Reply #28: Agreed. [View All]

[Jazz2006]

I think the "dissing strong women" is a side issue, and probably totally unintended on the part of the 9 year old.

It appears more as though the child was taking her mother's politics to heart, and doing so in a child-like manner.

We do impart our ideas to our children, of course, but some people don't seem to know how to do so in an age-appropriate manner - on both sides of the political spectrum.

For instance, I've seen in various threads here artwork drawn by children much younger than the 9 year old in question bearing very strong political messages, and posts about things young children have said and done, also with very strong political messages mimicking the strong views of their parents, at ages long before the children could really be capable of fully understanding what they are saying or promoting.

I think that is unfortunate. It is probably unintended in most cases. But I've seen just as many Democrats do it as Repugs.

I have been very careful to impart to my daughter my own views, at an age appropriate level, but always made sure that it was clear to her that others disagree with me - sometimes vehemently - and see things differently than I do, and that she should form her own opinions only when she can grasp and understand both sides of an issue (as much as I would, of course, like her to agree with me).

I'm proud to say that this approach has worked very well. She is now 18, very progressive, very well-informed, and because she was not fed a steady diet of only one side of any issue, she is fully capable of looking at any given issue from opposing sides and therefore can easily refute conservative counter-arguments with ease.

I don't think she would have been able to do that so well if all I had done was to try to indoctrinate here with my firmly held views without encouraging her to think about the counter-arguments and the views of others.