Selfish adults 'damage childhood'

BBC News by Mark Easton | Feb. 2, 2009 (News Report)

The aggressive pursuit of personal success by adults is now the greatest threat to British children, a major independent report on childhood says.

It calls for a sea-change in social attitudes and policies to counter the damage done to children by society.
Family break-up, unprincipled advertising, too much competition in education and income inequality are mentioned as big contributing factors.
A panel of independent experts carried out ... Full Story »

Posted by Dale Penn

More Info

3.5

by Marsha Iverson - Feb. 2, 2009

Interesting--if shallow--look at the ways "individualism" in adults has negative impacts on children. While the basic premise has merit, perhaps too much emphasis is given in this piece to the purported negative effects of 'working mothers,' and not enough given to systemic generational poverty that many single mothers face when the fathers of their children skip their financial responsibilities, or when unemployment and economic crises tear the families apart. .

I'd be interested to see information about the effects of pressure directly on children to excel, achieve, and be active at all times. I believe that everyone needs "down-time" when they can unwind, be themselves, and just putter around without the sense that they are competing or being graded on their efforts. Adults' over-achiever status-quest tends to carry over to their children, when what most of us need is time to simply BE.

See Full Review » (13 answers)