I mean, other people's children. Your own don't count. (Unless you really hate them, in which case you may feel free to tell us about that.)

You may use this story as your starting point, if you wish, as long as you aren't as mean as these people were.

I like kids -- but after reading this story, and working at a day care center, and being exposed to some monstrous brats in my day, I think everyone who has a child ought to be issued a copy of Don't Shoot the Dog, which is a little dated but does a great job of pointing out how parental responses reinforce bad behavior.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Answers

(Please note that I don't think DSTD is a very good book for dog training. The title is a little misleading. But for getting along better with your s/o, or getting your coworkers to treat you better, or teaching a child not to wreak havoc, I think it's pretty good. It's a good for changing the way you look at problems in general.)

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I tend to like people who discipline their children responsibly. I didn't plan it that way but it seems that if I'm friends with someone their kids are pretty good.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I think I like most children - it is the parents I cannot stand! I have a pair of cute dogs, and my toes curl up every time I pass a parent who pushes their children out to pet my dogs, without asking me if it is ok, or if they are friendly. But I love it when children come over and ask me first, before they lean over and lose a hand, I mean pet the dog. Ok, so my dogs have never snapped at anyone (except me) but they do growl, which can be scarey to kids.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Having taught elementary school, I've been asked about "liking children" perhaps more than most. My usual answer is that I love some of them, others I can't stand.

The question invariably strikes me as odd. Does anyone ask, "Do you like adults?"

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I like children that I know. My nieces and nephews and friends' children are are cute little angels. Yeah, because I they're NOT MINE and I don't have to be there when they are monsters. I love them more than anything, but I couldn't be around them all the time! In general I don't get all worked up over children, but I don't necessary dislike children that I don't know. It depends on the kid and on the parents. I work in a store that carries a lot of breakable items and I cannot believe the number of parents that let their children run around the store totally unsupervised. Some parents seem to think that a store is a daycare center. Wrong. My workplace is pretty mellow and we don't enforce any sort of "you break it, you buy it" policy, but when littles ones start running around with glass things or banging on the glass case, I get a little uptight. But mostly I want to smack the parents, not the kids. When I was a child, no way in hell my parents would have let me run wild in a store, muchless touch everything and beat on things. So the kids aren't necessarily bad, just unsupervised. I guess you could say that kids in my store make me nervous, otherwise kids are pretty much

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I LOVE babies and children young enough not to have been FO'ed by adults yet (this age tends to vary with the surrounding adults I think...I don't have any kids of my own yet, so I'm still studying the matter). Once they are old enough to be influenced, then I like children with good parents who are generally well behaved, polite, socialised, etc. It's the same with dogs too btw....I love all puppies and I love dogs with good owners. Did it amaze you the first time you realised it's generally the same people who screw up their dogs that screw up their kids? There needs to be a test, and then a practice run with a dog and then a kid ONLY if you pass the dog section! And no more then two practice runs with the dog people...this isn't the bar exam!!

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Oh. My. Buddha.

I've never thought of the dog/child analogy before! And it's hard to say because the people it brought to mind had their kids before they had their dog, but the dog acts the same as the kids.

VERY high strung and out-of-control.

Well, they used to be anyway. I haven't seen them in months and months, so I don't know how they are now, but they used to be that way.

Of course, the van kids make them look like perfect lil' adorable angels. (=

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I thought the people who wrote to Dave Van were very cruel and in some cases completely out of line. However, I do believe that Dave reinforces his childrens bad behavior. The flour incident and ornament incident are perfect examples. He never should have taken those pictures with the children in the room. It is obvious he loves his kids very much, but they won't be that cute or little for long.

But people shouldn't judge. I have worked in a special needs preschool, and some of the kids were just completely out of control. Discipline meant nothing to them. I mean seriously, did you read about Dave trying to put his son in the corner and the son laughing? What would you have done? It is very hard to deal with kids like this. Especially if you don't believe in spanking or it isn't an option.

Do I like kids? Hard to say. I like some children, some I love, some I could do without. I have two nephews. One I practically raised. The other I am happy to say I don't have to see very often. Both are adorable, sweet and spoiled as all hell. But one is fun, he is brilliant and full of personality and spunk. The other is, well he is whiny and not very well behaved.

But it is not his fault. He is being raised to behave that way. If he falls and cries, my mother in law will come running scoop him up and baby him. If he falls and doesn't cry, she will ask him a million times if he is OK until he does cry. Then she will scoop him up and baby him. My MIL has bruises up and down her arms where he has bitten her. She doesn't want to tell him no. She actually laughs when he bites her. No one ever tells this child no. It is amazing. The few times he has tried to bite me, I have promptly put him on the floor and said, "NO!". The result of this has been him screaming like I kicked him and me being told, "He is just a baby, Misty". He is going to be ten years old and they will be saying he is just a baby.

My husband refuses to babysit him, and it is his sister's baby. But I have to agree. Any child that comes in to my house is not going to bite me or break my things. And if I am not allowed to discipline, well babysitting the child is out of the question.

I have questioned the attitude of my MIL where his behavior is concerned. She told me she does not believe a child can be too spoiled. Whatever.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Three and half years ago, I felt my "biological clock ticking." I turned to my husband one day and stated,"It's either a baby or a dog."

His reply, "Let's get that dog."

She's a 4 year old Yorkie, who I might say is one of the cutest and smarted almost people out there.

Of late, we have been happy about that decision. We had a Christmas party at which time 10 children (I counted) invaded our normally peacful house. They terrorized my dog, wrestled on my furniture, smashed cookies into my carpet, and asked 1,001 question - IN A ROW. When everyone was getting ready to leave, one parent turned to looked back in at the mess that was now my living room and stated, 'Oh, we are leaving your house in such a mess. We should hel..."

"No, you should take your family and go home. Merry Christmas."

In retrospect, I don't think it was my biological clock after all. It must have been the pizza I had for lunch.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Mis -

My grandmother used to say that a child can never be *loved* too much, but they can definitely be spoiled too much. It's unfortunate that some people can't tell the difference.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

No, I don't like children. I'm a mean old bitch. I was all cranky at the New Years Eve party we went to because there were children there, running around and sliding on the wood floors and otherwise getting in the way.

Even the best disciplined ones are pretty boring. They always want to show you something right now, and it's always something thrilling like a new Pokemon card or something. They are up there with any obsessive-compulsive I know when it comes to being incredibly persistent about asking for something or wanting to go somewhere or show you something. I certainly understand why so many parents give in under the pressure, though it just teaches the children that this kind of behavior will be rewarded.

Contrary to popular belief about children being free spirits, most of them are actually little nazis who can't deal with changes in their routine, unfamiliar food, reading a different story, etc. Hell, many adults can't deal with those things either, but we don't get carte blanche to act out our "high needs" when we can't cope.

I have two nephews and a godson all courtesy of my spouse. I actually like the godson and one of the nephews, now that they're over ten years and can talk about stuff besides the latest toy they got. The godson is actually a great character who is interested in history and vintage stuff. But even him I can't take for very long - he inevitably descends into repeating something or insisting on showing us something, and no matter how interesting it is, I just don't care and grow tired of humoring him.

I don't think those people who wrote to Dave were mean, I think they were right on. I can't believe the way he lets his kids run the house. But after all, he and his wife raised them that way and have reinforced their behavior, so maybe they like it. Oh, I forgot, the mMounties are going to come in and arrest them if they spank.

Whatever.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I have really gotten to enjoy little children of about my son's age (17 months). All that chaos in so little body mass -- it's invigorating. And they're so easy to please -- just a little attention and head-patting. It's a shame they're fated to grow up and become assh*les like everybody else.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I totally agree with Laura - it's a question that makes as much sense as "Do you like adults?"

Yes, I like some children (and some adults). And I don't like obnoxious brats of any age, though of course as they age, many people tend call them assholes and bitches, not brats.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Lizzie-

One of the emails suggested that Dave needed to "beat the shit" out of his kids. He/She then went on to say maybe he should just shoot Dave's kids so society wouldn't have to suffer the burden of seeing them grow up.

I would say that is mean.

Infact I would be more worried about the outcome of the writers children than I am about Dave Van's.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Allison-

I have heard that before! Thanks for reminding me.

The next time I get into a discussion with my MIL I will pass that along.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

It must be in fashion to hate Dave Van (which, let me tell you, I've had quite enough of) but I took one look at those pictures, and read the story and I thought, God, big deal! I did the same stuff when I was kid: crayons and lipstick on the walls, dumping eggs on the kitchen floor, pouring Tide under the cushions of the couch. Kids are obnoxious and have no sense of boundaries until they go way the hell past them and get screamed at. This is how we learn - not with polite requests for good behavior but with a glass-shattering parent yell.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

It disturbs me that we're airing so many views about Van without giving him notice and an opportunity to defend himself. Okay, I fixed that. Carry on.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Good Lord.

I'd never read those Dave Van entries before. All I can say is that when I was a kid - if I had done those things - I would have had the living shit beat out of me. I guess since I was raised that way that seems like a perfectly acceptable response to me. Take a belt and run 'em through the house! It didn't kill me or my siblings, though my brother is something of a reprobate now.

