Forever Young

I apologize for not posting anything for three weeks! I read a very interesting article today about America's 21st century spoiled children on The New Yorker. This article really grabbed my attention so I thought you would really think about this as well.

Carolina Izquierdo, an anthropologist at the University of California, went to the Peruvian Amazon and spent time with the Matsigenka, a tribe made up of 12,000 people. During her time there, she observed a girl, Yanira, who not only helped with the chores but also fished for crustaceans, cleaned, boiled, and served them. She wanted to be useful without anybody asking her to do anything and can you guess how old she was?.......She was only six years old!  Now, I'm not saying that every single six-year-old in this country should be able to do this, but should be helpful in the household.

Here's another example from the same article. This time, it's an eight year old girl who was sitting at the dining table to eat, but there was no silverware laid out on the table. She knew where it was kept, but instead, she said, "How am I supposed to eat?" Her father, not telling her to get the silverware herself, went and grabbed it instead. This example tells me that this girl is spoiled but if her parents are treating her like a baby instead of making her independent, when she is older, she won't be able to do this or anything else on her own.

From this article, I think that if parents are taking charge, hovering over their children's lives and doing simple things for their children, their behavior will continue to be childlike even when they are older.

There is other interesting information in this following link: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2012/07/02/120702crbo_books_kolbert?currentPage=all

I highly recommend this!

Thanks for reading,
CityLover