Letters to the Editor
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@ Ravenveil
'Shipped off to warehouses'? What country did you grow up in.....Hon?
They did something where I lived, which incidentally was in the United States, on planet Earth, for kids with disabilities called 'Special Ed'. That's not a name I'm making up, that's the name my very middle class suburban school system called it. I guess that's where the ADHD kids of the day were put. I don't remember seeing a 'Baby Einstein Sanitarium' anywhere in my area. Whatever your argument is, kids develop these 'disorders' because of the environments they grow up in. You don't need to be Supernanny or Dr. Spock to understand that.
As far as all of the products that are 'mocked'. My opinion is, if my parents and other parents of the 60s and 70s could do without them and raise fairly stable, responsible, and constructive individuals, so can I and other parents of today. When and if I have kids, I can guarantee you that I will NOT be buying all of this crap for my kid. If I do I'll eat my computer. So you can play the 'wait til it's your turn' game all you want. I want whatever child I have to develop without their senses being assaulted at all waking hours of the day by nonsense marketed by a 'creative' group of white yuppies looking to cash in.
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Cult of Sears
"And she was carried everywhere from birth until she hit 30 pounds, in a wrap a lot like a Moby Wrap. My niece went everywhere with her mom, and the wheeled cart was for shopping, not for the baby. [...] Anecdotal evidence is pretty strong on this kid -- she's got a seven year old's vocabulary, she's very secure and emotionally stable, her hand-eye coordination and gross motor skills are in the top 2 %. She's self-willed, determined and well on her way to being a strong feminist. No one's ever going to push her around. We think we're doing a good job, even if shopping for her is a nightmare."
- CZHEdwards
You know, your sister might be one of those women who give me dirty looks and have since I started pushing a pram as my little girl started out as a 6 pound wonder and tipped the scales at 30 pounds by the time she was one and wasn't yet walking. I am so happy carts have those kiddie seats as I've gotten a horrible case of tendonitis in both arms just from carrying her around. I think the whole cult of baby wearing is weird. It's great if it works for you but the smug granola mommies who glare at the rest of us who cherish our wheeled transports for the spawn are really galling.
As for the baby wearing magically making your neice a loquatious future feminist, my mum was an MD (in the 50s) and went back to work about 20 minutes after popping me out of the womb. I don't recall her ever wearing me much less a single memory of her hugging me or anything quite so emotive and I had an adult reading level by kindergarten....my point being that I think innate personality has far more to do with who your kid turns out to be and do than if you put your kid in the shopping cart and race around the parking lot instead of strapping her to your chest.
She sounds like a great kid, just don't cop the Sears cult routine as being the reason since it likely isn't.
I love my pediatrician but damned if that profession knows any more about kids these days than they did 30 years ago.
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I needed my lactation consultant!
please don't put lactation consultants in the same category as baby Einstein videos! Without mine, my nipples would still look like raw hamburger meat and my baby would be on an all-formula diet. Not that formula is poison, as so many would have you beleive nowadays, but it's not the food I wanted to feed my newborn. Unfortunately, as the author points out, if you want to breastfeed you really do need professional help. My mother bottle fed all of us (and, her reaction to my nursing problems within a week of the birth was "give that baby a bottle!") and had no idea how to help me, as did every other female relative who'd had kids. Everyone (especially the most strident anti-consumers) agrees breast is best, so if you don't hire a lactation consultant, and it doesn't come easily for you and your baby, how are you supposed to make it work? I hardly think spending money on a lactation consultant is going overboard with baby spoiling or setting my kid up for a life of mindless consumerism.
Also, I just have to say that I haven't bought my kid a damn thing (he's 2 weeks old) but my home is awash in baby crap (and I didn't even have a baby shower) because people heard I was pregnant and went on a buying spree. What was I supposed to do, tell people thanks, but I don't want the gift you thoughtfully bought for me? I have a "to re-gift" pile as big as my spare room right now. Over-buying is not limited to parents.
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Can you spell "overcompensating?"
I wonder what percentage of these hyper-materialistic parents are buying the big-bucks stuff for entertaining and caring for the children on weekends and evenings...because the kids are spending the better parts of their waking hours with the sitter and/or day-care center.
I was a typical blue-collar baby of the 50's. My childhood included hand-me-down toys and clothes from my older sis and cousins, days filled with locally-produced kiddie TV (Ah, Romper Room!!!) as well as interaction with at-home mom, but first and foremost SPONTANEOUS PLAYTIME WITH ALL THE OTHER KIDS IN THE HOOD EVERY (NON-SCHOOL) DAY THAT WEATHER PERMITTED!
Maybe it's a good thing that I was fated not to have kids of my own. I would have been the wierdest mom in the neighborhood.
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Where do these people live?
In "flyover country", most Americans do not have Bugaboos. I live in the Midwest, in a larger city and a neighborhood that is composed of middle-class, very educated folks (we live next to several universities and 2 teaching hospitals)...but I've never even seen a Bugaboo except in magazines. NOBODY here owns one and with good cause -- they couldn't possibly afford one. And people -- this is the SNOW BELT. Yet every family around manages to get through six months of wretched cold, snow, slush and freezing rain WITHOUT a super-fancy European stroller.
I have never seen this thing. I did buy a good car seat after consulting Consumer Reports, but my crib is from the first kid (a Sears special given to us as a joint gift), my running stroller is used (given to me by a colleague) my bike stroller is 9 year old, etc. The only new things I can think of are the mountains of clothes (people go nuts buying baby clothes) and a bouncer (because I gave a poor student the old one).
Most clothes and stuff are recycled where I am. Only car seats, swings, and cribs are new. They have to be, for safety sake. I'm in the Midwest (or the cold frozen North according to relatives "How close to Canada ARE you?") and my less than $200 stroller from Sears works fine here in the country and in Minneapolis.
I think these articles are about straw men. Most parents can't afford this stuff (except that the hospital provides lactation services for free- you can rent lactation consultants? I did not know that.) I don't think they sold Baby Einstein here for my first child; my second prefers cordboard boxes and her brother's trucks (he is programming her). I've never seen this stuff in stores. So many people shop garage sales for baby clothes that the mothers in my neighborhood track child ages to know whose garage sale to go to.
Do an article about those damn cheap plastic toys at fast food places and the irritation of repetitively telling your child "no, I don't want to go to McDs" every day. Do an article about the irritating, insidious cartoons with their relentless "parents are stupid" message (I banned Jimmy Neutron and several cartoons in my house for that.)
Or do an article about how kids are a great excuse to buy every old cartoon and child movie you want. My single friends cruise my child's DVD collection with more interest than mine. I would prefer not to be able to run lines from Monster's Inc., but it goes with the territory.
Or write about how Teletubbies and the Wiggles are signs of the Apocalpyse.
This article just seems so silly. As long as there are rich people, there will be a gilded toliet seat somewhere.
Baby signing is pretty normal today, by the way. Most daycares where I am teach it to kids for communication. The "sick" one is really, really important. I never met anyone who paid to learn it. The information is free on the web.