Kids, though...the Wife and I talk about it, occasionally. It seems our desire for children has faded considerably in the last few years. There's just so much shit to do, you know? And everybody knows you can't do anything fun if you have kids.

Our reasoning goes:

1. We have a good life that we deeply enjoy

2.It is an indisputable fact that children cause huge changes in the lives of their parents

3. Why change something we enjoy so much?

Selfish? I don't think so. It would be selfish, now, if we HAD a kid and didn't buy the kid shoes so we could have more vodka. THAT'S selfish.

- Harold wonderland 2 http://home.midsouth.rr.com/wonderland2/

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I'm with a lot of the other people here, I like some kids. I like kids who are well behaved and disiplined to act appropriately. But I'm also of the mind that kids need to be able to be kids. You know, get dirty, play in the puddles, make a mess with their toys. And at the same time you show them how to clean up and be responsible.

I adore my fiancee's niece, Mia. She's a joy to be around. She laughs a lot, she loves my dogs, and she's not too fussy.

Whiney kids are not for me.

I don't have kids myself, but I think you can learn a lot about raising a kid from raising a dog, just like Cathy said. If you can't handle a puppy you can't handle an infant. I let my dogs be dogs outside and run around like loons, but inside we have rules. And if they break the rules, they get punished and disiplined. Works great, everyone comments on how well behaved my dogs are. We love them and take care of them, but they know that when we say JUMP, they do it.

I'm figuring we'd do the same with kids.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I don't think glass shattering yells or spanking the living shit out of small children is the way to get the behavior you want. Both result in children who are nervous wrecks or ultimately rebellious. I think the time-outs that Dave and Cheryl use are probably the best sort of correction for a child of that age. On the other hand, practically every thing kids to is for attention, and if destroying a house results in an "Oh, aren't you cute" response, or a big blow up, or any other kind of increased attention, positive or negative, then the action was successful.

I know special needs kids are often impossible to control. I also know that at the day care center I worked at, we had one hard and fast rule: child misbehaves, child goes into time out immediately, with no discussion. (You can't exactly give a two or three year old a dissertation on why his or her behavior was bad, just like you can't ask them politely to behave.) Kids who were playing nicely got oodles of attention.

It was an extremely well behaved bunch of kids; even the ones who were obviously monsters at home did pretty well with us. It wasn't until much later that I decided that I didn't like children and I never want any. (Sorry, Mom.)

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

This is the best explanation for not having kids I've ever come across.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Beth, I totally agree with you about time outs being the best posible solution.

However, I worked with many children who when sat in time out would just get up and run around immediately after. So I would pick them up and put them back in time out, with the same result immediately after. We had to be extremely careful in how much physical contact and force we would use with the children. Besides the children would basically consider it a game anyway. So we would try it twice if that didn't work we would just ignore them. It would frustrate me to tears and I cherish the day I stopped working in special needs daycare.

I do believe that even with special needs children a lot of that behavior is learned at home.

To me though it is too much of a risk that my child would have behavior problems. I do not have the patience or the time. I romanticize about children but the reality is, I don't think it will happen.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

As I was reading Dave Van's entry, I was wondering when the discipline or getting in trouble would start. I mean, to actually take a picture of how "cute" your kids are covered in flour, or to start laughing when they have destroyed the house....Augh! I don't have kids, but I know how I was raised and I've seen friends and relatives raise good and bad kids (not in that order). The ones with the good kids set limits and are consistent; the ones with the nightmares indulge the children and give 4 minute time outs and laugh at their misbehaviour. One child is now 10 years old, still in 2nd grade, all 3 have strong behaviour and control issues. This man needs help and counseling, a good babysitter, and interfering MIL--- something to give these kids something strong to hold on to and look up to.

He references "difficulties"---are these kids truly developmentally disabled, or have they been crippled by his indulgence and lack of guidance? If there's something really wrong with them, he has my sympathies. Otherwise---well, I guess it's none of our business if he wants to let the kids ruin the house.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Oh, man, they really are just like puppies. Physical corrections have never worked with Doc, because it all just becomes part of the game. (Except for the water gun -- and even that seems to act more like a reminder -- Oh, yeah, she hates it when I do that.) Time outs are the only thing that works. That and giving him tons of attention for being a good dog.

Of course, I hear it's illegal to keep children in a crate. Which is yet another reason I don't have any.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

That last post was a response to Mis. I hate it when these things get crossed in the mail.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Dave's kids difficulties are that they have speech problems. other than that, they seem like your average kids.

I did notice that most of the time (at least lately) they get into trouble while the parents are sleeping. Start getting up earlier! And also, why does his wife always take one look, go back to bed, and let him handle it? And yes, immediate time-out, not stopping to take a picture, would be *far* better. Do it again, then you get a firm spank on the bottom. Both parents with the same rules, that helps too.

ANyway, he also made it seem like here in Canada you're tossed in jail and your kids are snatched if you even look at them the wrong way. maybe its just BC, but it's still legal to spank (not beat the crap out of) your kids. So far. i'll let you know exactly when the legislation is tabled....

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Because children look like little people we assume that their minds are working like ours. In fact, children start out as stimulus- response packages and develop into action-stimulus-response packages (stay tuned for the next step). When I say "No" to my boy, he has no more clue about what the sound means than a man from Mars. When he opens a forbidden cabinet (relax, it's got my VCR tapes in it, no caustic chemicals), I say "no" and pull him away. He naturally goes back. Eventually, he gets bored with being pulled away and either pitches a fit or goes to another forbidden cabinet. The experts asure me that by the 5 millionth repetition the boy will understand both what "no" signifies, and that he may not go into my VCR cabinet.

So far, it is like puppies. But this puppy of mine is going to be asking for an allowance soon. What then, Barbara Woodhouse?

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Dave also said he "tried" time outs, but the kids just kick the doors. What's wrong with a supervised time out---especially since he's only putting them there for a few minutes? These kids seems to spend ALL DAY unsupervised (either getting into trouble, or sent "somewhere" while the mess is cleaned up).

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Well, obviously children develop a capacity for learning that goes far beyond that of dogs, Tom. I read an article in law school, of all places, that went through human development and understanding of right from wrong from childhood through adulthood. For instance, a baby can't connect a bad experience to its own behavior, which is one of many reasons why you don't spank a newborn -- but supposedly babies *can* learn some things through positive reinforcement: I cry, I get fed. I cry, I get picked up. I play peek a boo with mommy, she smiles and laughs and picks me up. Since according to what I've read babies and toddlers can't go much further than that in their understanding of cause and effect, as several people have said, they just have to be supervised at all times.

A slightly older child can learn through negative reinforcement: okay, I touch the stove, it hurts, I won't do that anymore. Or I pull my sister's hair, and she turns around and smacks me. Somewhere down the line, if our parents are paying attention, we can learn in less immediate ways: I make a mess in the living room, and I don't get to watch TV for a week. And even: I blow off my homework, and I flunk math. (I'm still working on that one, myself.) Somewhere down the road, we hopefully become adults: if I make a big mess in the living room and smash Mom's Christmas ornaments and get paint all over the floor, Mom is going to feel really bad, and Dad is going to have to clean it all up even though he spends all week at work, and boy is that unfair of me.

But that last one is a pretty advance understanding, obviously far too much to expect from a three year old. You don't generally see adults smashing Christmas ornaments, though, and it's not just because we might get a spanking. For some people, it will always be the fear of immediate reprisal: if I smash Mom's Christmas ornaments, she's going to kick me out of the house and make me pay for them. If I steal that car, I'm going to go to jail. For other people, there's a more advanced sense of right and wrong that goes beyond those kind of consequences.

A lot of that seems to be common sense, except that you see people all the time who obviously don't get it. I recall a person of my acquaintance who used to smack her ten month old for making a mess of her food in her high chair. I've seen people try to argue with toddlers or reason with them. My own beloved boyfriend tries to lecture the dog.

And I hate to say it, Tom, but I've known a lot of two year olds who didn't learn what "no" meant no matter how often it was repeated, until they learned that they could use it to say they didn't want to do something. (And isn't that cute the first seven thousand times?) Maybe you'd better get a lock for that VCR cabinet!

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Time-outs are as repulsive to me as the 90s explosion of playgrounds being given special padding to protect children. Blacktop was sure good enough for my generation growing up - we fell, we bled, we got scrapes (I got several nice concussions after falling off the monkey bars - and then I figured out that me and monkey bars don't mix so I stopped climbing) but we lived.

It's cutesy, cuddly, non-confrontational modern parenting. The ultimate in feeling proactive without having to actually get involved.

I've said it before: children are idiots. They do not understand anything - they can see no farther than the end of their own nose. It is a parent's job to protect them and give them the boundaries that lead to a happy and safe life. Yelling will stick with a child a hell of a lot longer than being put in bloody time out for X number of minutes proportional to their bad behavior blah blah biddy blah. Feh.

I'm so thorougly disgusted with modern parents, I don't have words.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I like kids in general. I like people in general. You should all know that I'm reading these responses and giving bonus points to the people who actually have children. Or have taken long-term responsibility for a child's development. It's my job to score these things, you know.

