A little while back I stumbled on an editorial from The Weekly Standard* simply titled The Kindergarchy.^[1] The article itself is lengthy and at times convincing of it’s own merits, and admittedly, it has taken me multiple readings and a few stretches of thought-filled time to figure out what I really think of the concept presented. At first, I wanted to post the item here and get input to rationalize what I thought came off as something of an attack on modern parenting — with a taste of “well, you know he might be right…”

Instead, while the parent in me churns the idea of “stepping back” around in my head, the skeptic in me has had some time to balance the perspective. To summarize, the editorial hearkens back to the so-called ‘good old days’ of parenting, when children were spanked, and independence was forced upon them by indifferent parents. If that comes across as loaded language, be warned it is exactly what the author asserts is cause of modern parenting griefs: the coddling of kids, the over-nurturing, the abundance of love and attention, and the to-easy willingness to be a “parent” and not just someone with kids. The author cites no real good examples except for his own upbringing — apparently lacking parental attention — and some very clear disdain for the affection shown by modern parents.

My mother never read to me, and my father took me to no ballgames, though we did go to Golden Gloves fights a few times. When I began my modest athletic career, my parents never came to any of my games, and I should have been embarrassed had they done so. My parents never met any of my girlfriends in high school. No photographic or video record exists of my uneven progress through early life. My father never explained about the birds and the bees to me; his entire advice on sex, as I clearly remember, was, “You want to be careful.”^[1]

He seems bitter and resentful in a kind of ‘for-my-own-good’ kind of way. But as if he is caught up by some Ayn Rand-style model of self determination, the author’s march moves onward against the model of modern parenting that dares to suggest there is good to be found in nurturing the young. Instead he equates attention paid to children as somehow directly proportional to the development of a society full of uncaring, unthinking, spoiled kids, hinting that only when kids are set free from their parents’ love will they be able to fulfill some abstract ideal of innocent childhood.

My own hope is that the absurdity of current arrangements will in time be felt, and people will gradually realize the foolishness of continuing to lavish so much painstaking attention on their children. When that time comes, children will be allowed to relax, no longer under threat of suffocation by love from their parents, and grow up more on their own.^[1]

What bothered me, I think, is that there is a thread of truth running through an otherwise flawed argument: yes, independent kids who have not been coddled their entire lives, common sense should tell us, grow up to be thinking, contributing members of society. I agree with that. In fact, it is one of the primary assertions of this blog. But that the answer to finding independence in youth is, in the metaphor of nature, tossing them from the nest, I heartily cannot concur. And as I examined this assertion two clear fallacies occurred to me: first, the argument from antiquity or tradition, stated simply as “This is the way we have always acted or believed. This is what our ancestors did or believed. Therefore, it is the way we should act or believe.”^[2] Second, the argument is based on a few bits of scattered anecdotal evidence, cherry picked to support his point.

I’ll address the argument from antiquity or tradition first, if simply, by asking a few questions. To the author: as an man who has lived his life and is reflecting on it back through his fallible, human memories was this really the best way for him to have been raised? Does the end justify the means? And because one can look back on their life and reflect on where one has come with little or no regret, does that mean that is the only path to get there — or even the best? According to the author at some point in the 1940s society seemed to have reach the ultimate perfection in raising children. (And, how fortunate for him that he was born in time to take advantage of that.) Or perhaps the author is recalling some sanitized version of the past from television that is clouding his recollections, for surely those years were ones where groups of well-mannered youngsters roamed the neighborhood, picking up litter, helping senior citizens across the streets, on their way to the ol’ fishing hole to skip stones and play on the tire swing. Yeah, right. Perhaps the world is a little less inviting to the youth of the twenty-first century, but the 1940s was no more like the Andy Griffith’s Show then as it is like the Cosby Show in the 1980s, or like The Family Guy today. Where is that ideal time?

I must confess that part of writing a blog — skeptical or otherwise — is the fact that most everything published is based on anecdotal opinion. Blogs are pure editorial, and should be taken at that value. In that vein, it is difficult to not seem hypocritical for confronting another written piece on that very idea — that it’s assertions are based purely on anecdotal evidence. And please comment if you disagree with this or anything I write. But that said, some anecdote is fine — particularly in editorializing — if the author tries to present a well-balanced experience and opinion, and is open to challenge. The Kindergarchy comes across as neither, instead recalling ‘the good old days’ of one lucky youth while failing to cite the effects of even one case of true parental absenteeism on child rearing. It might be fine to claim apathetic parents will an independent child make, but take for example a case from the other end of the bell curve: the case of a six-year old in Flint, Michigan who shot his classmate in 2000.[3] Poverty and drugs can be the unfortunate cause of parent absenteeism as well, and I’m sure there are plenty more less extreme examples of the same, where kids booted out the door without any coddling (or “too much love”) from their parents definitely did not result in some so-called good old fashioned wholesome kids. Would it have hurt the author’s case to cite at least one case of this? Well, I suppose it would have.

I read the next bit and I envision a cold, love-starved man trying to raise his kids:

A single generation later, I have to confess, I didn’t–at least, not quite. I tried to bring up my two sons on the model on which I had been brought up, but I was unable to bring it off very successfully. My own confidence in my doing the right thing as a parent was considerably less than that of my own parents. I was always telling my two sons how much I loved them. I told them this so often that I should imagine they must have begun to doubt that I had any real feeling for them whatsoever.^[1]

I feel for those poor kids, growing up with a cardboard cut-out of a man for a dad who tries to love but really, deep-down feels the best answer to his inability to show emotion is a swift kick in ass.

Readers by now know that this blog is about skeptical parenting. And this blog will continue to be a dialog on raising kids to be critical thinkers, members of society who bring society forward through questioning their parents and their parent’s values. A big part of critical thinking is avoiding the false dichotomy — the black-and-white solution — of a problem. The author of The Kindergarchy sees the current model of parenting as a the white — though thinks the solution is in the black. These are two extremes for which there can be no reconciliation without work, and with which I think are both failing propositions. What he fails to contend — but which I assert here — is that there is a lot of gray in the middle.

[1] The Kindergarchy: Every child a dauphin. by Joseph Epstein
[2] About.com
[3] The Michigan Times

*While I wouldn’t count myself among the target audience of The Weekly Standard, this blog is not intended to be political or partisan (particularly since it’s written in Canada) and I evaluate everything individually on it’s own merits. That said, I am perfectly aware that the goals of that particular publication are likely contrary to the goals of this author and this blog.