Free-Range Kids and Attachment Parenting

Hi Folks! Just found this post buried in my “to put on blog” cue. Sorry it’s so long after the Time Mag cover (which cover? You KNOW which cover) and the “Take Our Kids to the Park…and Leave Them There Day” piece.

Anyway — after the umpteenth question and comment about Free-Range “versus” Attachment Parenting, I wrote one commenter this note. He had asked, “Have you seen any correlation, either positive or negative, between Attachment Parenting and Free-Range?  Or do the bubblewrap/helicopter parents you see tend to be the Attachment Parenting parents?” My answer

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I have, thank goodness, no idea. What I always try to explain is that Free-Range is not a “type of parenting.” It’s an outlook that tries to resist the rampant fear being foisted upon us by marketers, politicians, “experts” and the media, all of whom have a vested interest in making us worried that our kids will be killed.

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Or not get into Harvard.

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I don’t endorse bashing any parenting decision. I DO endorse bashing all the forces that are trying to make us unnecessarily suspicious, worried and afraid to connect. – L

And Now We Bring You The Apocalypse!

Hey Folks — Look at this illuminating list of what constitutes “news,” at least according to the Minnesota Associated Press guidelines for reporters, as posted on the blog Business Insider and first reported by Libby Reinish on savethenews.org.

Note that train wrecks, airplane crashes and drownings are news, as are car crashes if there are “multiple victims or unusual circumstances.”

Fatal fires, exceptionally violent robberies, ice storms and damaging floods are also all “news,” while plain vanilla deaths are not.

That’s why it always seems like the world is coming to an end: Only the worst, creepiest, goriest stuff, as you well know,  makes it to the airwaves (with an occasional saved kitten thrown in). What’s interesting is that this “news” isn’t new at all. It is Kabuki — an elaborate ritual. Far from new and surprising, it MUST conform to a template and here it is! Laid out for us by the Associated Press folks in Minnesota! As we can see, the job of a “news” story is to constantly re-confirm the media’s contention that the world is a terrible, mean, scary place (except, again, for the kittens). It’s like Groundhog Day, without the feel-good ending.

So here’s an idea: Let’s stop calling it news and start calling it what it is: Same Old Apocalypse. “What’s on TV?” ” SOA.” “Turn it off.”   — Lenore

Arrrr, Mateys! Verizon’s Done It Again!

Ahoy There, Readers — Have you seen this ad? From the folks who brought you the ap (or network, or whatever) that allows you to track your teen daughter’s ever step at the mall comes:

Talk about raising resilient kids who can roll with the punches! Talk about getting your priorities straight! Talk about having a memorable birthday party, thanks to an unsuspecting cowboy the wee pirates could truss to a tree!

Anyway, everything I’d like to say about this spot — and world — has been said already with great gusto by Tom Henderson at ParentDish. And so, I give you his matey — er, meaty — essay while I go walk the metaphoric plank that is Monday morning. — Lenore