It's such an immense and intimidating thing to take responsibility for, especially when you realize how little difference your efforts may end up making. Personally, I find it hard to criticize anybody who's making an effort to help their kids survive and be happy, and grow up into adults who can survive and be happy. I think that intention is the primary thing. The methods are secondary.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

Yelling doesn't teach a three year old a damn thing except (a) that mommy is scary, and (b) that obnoxious, confrontational behavior is the way to resolve problems. The point is, Gabby, that a toddler can learn very little in terms of right vs. wrong -- so the time out is to remove them from whatever trouble they were getting into, as well as to give parents a chance to cool out.

Frankly, I think yelling is worse than hitting.

-- Anonymous, January 06, 2000

I have not yet met a child that I didn't like.

I thought I met one the other day. She was a HORRIBLE brat at the mall. I told her we're going home since she couldn't behave, and she said "I don't care."

I almost decided that I didn't like her. But then I asked her mom later if she was mad at me for disciplining her (figuring she's used to having her own way, a disciplinarian like me must be a drag to a 6- year old) and she said, "no, my daughter said later that yes mommy, I was being bad and stasi was right to take me home instead of letting me have fun. And plus, she's really pretty and she is going to be a good mom."

How can you not like kids when their minds work like that?

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

I guess I'm one of those disgusting modern parents. I sort of like the idea of my daughter not getting injured. I'm unbelievably squishy that way, I know.

I know I endured my share of yelling (and worse) from my father, and I suppose the smartest conclusion I ever came to as a kid was that he was ill-equipped for fatherhood or much else in the way of social interaction. He was one of those parents who was very quick to yell and make a scene, and we learned plenty from him. But probably not what he wanted us to learn.

I'm curious as to how many of the people doing the tough talk about parenting are actually parents themselves. Obviously, I've been doing it for a whopping three weeks, so perhaps I don't have any more place than they to pass judgement. All I know is that it this point in time, the idea of yelling at my daughter or striking her makes me want to puke. I hope it always does.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

I said before, I don't have kids, but I do remember being a kid. I remember the things I resent now. I remember not being allowed to make a mess and I remember being spanked till I couldn't sit down.

I see the way my friends and family raise their kids and I get ideas about how I want to be with my children, or child, someday. I know it might be different when it's a reality, but I still have ideas.

I agree with Beth about the yelling at three year olds. There is never any reason to yell. You might have to raise your voice a bit, and be stern when you say NO, but yelling just isn't necessary.

And I also agree that there is an appropriate age for all disipline. I think kids learn from action-reponse at almost all ages. You're good, you get attention and love, You're bad you get scolded and punished. But scolded and punished mean different things to me than yelling and hitting. Take away their favorite toy, they get it back when they stop misbehaving.

Time outs can work, if properly administered. But I have to admit that I'm not against a smack on the butt to hammer the point home. At an appropriate age though.

But I think the big thing is consistency. I know I read someone else say that. If you say NO, it has to be no. Not No, No, NO, Oh, Ok, Leave me alone Yes. Both parents have to be consistent with each other and consistent in their response to things.

And Beth was right too, Kids have to be supervised ALL THE TIME until at least age five or six. You can't leave them with dangerous things and then wonder why they get hurt because you know you told them not to go near those things.

I think you need child safe areas in your house. Areas where they can play safely and be a kid. Places for them to run around like loons and to scatter their toys all over the place. Besides, then you can teach them all about the joy of cleaning up after yourself.

And if you know your kids are prone to do bad things, Keep a better ey e on them! You've got to catch them in the act to teach them right from wrong. Just like a puppy.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

Disclaimer: I don't have kids, but I've worked in dormitories for emotionally disturbed children.

The theory behind a timeout, as I understand it, is this: when a child is engrossed in certain kinds of misbehavior (especially tantrums), you need to remove the child from whatever's occupying his or her attention, and give the child time to cool down.

So a time-out is not a punishment. Maybe some times, for minor offenses by some kids, it's enough of a negative reinforcement that the parent doesn't need to do more. But parents need to have discipline techniques up their sleeves other than time-outs.

And people who want to complain about modern parents, child psychologists, teachers, etc., should understand the difference between concepts and buzzwords. It's very easy to shut kids in their rooms and call that a "time-out", or preside over an English class with virtually no structure or guidance and call it "whole language", but people who do that are demonstrating that they know the right buzzwords, and nothing more.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

I have three kids, and I love 'em. But honestly (and maybe it's because I'm just too old) I don't particularly like being around kids in general. I don't hate it, but it's just not one of my favorite things.

As far as the people on the "Child-Free" forum who emailed Dave Van, they were way out of line. Dave has chosen to have kids and he chooses to raise them that way (and whether I agree that you should allow your three-year-olds to destroy your house is moot). I have the utmost respect for people who have chosen to not have kids, and I expect the same respect from them.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

I don't know how anyone is defining "beat the shit out of", but when I was young, if I did something destructive, I got spanked. As I got older my parents punished me by taking away privileges, though a slap on the arm wasn't out of line. They didn't beat me, but they set firm limits and when I went past them, I got punished and sometimes that was physical. I don't have any problem with that. There's a huge difference between an occasional swat on the butt and beating someone.

For what it's worth, our playground had padding under the jungle gym, and I started school in 1960. No swings, for safety reasons.

Please don't give us the "if you don't have children, shut up" thing. I've been a child and I've been around a lot of children. One of the reasons I made the decision not to have them is because I know what a big job it is, not because I don't think it's hard. And because I've seen so many people do what I think is a poor job of it. I'm not sure I could do as well, but I don't see why I shouldn't have opinions about how I would like to have done it.

Not all people who do have children seem to have thought through the responsiblities or the commitment. God knows what they were thinking. Again, it's just like puppies. Just cause your heart melts when you see a darling little puppy, doesn't mean you actually want to have it around all the time, or that you'll raise it to be a well behaved dog.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

People make raising children SO much harder than it really is.

The biggest, Number One Rule of Parenting:

Consistency. Consistency in house rules, with discipline, with bedtime, with anything. If you don't have consistency you have no authority. No authority=shit out of luck.

My sisters baby does NOT listen to her. My sister is a Modern parent who wuvs her baby and would be so happy if she could keep the baby in a bubble. The baby runs the house.

When said baby comes to Auntie's house oh is the world different. However, I have proven that the child understands NO. And knows exactly which of my sister's buttons to push at any given time for the reaction they are looking for.

Children who control the parents by their behaviour. Those people are the ones that need to be trained.

I very very very rarely raise a hand to my children. (one almost 11, the other a girl just turned 7). I feel that they are old enough that _shouldn't_ have to do that. I have given THEM the responsibility of their OWN actions. They own them, and the mistakes, I don't.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

wow, first time I've been able to get over to this forum in awhile. Parenting sure does push a lot of buttons, doesn't it?

Here's my take - if you're a parent you are going to do things that make you want to puke. You're going to put in some time yelling. You may indeed find yourself offering up a spanking. You're going to find out that time out can be as hideous a punishment to some children as spanking them is (if the kid is attention-seeking, removing their audience is a Big Deal to them). You're going to hear stuff pop out of your mouth that you remember your parents saying to you, and that you swore you'd NEVER say.

But you will. The accumulate effect of parenthood is that it strips you of a bunch of holier than thou crap you've got (and we all do) about how other people are handling the job.

Fact: good parents sometimes still wind up with difficult children.
Fact: rotten parents sometimes wind up with gems.

Why? Because everyone involved are people with their own personalities. The idea of kids being moldable blank slates went out years ago. The idea of parents being perfect idealized people did too, and it's time everyone got over it.

Parents make mistakes because it's a job that is more intensive than anything else you might ever do - there are no vacations, no time off, and that gets tiring, and when you're worn down and burnt out (and the toddler years will do that) you sometimes aren't at your best.

Ever yelled at anyone about anything? Then you'll likely yell at your kid sometimes - give yourself a break about it! It won't be the end of the world, and if it is the exception rather than the norm, it may startle them enough to make the point that other, more planned out techniques have failed to do. Move on.... there are years and years and years to left to continue refining your parenting style.

I so strongly agree that consistancy is the bigger key - kids need to know their boundaries, and they will push and push and push until they are positive they know what they are. If a pair of parents (or other significant adults around them) don't agree on where those boundaries are, the kids will go straight for the divide and conquer route. If the kid can learn those boundaries with a 3 minute time out, wonderful - not all of them can, so get your head out of the 'expert' books and pay attention to what the child regards as a deterent. If you have more than one, it may not be the same for each of them.

And they do NOT think like adults - you have to find out what their payoff is, and if they are continuing to do the same thing after you've tried 'everything', you better be looking at what benefit they are getting from having you do all that, even if you think it's unpleasant.

Dave has got some challenging kids and like any of us parents, he and his wife are still trying to figure out the solution to that challenge.

I'm a little uncomfortable about how many people think they have the answer to his problem, though. Just on a journally note, we're seeing it through the filter of where he chooses to focus, and that skews the image.

But unless you're extremely consistant and level-headed in the rest of your life, don't expect there to be any magical transferance of those traits just because you had a kid. "Let he who is without sin...", folks.

