Yesterday I posted a short piece here about the increasing use of genetic testing of pre-born children with a view toward weeding out the "undesirables." The article to which I linked discussed the availability of OTC tests that could be administered to the mother's blood to determine whether the child she was carrying suffered from Downs Syndrome. Only more such tests can be expected to hit the market over the coming years, which, in the not-too-long run, will allow parents to abort children who in utero show the existence of even potential medical problems.
Over a week ago there was a well-written piece in the online edition of The Wall Street Journal. You should be able to find it here. Anthropologists at UCLA conducted a week-long study of 32 middle-class Southern California families. Not an ordinary study, mind you, but one that involved recording virtually everything each family did in their home. The results come as little surprise to me: "The families had very a child-centered focus, which may help explain the 'dependency dilemma' seen among American middle-class families."
What's a "dependency dilemma," you ask? "Parents intend to develop their children's independence, yet raise them to be relatively dependent, even when the kids have the skills to act on their own." In other words, by catering to their children's whims, parents undercut the very life skills that make them capable of exercising independent judgment. Such life skills include dealing with frustration and failure, which, after all, are more a part of life than success. Insuring your child has every conceivable experience and chauffeuring him or her to every activity, and failing to requiring even a limited level of reciprocity, is geared toward creating a child who in unprepared for the so-called real world.
Both using abortion to cull the heard, so to speak, and raising children in middle-class America have the same goal: perfection. But not moral perfection; not excellence in the virtues of character. Perfection understood in the narrow sense of controlled material success. The market meets the family, and the market wins. When parents in effect consume their children, the family has been turned inside-out. Of course, such parents should be wary of how their children might consume them when their performance begins to slip after, say, age 70 or so.
Over a week ago there was a well-written piece in the online edition of The Wall Street Journal. You should be able to find it here. Anthropologists at UCLA conducted a week-long study of 32 middle-class Southern California families. Not an ordinary study, mind you, but one that involved recording virtually everything each family did in their home. The results come as little surprise to me: "The families had very a child-centered focus, which may help explain the 'dependency dilemma' seen among American middle-class families."
What's a "dependency dilemma," you ask? "Parents intend to develop their children's independence, yet raise them to be relatively dependent, even when the kids have the skills to act on their own." In other words, by catering to their children's whims, parents undercut the very life skills that make them capable of exercising independent judgment. Such life skills include dealing with frustration and failure, which, after all, are more a part of life than success. Insuring your child has every conceivable experience and chauffeuring him or her to every activity, and failing to requiring even a limited level of reciprocity, is geared toward creating a child who in unprepared for the so-called real world.
Both using abortion to cull the heard, so to speak, and raising children in middle-class America have the same goal: perfection. But not moral perfection; not excellence in the virtues of character. Perfection understood in the narrow sense of controlled material success. The market meets the family, and the market wins. When parents in effect consume their children, the family has been turned inside-out. Of course, such parents should be wary of how their children might consume them when their performance begins to slip after, say, age 70 or so.
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