yes. it floweth out your child’s backside. yours, too.
as parents, we all think the world of our children. why wouldn’t we? they are all amazing creatures, each one a special flower annointing the earth with a special glow.
of course, your child is more special than the rest.
your child is a kind and gentle person, ever-so-talented academically, ever-so-agile in sports, ever so social and perfect.
and that is why you cannot believe that your child said anything threatening to my child. you cannot fathom that your child called my child stupid, he called him dumb, he told him he ought to kill himself.
and that is also why it isn’t surprising that you invited a few boys over for a playdate while they all stood in a group with my son… only too bad for mine — he was the only one not invited by you, all in front of the others. i was standing there; i heard it all. or how about the time you cancelled my son’s long-awaited playdate at your house so that another friend of his could come over instead? of course, my son wanted to know why you did this. you can’t imagine how fun it can be to have to come up with a more palatable reason why an adult would be mean to a kid.
this, of course, isn’t one particular person; this is just a composite of some of the bullshit my child has had to experience in the past 6 months.
now see i am the biggest fan of each of my children. that much is true. but i also don’t believe that the sun shines out of their backsides. i’m well aware that my son, for example, occasionally engages in behavior that isn’t stellar. and when i know about it, i call him on it. it’s simply not acceptable behavior.
but not every parent participates in his child’s upbringing as i do, apparently. because there are plenty of parents who are not willing to believe that some pretty harsh things come out of their kids’ mouths. they cannot conceive of their child engaging in hurtful behavior. shoot, so many of them cannot see how they participate in this behavior, so how can you expect them to see it in their child’s?
i’m tired of lazy parents who live in denial about their kids.
I have had some issues with this over the past few months. I’ve seen parents ignore behavior from their kids that would earn a stern reprimand from me if I saw my own kids doing it. I’m not even sure its laziness that’s the problem, either. I think it’s parents being overly concerned with being friends with their kids. They want to be seen as “nice”.
I’m not naive…I’m sure my own kids do sometimes act out and behave in ways that are not acceptable. But when they do it within my earshot, they don’t get away with it.
That sucks. Your kids do rock. It’s bad enough when kids are jerks, but when their parents are jerks too? Incomprehensible.
I see the world as a sort of global village. And when kids are in my neck of the village, I treat them as my own. What that means is that I care for them as I would my own. The flip side: if they are doing something unacceptable by my family’s standards, I call them on it. I’m not scaryl I’m certainly not lifting a finger up against anyone (I don’t believe in that), but I will give a talking-to if needed. The parents with whom I’m on a similar wavelength are okay with that — and please dear Dog, if MY kids do something like that, PLEASE call them on it. discipline to me is all about LEARNING; and sometimes, people need a refresher course in behaviorland.
Of course, then there are parents who worry that their little flower has been crushed beneath my wheel. Really? So next time, I should just let your kid run into the street without looking? I should let your kid smack other kids? I should let your kid put himself and others into danger? Go ahead and yell at me, but hell no. I am not letting your kid get hurt, and I will let him know what he’s doing wrong on my watch. I am not a yeller; I am not physical; but I will use my words, as the parlance goes, to let him know that there’s a better way.