Lynda (who has bunkbeds that were scribbled on by supposedly napping kids over the years, and just fished a full bathtowel out of the toilet last week, and has yelled more than a little over the past couple decades, and has a few 'meyhem' pictures taken long before the journal existed, because sometimes if you don't find something to laugh about, you'll cry)

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

It doesn't actually add anything to discipline if the parent is in fact angry, y'know. Righteous indignation on the parent's part and the actual suffering of emotional distress on the child's part are irrelevant to teaching children to be adults.

American adults in our new century need to learn to be their own guardians, rewarding themselves for good behavior by self-approval. The norms of the 50's have disappeared, and we've traded a world of inherited status and "expected" behavior for individual freedom of choice, which is much trickier in many ways.

My grandfather had a Prussian military school education, and he spent his youth chewing his food in cadence with his class, sitting with them at a table lined with steel spikes that prevented him from dropping his chin too close to his food. Ten years after his death people still talked with awe about the perfection of his manners, but he gained them at a price I would not pay and will not inflict on my son. I don't mourn the 19th century or the 1950s and I bet most women, African-Americans, gay persons and non-Christians will agree.

I want my boy to be a normal kid who's conditioned for American life now. Being a proper little bourgeouis who says please and thanks just isn't relevant to our world -- you need first to know yourself and choose your gods accordingly, and second to be able to act independently to serve those gods. I agree it makes our 7 year olds less cute. But I disagree that it ill-suits them for life. If you don't like it, please stay out of the playgrounds and for my boy's sake, don't teach school.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

Lynda just summed up exactly why Jeremy and I are not having kids, as well as why I wish more people would think long and hard and make the same decision. We are not having kids because we are both yellers and screamers, and we are impatient, and we are selfish. We didn't like being yelled at when we were kids (I still spend half my life in fear of someone yelling me; ask Jeremy) and we aren't going to inflict it on a child. It's one of the few things about which we are in perfect agreement.

I agree that people do not magically become perfect when they become parents. I don't think you need to be perfect to be a parent. But if you are seriously flawed or immature in the sense that you are violent, or extremely volatile, or intensely insecure to the point where you belittle others to make yourself feel better, or prone to crippling depression that renders you incapable of taking care of yourself, much less anyone else, then you need to think ahead and not have children.

And as someone who happens to like children very much (with the obvious exception of screechy little girls at the park) who has made that decision after long, hard thought and some great emotional conflict, I reserve the right to form a bad opinion of someone who should have made the same choice, but did not.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

I am so not looking forward to living in the future that Tom describes.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

(g) oh no argument there Beth, lots of people shouldn't have kids, including lots who do.

But, just as I wouldn't waste too much effort focusing on what my kid 'shouldn't' have done after they have, I tend not to with adults either.

At that point should-haves are irrelevent, and 'now what?' is more to the point.

There isn't ONE person out there who lives up to the ideal as a parent - for starters, common wisdom keeps changing what the ideal is. And no matter what you do, there is someone who is going to tell you how you did it wrong.

My point here isn't what people are thinking - it's what they are SAYING just about everywhere...focusing in on that one particular journal.

I know for damn sure that I don't deal well with people reading my journal and shooting me email telling me what I 'must' do to fix the problem they read - and I know you don't, either. ;)

Does anyone think he's going to read all this and go 'oh THAT'S what I'm doing wrong!' when we wouldn't?

I'm just wondering, i guess why some journals are ok to do that to (not focusing on you, but on the entire 'community') or why there is an assumption that what he writes about is all there is, when it isn't for the rest of us?

Bah... i'm losing track of my point here I think.

Per kids...do I like them? some of them. sometimes. just like everyone else!

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

Tom - why do you think saying please and thank you is at crosspurposes with independant thinking?

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

I think that seeing it as an end in itself for a child to learn "thank you" and "please" before the child understands gratitude and deferred gratification is as logical as encouraging the child to date before puberty. If the purpose of teaching a child is to make the child pleasing to adults, then the child is an object upon which the parent and society works -- property -- as in fact children and women have been in the West from time immemorial and until very recently. I oppose this.

If the purpose of teaching a child is to prepare him or her to be a rational subject who will choose his or her own path to pursue happiness, and a person who works within society, then the parent (and onlookers) has to suffer through uncharming periods until the child's comprehension catches up. I'm not against "please" and "thank you." Please be sure my boy will learn to say both, and will be physically restrained from doing property damage to strangers' stuff. But he will also be permitted to annoy me no end by opening my VCR cabinet until he can understand why I want it closed.

Read on only if you can stand theory: The goal of raising a child has to be to fit him or her into the society in which he or she lives. It surprises me that capitalism, which purports to proceed from this presumption that people should be trusted to form a society of rationally self-interested individuals, is completely uncontroversial among the readers of this forum, while treating children like they ought to learn to be rationally self-interested is offensive to some. (I'm happy to discuss why I oppose capitalism but support pluralism and Mill's utilitarianism -- in fact, it will require almost no provocation. I will deliver my position to your door in a bound volume, and stay for tea to hear your reaction, if you let me. It is my one true passion).

I think the line between a world where children sit at table in front of a row of spikes to learn not to slouch, and one where adults suffer through childish behavior at table until the child outgrows it should be drawn closer to the child's side. Partly, this is because we Americans are, face it, a little more childish than other cultures and we let our id have a little more play in our adult life than the Europeans do. Partly, this is because adults have all the power and have been abusing it for eons, and I oppose tyranny. Partly, it's an aesthetic reaction -- I prefer wild growth to bonsai, wide feet to bound feet, and bold dashes of paint across a big canvas to cameo. I'm really not interested in how others raise their children, as long as those children don't commit crimes. But I don't want the old view that kids are property to be commanded to have much play in my son's life, because I love the chaotic beauty I see in his developing psyche, because I want him to have the experience of a life free of tyranny, and because I want him to have freedom of choice about what he will do as an adult, rather than following childhood patterns of conformity into expected ways of expressing himself.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

I don't buy into the whole traumatized by yelling thing at all. I, too, am squeamish about being yelled at but that's because I am, by nature, a pleaser and incredibly hard on myself - being yelled at compounds that feeling of failure and self-criticism.

I think it's pretty damn simple: your primary job as a parent is to keep your child alive. If I would find a child, any child, about to stick their hand in a fire, I'd scream my fucking head off to scare them - negative reinforcement is your child's friend. Let them fear me and my vocal cords - better the fear than a burn or a limb lost.

Parents, I find, want too much to be their child's friend or advocate (hence the squooshy useless time-outs, etc.) or (god help me) coach - this is ridiculous. A child is a self-centered, semi-lobotomized mass of hormones and impulses - has no one here ever seen a Bill Cosby routine.

And, no, I'm not a parent and I will never be a parent - but I was a child and often a pretty rowdy one, so I can speak rather well from that angle.

I am grateful for every yell my mother let fly.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

Why, because you turned out to be a pleaser who is incredibly hard on herself and feels a sense of failure and self-criticism? Do the math, Gabby. I don't buy that logic at all.

Screaming at a child for reaching toward a fire is one thing. Screaming at a child as a regular method of discipline is a whole different ballgame.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

Right on Gabby! I'm right there with ya. If only more people would learn how to parent from Bill Cosby routines. Those self righteous twits with their PhDs rightin' their touchy feely child rearin' books make me sick. My dad used to beat me plenty and I terned out A-okay.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2000

So when I find my child about to ignite herself, I suppose I'll rethink my philosophy and who knows? Perhaps I'll yell at her. Yep, I suppose that if self-immolation is the alternative, then I'll do it. I can probably guarantee that.

Funny how these discussions turn into life and death struggles when the reality is much more banal. I suspect I'll be preventing a lot fewer accidental deaths on a day-to-day basis than these discussions seem to suggest.

I have to respectfully disagree with Lynda, while recognizing her experience with kids (as opposed to my own rather limted time). I suspect she may be right about the reality of children forcing you to occasionally drop your own carefully constructed value system. But I refuse to start off with those lapses as a given fact.

I mean, getting angry or frustrated is pretty much a given reaction in any relationship, whether it be as a parent or a spouse or a teacher or whatever. But it doesn't mean I have to be at peace with myself somehow if I lose control and do something (yell, hit, etc. in a non-flaming child situation) that goes against my own personal beliefs.

If I think that using verbal or physical bullying is wrong when I'm sitting here typing rationally, then why would I believe any differently when I'm pissed off? The key is self-control, which is certainly a rare enough commodity amongst too many parents. And spouses. And children, I suppose.

But I guess I'll still yell if my kid is going to set herself on fire. I'll give you that.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

But Mr. Sir Rob, the issue is not losing control, but rather gaining control. What do you do when your planned methods of discipline prove impossible to carry out due to lack of cooperation from the child or have no effect? You can't let them just run wild, can you?

I know the only way my daddy could control me was to whoop my ass and I thank him to this very day! Who knows how I would have turned out without his loving beatings.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Just to take a step back for a minute - this is an amazing discussion. There are a lot of different viewpoints represented in these posts and it's just fascinating.

From my point of view - do I like children? This seems to be a meaningless question because the subject is so broad. I like some children I've met, and I've disliked others. Because I don't have children and don't intend to I think that I might tend to demonize them - make them worse than they really are. Therefore, I am always surprised and delighted to meet an intelligent, polite child.

