I fully believe the posters here who were sent to a religious camp in their youth and did not become indoctrinated because they were smart enough or prepared enough to see through the bull. The LW's kids may well have the same experience and come home more convinced than ever that mom and dad were right to break away from the crazy fundamentalists. Whether the kids survive the experience is not at the heart of the matter, however. The real issue is a matter of your values as a parent. You simply do not sell out your religious beliefs because your kids "really want to go" or because someone else is paying. What kind of parent abdicates supervision to people who's values they don't agree with when they know those values are going to be pushed, and pushed hard?

It's time for the parents to just say no. They have no idea what the kids are going to experience at the camp and they'll probably never find out most of it afterwards, either.

I'm not going to get PC about this - I think it's bizarre. Yeah, the MSNBC anchors and their revulsion was too much, but I don't really get it either. It sounds like Beattie wanted to stop being a woman and got that, and is now going back to being a woman because it's more convenient right now. I can't say I have a great insight into a transgendered person's state of mind, but I'm willing to live and let live. Beattie seems to want to toy with gender when it suits her. It's her life to lead, but I don't really see how she represents the transgendered. She seems more like a woman who has embraced facial hair. And honestly, that kind of squicks me out.

Maybe Miley is embarrassed about how the photos turned out, but everyone else involved obviously knew exactly how sexy they wanted them to turn out. I'm sure the level of "sexiness" was carefully calculated by her agent, publicist and father. I don't find the photos tasteless but Miley, whenever you take your shirt off, it's not going to be all innocent. Is she really still that naive?

This feels like yet another article trying to make a controversy where none exists. While I find little objectionable in Richard's viewpoint, I do not find "take time for yourself" and "let your husband do the childcare and see what it's like" to be particularly earth-shattering or controversial statements. It sounds more like 1970's consciousness raising.

But I do disagree with the notion that feminism has so rigidly defined mothering that women don't know what to do. If it's so narrowly defined, why do we have so many women doing it in so many different ways? Why do we have the media's so-called Mommy Wars? And since so few women call themselves feminists these days, why would they be hampered by feminism? You can't have it both ways.

I think the issue of women criticizing their husbands for "doing it wrong", as well as the current phenomenon of hyper-parenting, go back to the central idea of women having higher career standards for themselves than they did say 40 or 50 years ago. Women are told they can be/do anything they want. If they opt for mothering as a full-time career, they feel they better do it damn well, since they quit their job and paycheck for this. Hence, strong opinions on doing every little thing "the right way" and being the best damn mother on the playground. What else can you do with your ambition? If you decide to stay home with your kids and then you don't do a very good job of it, how does that define you? Women in previous generations did need that definition as much because they weren't expected to have careers. We are.

Normally I wouldn't say save the marriage for the sake of the children, but with 5 kids including a newborn, the rules change. Plus, it sounds like the husband is going through some sort of crisis (emotional, mental?) that he may be able to get out of. Maybe the LW should ask her husband to agree to one year of counseling and staying together, even if they have to change the rules and terms of their marriage to accomodate some of his current weirdness. No rash decisions should be made with a 2 week old in the house!

Cary's response today was a great example of why you should skip his answers and go straight to the letters page.

The LW is ready to move on from these "secondary" college friendships, yet she doesn't want people to be unhappy with her. If she's going to let the ties drop, she's going to have to put up with people acting accordingly, you can't have it both ways. At only 2 years out of college, she probably doesn't realize that a lot of these relationships are going to fall off in the next few years; she does seems quicker to do it than some people in her circle. In a couple of years she'll be wondering why she even considered going.

Seven hours is a long way to go to wedding of someone you aren't close to. Don't go, but make a point of connecting with those that are important to you, and let it go. Cary's right, a nice letter can go a lot farther than just checking "no" on the rsvp card.

Lily and Bart? As in, Edith Wharton's doomed Lily Bart? Is it ironic or do we assume that no one involved with producing Gossip Girls has read Wharton's classic?

Clearly, I'm not a viewer.