Posted on 11/27/2005 11:25:37 PM PST by Jeff Chandler
Decades of lecturing around America and of speaking with parents on my radio show have led me to an incredible conclusion: More American parents would be upset with their teenage children if they smoked a cigarette than if they cheated on a test.
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There has been a profound change in American values. In a nutshell, health has overtaken morality. Or, if you prefer, health has become our morality.
(Excerpt) Read more at jewishworldreview.com ...
Not only that, you missed the whole point of the article. You also missed the whole point of my post.
Sounds like your raising your kids just right.
My 7yo loves to play with mommy's makeup - and I let her. She'll go in the bathroom and put on blush and eyeshadow and lipstick and come out to me and ask "Mommy, how do I look"? Most times I tell her she looks like a clown. She goes back to the mirror and about 15 minutes later will come back out to me........and she no longer looks like a clown. She still looks like a 7yo who was using mommy's makeup, but she got the point.
Oh, and she hates beer and doesn't particularly care for wine - except in the sauces I use it in :)
I'm with you - and have your back :)
It is not a poll, but rather a philisophical question designed to discern what is most important to a parent.
Or, if you prefer, health has become our morality.
While the new religion of health enables many people in our society to gain a sense of moral worthiness, it also provides a valuable means of censuring deviants - those new outcasts in a world where the concept of 'zero tolerance' has somehow become a 'good thing'. (The currency of this term alone, in my view, is sufficient to illustrate the extent to which we have lost the moral plot.) People who are unwilling to succumb to what the late Petr Skrabanek (a renegade Czech medic) described as 'Coercive Healthism' - those among us with 'bad habits' - are the new outcasts in this increasingly fearful and intolerant world. It is, in the words of the East London GP Michael Fitzpatrick, the Tyranny of Health which now surrounds us.
Or, "Would you rather your child sodomized another child of the same sex, or cheated on a test?"
LOL!! They don't smoke because you ask? Are you serious?? You'll find out ten years from now just like I did. Please bookmark my name and let me know. I did all the right things you think you're doing now. Smoking doesn't have anything to do with character even though you made it so. There are a lot of very honorable people who smoke cigarettes. There are also a lot of very dishonorable people who don't smoke cigarettes. Did you even read the article? Or you think it just doesn't apply to you since you "ask"? Or you think this is about smokintg instead of character. If so, then you're one of the parents the article was about in the first place.
The only reason health has become a morality is beacuse 1) the left can't stand for people to live unhealthy lifestyles because....well it's so unhealthy and 2) the right can't stand unhealthy lifestyles because the working Right has to pay for it eventually (or their heirs) because those are the only people who work.
Then you have those ne'er do wells that show up on this site in rose colored glassess that have the same misconceptions we all had once about raising teenage children. It's a tragic comedy to watch.
I find myself laughing for some reason. I would think you could go even farther with this, and ask if you would rather they smoke or murder someone!
Ah my dear BMWC, both answers are no to what? Say it was a "pick one" which is exactly what this is. Which is the lesser of two evils? One is behavioral, one is a chacter problem. Behavioral problems generally can be dealt with as the "host" matures. Character problems are generally genetic or instilled by some parental deficiency, due to the parent's unwilligness to admit that they or their offsprings might not be perfect. In psyciatric circles this is called narcissism. I'm pefect and something is wrong with the rest of the world.
Nail on head
Your under the mistaken notion that lies by omission are truth . If mine were to either cheat or smoke they would have to lie to me and that is a character flaw. You didn't make yourself aware, the example you set was to smoke. I care very much to know what they are doing, with who, where and when. My kids are watched like hawks. If indeed in 10 years I find out I have been lied to, tricked or unaware of bad behavior I will be ashamed of both myself and my children.
I read the article... More American parents would be upset with their teenage children if they smoked a cigarette than if they cheated on a test.... Obviously, since you were unaware your response to the question would be if you knew - you didn't.
I have no doubts your children are fine upstanding adults, but my original response was to your statement that they did sneak around and smoke, to have to sneak around meant they knew they doing something wrong.
I agree. Our own children (and us when we were little - a hundred years ago) all got drinks of our parents beer and they all loved it. Our grandchildren do too. Not one of them (or us) had a problem with alcohol and none of them drank much at all or not at all as late teens. They still do't as grown adults. Our youngest only does occasionally because she has 2 children under the age of 4. LOL
OMG! I can't imagine someone in her right mind doing that! Our son in law isn't crazy about us giving sips of Lone Star to Marshal punky or Cassie but our daughter does it so we do when they ask. These are not a whole or half bottle sips although they would love to have it. Wya back in the olden days (when I was oung) you could have a beer with your parents in a beer joint as long as they were sitting there with you. Not anymore.
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