I work in a job where I used to see a large number of children (and their parents) on a casual basis, and I have to say that the behavior of the parents is nearly always more horrifying than anything the children do. I have seen some fearsome examples of bad parenting. I have seen parents who seem to be purposely trying to crush their children's spirits (like their parents did to them, I'm sure) and I've seen other parents actually abused and terrorized by their kids. In this latter case it seems that that parents are too weak- willed, or they just don't care enough, to consistantly show their kids how they should behave. Other times I've seen children "misbehave" simply because their parents expect too much of them. Should an eight year old kid be expected to sit quietly for three hours while his father looks at some magazines? This guy, and others like him, just don't bother thinking about their kids.

And Dave Van? His life looks to be a mess - why shouldn't his kids be a reflection of that chaos? However, those others who wrote to him with their wonderful "suggestions" - they're just evil.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

I really like children, even teenagers. I'm not always in love with the behavior or some of the stages they go through but I am awed by their "new eyes" and a bit jealous of their ability to learn new things so quickly. Children are generally more interesting than the adults they grow up to be.

My Mom, a very wise lady, told me to be very wary of people that didn't like children or animals. She said there is a feeling lacking in these people that should happen naturally. I listened to her advice and I have found it to be sound advice. (Notice she didn't say to be wary of people that didn't want or have children or animals; just to wary of people that didn't like them).

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Reading Comprehension, Lesson 1: ". . . by NATURE, I am a pleaser. . . " - which means that my natural inclination to want to please has naught to do with the fact that after drawing on the walls with lipstick, dumping Tide on the couch, breaking eggs on the kitchen floor when I was knee high to a grasshopper, my mother yelled at me, scared me, let me know in no uncertain terms that what I was doing was WRONG and should NEVER be repeated. And it wasn't. (The fact that I want to please sure didn't stop me from being the Toddler from Hell, did it?)

How how how is that a bad way to raise a child?

My childhood wasn't rosy and full of sunshiney days by any means, but Jesus H. Christ, I would never use it as an excuse to be afraid of rearing children in a manner that kept them safe, happy and civilized.

The methods that I see being advocated by and large treat children like tiny adults, with the ability to reason, the ability to see the future, long term outcomes of their actions - and I find that incomprehensible. Do you not remember being children? Is this a case of mass amnesia? All children can see is the now, immediate gratification, their own weird little wants and desires. Children are very very selfish. Parenting, done well, snaps them out of that and into an awareness of others.

If children had wreacked the kind of complete havoc that was shown in those Dave Van photos, yelling would be completely appropriate. Oh yes.

Mastering the Glare of Death should take care of 75% of other behavioral infractions.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Reading Comprehension, Lesson 2: the ability to recognize and reject an assumption that doesn't make sense. How do you know you're a pleaser by nature, and not because you got screamed at? The latter makes far more sense to me.

The truth is, everyone's parenting style (or philosophy about child rearing, if we don't have children) seems to be based on what their own parents did, whether it's a whole hearted rejection of that style, or an insistence that it's the only right way to raise children. Neither one of those makes sense to me, although obviously your own experiences will shape you no matter what.

Part of the problem, I think, is two competing cultural myths. The first is "my parents did their best." Everyone says that about any struggling parent. "Dave and Cheryl are doing their best." "I'm sure your mom did the best she could." Well, fuck that. Not all parents do their best. I don't know about Dave and Cheryl, because I don't live in their house, but some parents are lazy or stupid or uncaring or boneheaded or mean, and the fact that they're trying or that they're in a bad situation or that parenting is difficult does not mean they're doing their best. I agree that it's the hardest job in the world, but I also think that anyone over the age of eighteen knows that going in.

(The flip side to this, of course, is that by the time you're eighteen, there's not a thing you can do about the kind of parents you had except move on. But that's another discussion.)

The other myth, which Lynda pointed out, is that people are magically, hormonely transformed into loving, caring, patient people just because they've spawned. You'd have to be blind to believe that.

Some parents do a bad job, and like it or not, society judges parents all the time because the rest of us have to live with the product of their parenting. That doesn't mean that the folks who wrote to Dave Van weren't way out of line, because I think they were. But to say that a parent who lets his child put a power drill into his eye, or who leaves the baby in the backseat of a car with the groceries (really happened in Sacramento, and the baby died), or screams and yells and terrorizes, or ignores and neglects, is doing his or her best strikes me as pure insanity.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Having had kids that make Dave Van's look tame, and who have done much worse (I have had to had a drywall man sommoned because Eric literally peeled back a crack in the wall, making it bigger and bigger into a huge hole) and who, quite frankly, didn't let you all in on EVERYTHING---any scatalogical escapades I didn't have the stomach to record--I never, ever used physical punishment. Of course, with the autistic ones, I was told it wouldn't do any good, period. They don't associate physical punishment with the behavior.

The ways to punish kids with developemental disabilities is IMMEDIATE time outs. Some might remember the month or two where Eric was screaming---LITERALLY screaming---every half hour. Time outs EVENTUALLY cured it---and we weren't quite totally crazy by the time it was over.

Truth to tell, I've done my share of yelling---it will sometimes stop them just BEFORE they are about to do something bad---but it's a gamble. I've yelled at Jamie and then he's come at me pinching like fire, because his ears are so sensitive. Pinching doesn't sound like much---until you remember that before his death, Jamie was about five inches taller than I, and heavier. Red-hot pincers come to mind.

And yes, I've used Gabby's "glare of death"--Barb says my glare could poison pit vipers--but again, sometimes it made the autistic ones MADDER, since nonverbal cues are what they mainly followed, and it was the equivelent of a scream, nonverbally. The glare really worked on Brian, the normal one, though.

I, quite frankly, think Dave Van is getting a bum rap. It's all very easy to say he should attend the kids every minute. Practically, that's impossible. There are dishes and clothes to wash, things to watch and lives to lead. I remember waiting for Brian or Barb to wake up before I dared take a shower, because Eric and Jamie were up, and I tended to get up early because Eric did also---but sometimes Eric would wake up before I did. Is Dave Van never, ever, to sleep late again for the rest of his life? I'm an early bird and Barb's a night owl, so we compliment each other that way. Not everyone's so lucky.

Granted, he has left too much out where the kids can hurt themselves or ruin the house. Well...ask yourselves this. Exactly what would you put up to make sure that the kids could not do either? Lock up all the knives? Padlock the refrigerator? (We seriously considered that at one point, because Jamie was constantly wasting food....pouring cokes and drinks down the drain, scattering flour on the floor, etc.)

Kids can be extremely devious when they want something. That is one reason why I never have, and never will, have a gun in my house. Even if the bullets are at the other side of the house, Eric would only need to be shown it once, where both were, to try it.

Oh, by the way---if anyone doesn't want to have any kids, or wants to stop at one, I applaud them. I love my kids, and both my wife and I went into it with eyes open. But it's a job for volunteers who realize what they might be getting into. (For that matter, Barb loves her kids, but hates to teach or mind other kids, even for a little while.)

--Al of Nova Notes

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

"If children had wreacked the kind of complete havoc that was shown in those Dave Van photos, yelling would be completely appropriate. Oh yes."

Oh no. And I happen to speak from experience, as I seem to be one of the few actual parents posting in this forum. We're raising Zoe without spanking -- and I'm working personally on raising her without yelling since I tend toward having a bit of a temper.

One incident in particular supports, I think, our decision not to spank: Zoe was maybe a year and a half old, had done something exceptionally bad, and I spanked her for it. Not a lot and not hard, because I don't think causing pain in a 1-yr old is an intelligent goal, but it was such a change that it definitely got her attention. Then she turned right around, did something else bad, and *asked* to be spanked. Clearly, unless I actually tried to cause *pain* with the spankings they weren't going to work. So: out with that plan. I think trying to hurt a child to teach them right from wrong is, well, wrong.

And I've had some very personal experience with the yelling issue. My first instinct is to yell when Zoe's done something wrong, but I've slowly come to see that it's not very effective and it's more a loss of control on my part than an attempt to impose control. The truth of the matter is that if you yell at kids, kids *stop hearing you.* I know, I've seen it happen. So I don't think yelling at Dave's kids would have been the answer, no matter how badly you might want to. (Hell, *I* want to, and they're not even mine.)

Instead, we use time-outs *as punishments* and they work just fine. You have to frame it as a punishment, as a temporary loss of priviledges, otherwise it's just an interruption in the games, which I'm sure is how Dave is doing it. Zoe is sent to the Time-Out Chair in her room for about 5 minutes, then we talk about why she's there and she has to tell me what she did wrong before she can get up. She doesn't get to destroy her room while she's in there and then laugh at me on the way out.

I don't claim to have all the answers; I can only speak from personal experience. We're raising our child without spanking and I'm trying to not yell and we use time-outs as the primary form of punishment. And guess what? Our kid is great, she's very well-behaved. What we're doing works.

Dave Van, on the other hand, is the poster child for Poor Parenting. His kids clearly rule his house and he and his wife have no interest in changing that. I am simply stunned at how much time his kids spend unsupervised, especially when they're such hellions, and his recent claim that he's doing everything right and his kids will turn out fine boggled my mind. Frankly, I think Dave needs a spanking.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

I haven't read this whole thread, but I am an actual parent, and I did raise a child, who is now a beautiful, intelligent, sensitive, caring person - and I raised her without "spanking" (aka physical assault) and with very litte raising of voices.

