a little. My premise is that more die from the vaccine than the illness it's supposed to prevent. I am sorry if that bothers you. It bothers me too.
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      • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
        "Please do a little research when you make idiotic statements like in your first sentence."
        Abaco knew a healthy 15 y/o who got sick and died after receiving a vaccination. I don't know if it was causal. He does not accept all the anti-vax paranoia out there, but he researched the issue and came to the opinion that vaccines are over-used.

        I had both my kids get the full recommended schedule of vaccines because I don't agree with his opinion. But I don't think he's being idiotic about it.
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        • Posted by lrshultis 7 years, 7 months ago
          What would you call jumping from a single case to the general without checking on the reality of the situation where vaccines did not exist and still do not exist? Maybe mistaken would have been a better word, sorry about that.
          Take smallpox vaccine which did the most to wipe out smallpox. It had five or so deaths from the vaccine a year in the US. The cost benefit ratio, in the USA, continuing to vaccinate until the chance of getting smallpox from the vaccination became noticable with respect to infection possibility and then vaccination was limited to those going to countries where smallpox was still endemic.
          And had there been polio vaccine my mother would not have been crippled for the last 15 years of her short 33 year life.
          Like Abaco, I am a man of math and science and other interesting things, so let him do his own replies, I am certain that he is capable.
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  • Posted by Maritimus 7 years, 7 months ago
    The basic errors of that thinking are that it is one short step for conceiving the existence as too dangerous to live in and that it negates the individual's right to freedom and pursuit of achievement and happiness. In short, it is an irrational idea.
    EDIT: correct a typo
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  • Posted by wiggys 7 years, 7 months ago
    today we in the usa have people that we pay other wise known as civil servants that are looking over the shoulders of people who choose the be parents to make sure they are doing things the way some other civil servant has described in a manual on how to raise children. GOVERNMENT intervention one more time.
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  • Posted by $ Snezzy 7 years, 7 months ago
    We put little children up on our ponies for birthday parties. We believe that horses can improve us all, and that a pony ride at the age of 3 or 7 is a good way to get started in horsemanship.

    We have noticed that although some private schools and church-run daycares will invite us in to do rides, nearly no public schools want us at all. Apparently they are afraid that something will go wrong, that someone will claim that a child got hurt.
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    • Comment hidden by post owner or admin, or due to low comment or member score. View Comment
    • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 7 months ago
      Theiy built their own nightmare. Now it's hovering over their life like shadow. People deserve what they asked for. I have no pity for school administrations
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  • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago in reply to this comment.
    "Why? Because they aren't interested in reality. "
    We are back at my original understanding PC = generic straw man.
    We could refute people's actual claims. In the straw man fallacy, we invent an easily-refuted straw man argument, refute it, and pretend we've refuted the actual claims. Anti-PC takes the fallacy to another level. We don't even need to invent a straw man. We just say the claims we disagree with rest on denying reality.
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    • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 7 months ago
      So you characterize my argument as "well we can just call it anti-PC and refute the argument as an ad hominem fallacy?" That would only be true if no effort whatsoever was made to refute the actual argument. That is simply not the case, as I have given numerous examples showing exactly why labeling of certain policy decisions as PC is not merely just ad hominem, but is in fact an accurate categorization of a whole host of actions based around an ideological (and frankly pathological) avoidance of reality. The insidiousness of the cult of PC, however, does not lie merely in an avoidance of reality, but in the attempts to press others into believing in and subscribing to the same avoidance. This is one of the true problems currently infesting the Democratic Party - they have openly adopted Progressive principles with respect to race relations, media relations, education, foreign aid, trade, spending, housing, justice, and just about everything else. They are principles which are demonstrably fallacious, which is why the people here in the Gulch so despise the Democratic Party and anyone who chooses to affiliate with them.
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      • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
        "labeling of certain policy decisions as PC is not merely just ad hominem"
        I'm saying something very similar to that. I'm not saying anti-PC attacks the person (ad hominem). I'm saying anti-PC assigns a bogus argument (namely PC) to a large number of unrelated policy ideas.

        Take the idea of banning guns. I'm strongly against it. I know some of the arguments in favor it. None of them relate to a desire to deny reality, and they certainly don't relate to a mode of denying reality that relates to media relations, education, foreign aid, spending, etc. We should refute the real anti-gun arguments. It's easier to say their actual argument is they are anti-reality and we are pro-reality. That's easy, but it's not true.

        Thanks for being so patient in explaining your view of PC. I'll tell you a funny modern example of retro 90s-era PC. My wife asked my kid's teacher about fine-tip and fat magic markers. The teacher said we don't use the word "fat" anymore; we call them "bold-line" markers. LOL. It was not a joke either. She's a young Boomer, and we're Gen-X. I think Boomers invented this old-school PC, and Gen-X rolled our eyes when it was new in 1990. They probably think my wife and I are vertically challenged. It makes me want turn on some Pearl Jam. I miss the 90s-era PC, which was silly but at least I understood it.
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        • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 7 months ago
          Well, you are welcome to draw your own conclusions. I've tried to explain to you the phenomenon known as political correctness. You claim you don't understand it, but the actuality is that you have created your own definition which significantly differs from the one others use. You want to just dismiss the cries of PC as a mis-categorization or misdirection. I'm not saying we shouldn't refute the real arguments. What I'm saying is that those in favor of PC don't care. They have their agenda and that is all they are interested in. They don't want to acknowledge the truth. They don't want to look at the facts. They don't want to look at the failed policies and the damage they cause. And that is precisely what makes them PC.

          You say you'd rather have the 90's version of PC. It really wasn't any different, it just had fewer followers so it was easier to laugh at. It wasn't as pervasive in society and that was really the first generation who really started to get affected by the 1960's counter-culture. In the 90's, PC was just getting started. Now, a generation later it's mainstream and showing its true colors.
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          • Posted by 7 years, 7 months ago
            "You claim you don't understand [PC]"
            No, it's just that have very large comprehension opportunities and challenges. j/k LOL That was my attempt at 90s PC. Thanks for trying to explain modern PC.
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