So I know it can be done, and as far as I'm concerned, hitting children only teaches them that hitting is a good way to express your anger at or your dominance over someone, and yelling at them only teaches them that yelling is a good way to get your point across.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

I want to say that I don't advocate spanking. My parents did it and I don't think it was bad, but there are other fine ways to discipline. Same with yelling. My parents didn't do much of that, and I agree with whoever said that after a bit, kids tune you out so you might as well save your breath. It's true that in an emergency, of course you'd yell at them to get out of the street or whatever, but that's not the daily discipline we've been talking about here.

What does seem to work is some kind of discipline, consistency, and consequences. Whether it's taking away TV or getting a swat, kids need to understand that no means no and having a tantrum or whining won't change that. And that if they do forbidden things, they will pay for that behavior in some way. It needn't be by being struck, that's just the easiest thing a lot of the time. If people want to raise their kids without spanking, I think that's fine and I don't have any "you'll see when they REALLY get out of line" attitude.

I also think small children simply do need to be supervised most of the time. That's just the reality of being a parent. They don't have any judgment or much self control and will do forbidden things if they have the opportunity to do so. Yes, Dave and his wife should probably work out a way to get up before the kids, or confine them in their room or something. No, they don't have to do this for the rest of their lives. One hopes that in a few years it won't be necessary. Most children do learn judgment and self control and so forth and can be trusted not to wreak havoc.

And yes, this is one reason I chose not to have children. It's also a reason I don't have a dog. It's a pain, but it's what you've got to do.

I know several families where the kids are a pleasure to be around because they've been taught limits. Maybe they whine a little about having to put their toys away, but they do it. They don't have tantrums because they've learned it doesn't get them anything. Their parents don't yell or spank, as far as I know, as a habitual thing. (One of these families, I know the dad does yell at the boys if they do something really stupid that could be dangerous, like snowmobiling without a helmet.)

However, I think a lot of parents do want to be their kids' pals rather than their parents. I really sympathize - it seems like that would be one of the hardest things about being a parent. The neatest thing about being a parent would be having this little person who adores you and wants to be like you, and then you have to make them cry by telling them no all the time. It's so much easier to just say yes.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

I've always loved children. I started babysitting as an adolescent as many young girls do in America and I was very good at it. I was in high demand in my neighborhood throughout my teen years and I made a very large amount of money as a result.

I also learned a lot about how kids behave/misbehave and why.

There were certain families whom I preferred _not_ to sit for because I knew from experience that their parents were not consisent disciplinarians. Their kids were spoiled and difficult to manage, especially when as a the baby-sitter my options for discipline were limited.

Other families, I truly enjoyed sitting for and formed good bonds with the kids and had a lot of fun doing things like coloring, telling stories, singing songs and coming up with craft activities to keep the kids occupied.

In general, I feel that I've had a good apprenticeship in child-rearing, yet I still find myself going back and forth on the issue of whether or not to have children myself.

The reason I question the decision, is because I bear some of the hallmarks of a bad parent that Beth decribed in a previous post: I have a temper and I am prone to depression due to heredity and a medical condition.

On the other hand, I have always wanted to have children and as the years go by, I keep "testing" myself to see if I am ready.

Right now I still don't think I am. Because even though my temper is far more under control than it has ever been, I am not sure that I could control it adequately in the face of childish naughtiness and the stresses of day to day living.

I believe strongly that good child-rearing requires the following: patience, firmness, the ability to enforce adequate discipline, the ability to explain right and wrong in a meaningful way when the child is old enough, willingness to suspend your life and interests for your child, lots of love.

In general I tend to think that the biggest mistake made in modern parenting, is that often parents do not spend enough time with their children. As a result, they do not know their children well and are unable to tailor their disciplinary efforts adequately to the child in question.

I believe that there are many ways to discipline children, that different kids respond to different types of punishment. Some do very well with little remonstration, while others need to have a stronger message put across.

Hence I don't think that there is one right way to raise kids.

If I ever do have children, I know that my basic philosophy will be to avoid _excessive_ levels of yelling, spanking and to avoid punishment through anger.

The incidents that have scarred me as an adult were all ones where my father lost his temper, lost control and was taking his anger out on me instead of actually punishing my bad behavior.

That is the kinds of thing that I am terrified of doing to my own hypothetical children. The one thing that I think is truly horrendous to leave your kids with a memory of.

However, I won't know how I'd actually discipline my children until I have some of my own. Each situation has it's own circumstances, so all I can do is give myself a general idea of the level of discipline I'm comfortable with and then roll with the punches.

In general, I've found that the kids who are the best behaved, ar the ones who have parents like that: patient parents who don't sceram right away, but have a sort of sliding scale of response to their children. Parents who don't punish in anger, but punish the bad behavior and then move on. There's also a difference between punishing bad behavior and dealing with life-threatening circumstances.

If my dad hadn't yelled and grabbed me the day that I tried to cut the wires on a table lamp in our living room, I wouldn't be here today to expound upon this subject.

On that day, Dad didn't get mad or hurt me as he did on some other occasions. He grabbed me hard to be sure and he scared me, scared me enough that I never tried to cut a wire again. But after he'd scared me, he hugged me tight, explained why we don't cut electric wires and then calmly sent me to my room for an hour.

He protected me, got the message across and punished the behavior without damaging my confidence.

It's a tough balance to maintain, and sometimes parents fail. But the point is to try to hit that balance as many times as possible and hope that the times you don't hit it, that the damage is minimal.

On the whole I find myself to be more of a proponent of a REASONABLY strict discipline stance for children. But the key word in that statement, is reasonable. Some parents swing too far into "cuddly" parenting, others swing too far into "hard" parenting and IMHO both are equally bad, the one because it generally produces spoiled, poorly behaved and emotionally immature young people, the other because it can often produce fearful, emotionally distant, damaged young people.

Good parenting is a balancing act -- and some day I hope that I will find that balance, because I think that I could be a good parent if I tried hard enough.

I just hope that if I do have kids some day, that I'll do a good enough job that they'll be the kind of kids that the babysitters want to spend time with, and not the kind that send them running for the hills.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

I think Beth K. has a really great attitude and understands that it's a mix of disciplinary methods that is probably best. Everything in moderation, I say. I've found this whole thread to be fascinating. The one thing that is really sticking in my mind is Tom's comment that he won't teach his children please and thank you. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Everyday manners may be silly to you but they sure do make everyday situations go a lot smoother. I can't think of anything more annoying than a child that screams through your house grabbing things and pushing and causing mayhem and on top of that doesn't have the decency to thank you for letting them break all your stuff.

Tom, your kids will be very selfish people and unloved by many if they don't get the concepts of simply and common decency.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Anyone who truly feels that continual yelling is an effective means of parenting has never actually worked with children. It's certainly more work because the child will constantly manipulate you and up the ante, over and over - you will be forced, in order to make an impact, to increase the volume and become more threatening.

Put the work back on the child, if you are yelling the child has manipulated you and received a nice, big reaction. A consitant, low, "I will not change my mind" tone of voice while repeating instructions to a child (because children never ask once or try once) will become effective. If you can prove to a child, in a methodical, non-confrontational way, that you will stick by your decisions you have a much greater chance of influencing them.

And anyone who believes they've gained control with yelling has never taken an honest look at how ridiculous they actually look, much less weighed the results gained (lost).

Kids are not stupid and fear will only motivate so far (and often far away from what you want).

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Gee, Slack, it's obvious that you didn't get the point of either of my two posts on the "please" and "thank you" issue. I won't defend a position that I never took. My best suggestion is, read them again.

BTW, what makes Slack think it's appropriate to speculate in print about whether my son will grow up lovable? I mean, what's next, threatening his physical safety? I know we all think harsh thoughts about the people we disagree with. But it's gross to beat up on the reputation of a toddling baby, no matter how much you are disquieted by his father's ideas. Doncha think?

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Reading over all of the postings in this forum, it strikes me that it is grossly unfair to be using Dave Van as an example of parenting, good or bad. I don't think anyone here has met the man and his family in person, and I don't think that the full picture comes out in 500 words a day.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2000

Beth,

Do you really think it's right to start an entire discussion thread about the way someone else raises his kids? I know it's under the guise of "Do you like children?" but I can't see this thread as anything but an opportunistic attack on another journaller who's pissed you off in the past.

As I recall, wasn't DJR pulled (in part) because you didn't care for the response you got from some readers about certain aspects of your life?

Bad form, Beth. Really.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2000

I disagree, Patrick. If I were writing to Dave and saying, "Here, Dave, this is what you should do," in the guise of friendship (which is what I've complained about in the past -- you're free to call me a bitch or criticize my life; just don't expect to be my buddy or have me appreciate the attention), then I'd be a big hypocrite and you could jump down my throat about it. This has been a general -- and I think fascinating -- discussion of theories on child rearing in general. Some (certainly not all) of the talk has centered on one person who has recently -- before this forum started -- publicly defended his particular method of child rearing.

I will agree with anyone who suggests that the talk on alt.childfree.support (or whatever it's called) has been unfairly personal and downright stupid in its discussion of Dave Van. Probably a few of the posts here have crossed that line. But I think child rearing philosophies and techniques are a perfectly valid topic of discussion, and in particular, if you're going to blame "society" for your problems with your children, you ought to be prepared for society to discuss those problems and how you're handling them.

Besides, if you read carefully, you'll see that I've defended Dave more than once in this discussion. I don't think I've made it remotely personal.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2000

Well, I don't have kids. And frankly I don't plan on having kids. I'm not anti-kid or anti-parents - I just don't think that I would make a very good parent. I have a cat, which is kid enough for me. *grin*

But I have had to deal with kids. When I was in high school, my parents often volunteered me to babysit for their friends' kids. (Ick.) One of my "clients" had a very hyperactive four year old. He was a total terror.

One night when he was being especially terrorsome, I accidently hit upon the perfect punishment. Being a babysitter, I had very little I could lord over him. But when he purposefully crushed his sister's doll's head (and I mean CRUSHED it) I made him sit next to me on the couch and watch TV for 10 minutes.

Not too terrible? Heh. I was watching the Democratic National Convention.

Everytime he squirmed or tried to sneak off or whatever, I added 1 minute. Oh, the TORTURE! *grin* He ended up sitting there for almost 20 minutes before he was finally allowed to get up. He was very subdued for the rest of the night, and his parents asked the next day: "What did you do? He won't watch TV now!"

I don't think there's a pat discipline for any child that "fits all." You have to customize your approach to the kid.

she's actual size

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2000

Hi, Tom. Your theory about capitalism and bourgeois in relation to the politeness of your child is just silly. Don't read any further if you can't understand simplicity.

There are plenty of reasons to raise a polite child. If I handed your toddler a piece of candy and he/she didn't say Thank You, I may dismiss it as an error of youth but I wouldn't think that the little tyke was contemplating his position of power and ownership in this evil world run by adults. If your teenage son doesn't say Thank You then I just think he's being rude.

And, if you wish to take my disagreement with your point (and I will disagree with you on this issue until the cows come home regardless of your "theory") as a physical threat to your wee one then go ahead but that's about the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Seems you're happier in theory than in reality.

- Slacker

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2000

I call my children terrorists for a reason. I believe children take the creative tendancies and simply do things adults wouldn't even consider. I have cleaned up a wonderful flour mess myself. I took pictures and laughed because sometimes if you don't laugh you may just kill them. However, the angelic creatures did get punished. It was the first and last flour creation my kids pulled.

It is amazing what children will do with even the five minutes you are in the bathroom. There is no way to be there every second.

I have two kids and they are two entirely different types of people. I have done everything with 4 year old son; time outs, taking away fun things, swats on the bottom, and sometimes nothing at all helps. I have taken several parenting classes but in the end I really believe some children are built for a bit more mischief and rebellion.

Every time my kids do something that makes me want to run to the hills my mother tells me "Would you rather have them sitting in the corner drooling and not thinking or living?"

If a flour mess is all I have to clean up to keep their creativity and indiviuality alive then I will do it. I don't want cookie cutter children who always sit with hands folded never running, exploring, and experiencing.

You punish children hoping that they will learn some actions have negitive consequences. As adults from time to time still take that gamble. If you speed you take a chance that you may receive a ticket so you can have the result you want. Kids take the chance of punishment so they can have a few minutes doing something fun to them

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2000

BTW, what makes Slack think it's appropriate to speculate in print about whether my son will grow up lovable? I mean, what's next, threatening his physical safety? I know we all think harsh thoughts about the people we disagree with. But it's gross to beat up on the reputation of a toddling baby, no matter how much you are disquieted by his father's ideas. Doncha think?

Yes. I do think. This is not to say that I agree or disagree with anything else that Mr. Dean has said, but it really took an attack on my (UNBORN) child to make me stop and think about a lot of things that have been going on in the entire Dave Van thing.

In stasi's 1/6 entry, she told about a situtation where she told someone that she "has a friend that is singing Tori Amos songs to her child". The "friend" in question here is me, and the singing songs my child is reference to a conversation that stasi and I had a couple of months back when we were talking about the fact that my child's ears were developed. (Again, I haven't even given birth yet.) I am not pointedly singing Tori exclusively to the Bebe in my tummy, and I know that stasi understands that and that she was joking when she told the third person this.

Well, the third person's response was: "Poor child. She's going to grow up to be a man-hater."

Umm, you know what? Fuck off. My child isn't even BORN YET and you're going to sit there and speculate about the type of person they are going to be? How very very sad.

And it does seem to be a trend these days, in light of the entire Dave Van situation. The fact that he writes freely about the destruction his children cause seem to make everyone think that they have a right to say that Cameron and Melanie will grow up to be murderers, arsonists, strippers, accountants, zoo-keepers, whatever; and the bottom line is, simply because he writes it does not give anyone that right.

Do I like children? As a great majority of people have answered: Some of them. Do I have children? Almost. Am I scared as hell about the type of parent I'll be? Yes, yes, yes a resounding yes!

Jake and I didn't want to have children, for many of the reasons that Beth and Lynda have been discussing. Jake was a victim of physical abuse, I was a victim of lots and lots of yelling and manipulation. We don't want to turn into our parents and that's why we were not going to have children; but even though I was on the pill, the Child-giving Gods seemed to have different ideas for us.

At that point, we just learn to begin to deal with our fears the best way we can. We have seriously considered taking anger management classes, we talk about how we are going to discipline our children, and yes, we're scared, but we are two parents that will do the best that we can. Will I raise my voice to our child? I hope not. That's the extent of my future predicting capabilities. Will I hit my child? I sure as HELL hope not. Again, that's as much of the future as I can predict. I will not concentrate on the fact that "it could happen". Instead, I will choose to concentrate on alternative methods to keep it from happening.

I would like to thank Rob and Chuck and Lynda and Renee and all the rest of the child-havin' folk that have contributed their experiences to the discussion. I've found that I'm becoming like a lil' sponge these days. Soaking up as much information on this issue as possible.

Thanks for everyone's input.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2000

I have to say I do have a problem with spanking, because it is (in my experience) usually an expression of anger rather than a correction. Once the child is old enough to reason, there is a great likelihood that they will see a parent coming at them with hand raised as evidence not that they did something wrong, but that the parent doesn't love them (and in fact wants to hurt them). And that perception can stay intact for a long time. It can also lead to anger-management problems in the child in the future.

I don't know how I would discipline my children when/if I have any. I have a horrible temper, and if I yell at the cat I think chances are I'd probably yell at the kid (even with all effort not to). One reason I have no children at this time. I only have a little babysitting experience, and unfortunately that was with the horrible neighbor children from hell. Not, I think, an average family.

As to the actual question: I like some children. Some are absolute beasts. Just like adults, except I have a harder time understanding them when they talk.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2000

Being a mom of a fourteen and a half year old and a four year old (both boys) who have a reputation for being 'great' kids not only by their friends and family, but by school teachers and even strangers....I have to say that time-outs do work. I've never disciplined my children by hitting them. That's N-E-V-E-R. It was a conscious decision made by their father and I while I was pregnant the first time around that the time-out method would be our form of discipline.

However, just like 'spanking' or 'yelling' your child won't always insure good behavior (whoever heard of a kid being spanked just once and was forever an angel?), nor will time-outs. Time-outs only work when they are consistently given out as a form of discipline, even if this means it is given out while a kid is kicking the door and screaming at the top of his lungs (though, parents will find that if they utilized the time out method early on...around the age of two when children begin to really understand their actions and consequences, by the time they are three and a half, the need for time out hardly exists. This is where I think Dave Van has failed, not so much as his choice of discipline but the fact that he never proves to be quite consistent in disciplining his children. I remember there were times when my sons were two, when it seemed all I was doing was giving out time-outs).

As for those here who have lamented on this forum about timing-out being nothing but a silly notion of modern parenting, I have to ask them why would they rather choose a choice of discipline that can physically hurt a child when instead they can use an alternative method that has proven just as effective if not more? (though studies have shown, and even 20/20 did a show on this, that children who are physcially disciplined 'act out' significantly more than children who are instead regularly timed-out).

I tend to think the reason both my kids are quite 'good' (my fourteen year old got his last time out at six, while my four year old hasn't had one in about three months) is because their father and I have really tried to instill in them the idea that in order to recieve respect, they must also give out respect to others and the world around them. Humiliating them by yelling at them, or disrespecting their persons by hitting them would have been a really bad example...while using a time-out for them to 'think it over' about their bad behavior...seems rather the more logical way to go about having them understand this

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2000

I really liked your post, Beth K. It seems like parents really need to understand their children inside and out, and try to figure out the best strategies for working with them. And those strategies will be a balancing act among rewarding them, limiting them, reasoning with them, etc. Nothing will work every time.

Tom, I understand now that you weren't saying you wouldn't teach your child to say please and thank you, but your original statement that "Being a proper little bourgeouis who says please and thanks just isn't relevant to our world -- you need first to know yourself and choose your gods accordingly, and second to be able to act independently to serve those gods." sounded like you were rejecting courtesy as a bourgeouis concept.

I think that the fact that Dave keeps an online journal makes it reasonable for us to be talking about it here. Nobody came here and posted rumors about him, he told these stories about his family himself. He's free to post rebuttals here or on his site. That is just a reality of online journaling, though I'm sure I'd be annoyed if I had one and people emailed me about whatever they though I was doing wrong.

Also, his account of somehow mistakenly posting the accounts of his childrens' activites on alt.childfree.support seemed kind of disingenous to me...I mean, that's quite a blunder.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2000

A blunder? I don't think so. Dave doesn't do things like that by accident. He loves attention, good or bad. In that respect he is very much like his little feral children.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2000

>>I reserve the right to form a bad opinion of someone who should have made the same choice, but did not.<<

I don't really know who Dave Van *is* (never read his journal and don't plan to start), but it sounds like if I did read it, I might form a low opinion of his parenting skills, or lack thereof, but still be able to reserve forming an opinion of *him* as a person, since I don't know him, have never met him, and probably never will.

As far as people *choosing* whether to have kids or not, I think it's great that in the last 30-40 years, birth control methods have progressed so much, and abortion is legal, so people have much more choice in the matter than they did in mny parents' generation.

If *that* generation would have had practically foolproof birth control methods and legal abortion, I'd wager that a lot of us boomers and gen-xer's and gen-next-ers yakking here wouldn't even *be* here.

From what I've heard about my parents' generation, it was difficult for people to even get sterilized if they knew they didn't want children (or more children than they already had), and especially difficult for women.

But anyway... I think it's great that you, Beth, can make the choice not to have kids because you know you'd be a lousy parent, and I think it's great that anyone else who decides to avoid parenthood for whatever reason can do so nowdays without too much chance of failing in their efforts to remain childless.

As for the little controversy about whether people should talk about something someone posted in public, of course they should, if they feel like it. If online journalers (or just people who post in forums) don't want others talking about their lives or disagreeing with their views in public, or sending them email on occasion that's not all praise and agreement with their actions or ideas, then they shouldn't write about their lives or their opinions in public.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Yeah, I was trying to say that posting this stuff on alt.childfree was such a blunder that I'm skeptical that that's what really happened. I think he was enjoying rattling cages and then getting outraged when people flamed him.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Wait, wait, wait. Where is everyone getting this idea that Dave posted something in alt.childfree.support? I read through the posts in that newsgroup, and they started when a regular poster linked to Dave's journal entry, indicating that he was a regular reader of Dave's journal. I don't think Dave deliberately or accidentally posted any info to the forum, and I don't think he claimed to. Where are you guys getting this?

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

I think those people have betrayed a basic fact; namely, they haven't a clue what is going on. Of course that shouldn't stop them from having an opinion. Long live freedom of speach!

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Okay, reading back I see that something you said made me think he'd posted the stuff, and he didn't. His original account was kind of confusing (to me) about why all those people started writing him. Mea culpa.

So I got something wrong, thus I must know nothing, and will stop posting my opinions immediately. Got it.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Who said you know nothing? The first words you wrote in this forum were: "No, I don't like children. I'm a mean old bitch."

Obviously you do know something. You might want to stick to what you do know.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Big Joe - relax. I think a lot of people were under the impression that he posted the stuff. It's an honest mistake.

Anyway ... I have no children, and if this were an actual live, in-your-face discussion at a party I'd probably take the opportunity to go into the kitchen for a soda. But it isn't so here's my .02.

First of all, I like children. But on to the philosophy of raising kids ...

I was never spanked as a child. Not once. And my parents rarely yelled - they'd send my brother and me to our rooms until we calmed down. We didn't have TVs or anything in there, just lots of books, so there really wasn't anything to do besides sit back and be sedate.

My dad, in particular, very rarely yelled or lost his temper. Because of that, when he did get angry at something we did, we knew right away that it was a Very Big Deal. And we paid attention.

Obviously nobody here knows me from Adam, but I'd like to think I turned out OK. At least my grandparents think so.

On the other hand, I grew up playing all sorts of recreational sports, and had my share of coaches who yelled a lot. After awhile, if someone yells all the time, it was pretty easy just to tune them out. I'd hear the first couple of seconds of a rant and think: "OK, lecture No. 7a, entitled 'Get Back on Defense You Lazy #^%%&$es" and start thinking about girls or whatever.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

I would like to concur with Mike (above). I was never ever hit, and very rarely yelled at, only if I was really in trouble. In fact, I can't remember a single specific example now. A raised voice was a big deal, and that was always enough to immediately discipline me. Maybe I was just a placid child, but it worked perfectly.

As to if I *like* children: no. Not generally. I like my niece, and I am sure I will like my child, if it eventuates. (I will not have more than one.) Other people's children just get up my nose, especially when they're making a ruckus in public. I know it isn't always the parents' fault, but I'm sure the majority of children can be brought up to respect their mother/father saying "no, don't do that please".

-- Anonymous, January 12, 2000

Do I like children? Yes, I love children. I don't always like their behaviour, but then again, I don't always like my behaviour or that of other adults.

Before I had my daughter (she just turned 2) I thought that I would be a strict disciplinarian type parent, but it didn't work out that way. I learned from experience that trying to enforce my rules and regulations didn't work with a baby or a toddler. That doesn't mean that Fiona rules our house, but it does mean that the rules have changed around here. Would I like to live a quiet, peaceful live in a neat and tidy house? Absolutely! Does it happen? No way! I figure that I will have plenty of time for that after my kids are grown and moved out, for right now I remind myself a million times a day that Fiona wasn't born knowing that it is wrong to pour apple juice on the carpet. It's my job to a) supervise her if she has juice where I don't want it spilled and b) teach her that there are consequences of her actions. If she spills juice by accident she learns that everyone makes mistakes and she helps me clean it up. If she spills juice on purpose she loses the privelege of drinking juice in the living room (and she gets a "time out" in the sense that my attention is on cleaning up the mess, not on her). She might spill juice on purpose 50 times but she will learn in time. As for spanking, I see "bad" behaviour as children testing their limits and figuring out what is acceptable and what is not. That is how kids learn and grow. I would hate for Fiona to grow up knowing that every time she stepped outside of the boundaries that she was going to be met with physical pain. Instead, she is met with her mother or father or caregiver gently showing her where the boundary is and how to stay on the right side of it. We don't spank, we try not to yell and so far it is working just fine.

-- Anonymous, January 12, 2000

The Dave Van issue has been rattling around in my brain for weeks now, so this seems to be as good an opportunity to purge it from my system as any.

I think Dave is mostly correct in his response to the folks who judge parents strictly on their child's behavior. Believe me, unless you're a member of the family, you really don't have a clue what the true dynamics are. After ten years of parenting, I'm way past debating Nature versus Nurture. The scales definitely tip heavily toward Nature. Kids come hardwired with more stuff than you'll ever guess. You try to shape their personalities as best you can and teach them to behave in a civilized manner, but they are who they are when they pop out of the womb. The key to good parenting is figuring out how to help them exploit that potential for their (and everyone else's) best benefit.

That said, I think Dave is way to easy on himself when it comes to disciplining his kids. Maybe he's just exhausted, which is a distinct possibility. But if you have kids with those kinds of behavior problems, you don't leave your damn power tools and paint rollers where they can get at them. And you don't take cutesy photos of them when they spread flour throughout the house (because if that's not bad, then surely trashing the Christmas tree isn't so awful)? And maybe instead of staying up into the wee hours to work on your journal, why don't you go to bed so that you can get up before the kids start wrecking things?

What baffles me is that Dave doesn't seem to mete out punishments beyond sending the kids to their rooms. Don't they enjoy privileges that can be taken away? When my five- year-old is doing something he shouldn't, he gets a warning, and then he gets a count to five. Then he loses TV for the day or dessert or his Jedi sword for the night or whatever else might be sufficiently important to him to make him stop what he's doing. This gambit doesn't always work. Sometimes there is yelling (though no hitting). But it's better than throwing up your hands and saying, "Whaddaya going to do?"

And by the way, the subject of this forum is rather ridiculous. Why not: "Do you like adults?" Why, sure, I love every single one I've ever met...

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

It's only ridiculous if you like some children and don't like others. Most people feel that way about children and adults alike, but there are plenty of people (see posts above) who will claim to have never met a child they didn't like, and there are plenty more who categorically dislike kids. I've never met anyone who claimed to like or dislike all adults, but I know plenty who have sweeping opinions of children as a group.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

And you can tell how ridiculous I think those sweeping opinions are...

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

i don't think disliking children is ridiculous. as has been pointed out before--children, especially very young ones, do not think and react to the world the same way adults do. i don't think they're categorically horrible creatures, but in general, dealing with young children makes me uncomfortable because i never quite know how to interact with them.

if that makes me one of those godawful people who have "a feeling lacking...that should happen naturally" then so be it.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Exactly Eva. Children bore and irritate me. I have no interest in childish activities or all the things about them that parents seem to find so fascinating. Their noise and constant random activity drives me mad. I'm sure there are plenty of children with very nice personalities if you like the childish personality in the first place. I don't, and at 38 I doubt that's likely to change. I don't consider myself to be unfeeling, just realistic.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000