Roundup
There was a lot on our parenting minds this week so today we bring you a Parenting Roundup. It’ll be less fun with fewer cute outfits than the Pendleton Roundup in Emily’s home state, but it comes with a 100% guarantee of sending fewer people running than the herbicide kind of Roundup (though with any luck, one day we will be popular enough to send just as many people running.)
Here are a few headlines that had us thinking this week:
There is so much to unpack in this one that we could write a book on it. Actually, we couldn’t write a book on it so much as Virginia Sole-Smith did write a book on it. Fat Talk: Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture, argues that as parents we need to get over our bias against fatness and use a nonrestrictive approach to feeding our kids. Not only is obsessing about and restricting food counter-productive, it is also a good way to pass on our own phobias and disordered approaches to eating. Furthermore, Sole-Smith sees the ideal of thinness as fundamentally rooted in classism and racism. As a mother of two picky eaters whose limited diets worry Emily constantly, this perspective is helpful. Although she worries less about fatness and more about nutrition and overall health, Sole-Smiths offers a paradigm shift that is insightful and reassuring.
What Our Toxic Culture Does to the Young (NY Times)
A downer of a headline if there ever was one, David, but an interesting take on how our “culture of exaggerated distrust and presumed toxicity has influenced us all, but the younger generations most of all.” Having grown up on a diet of what Brooks calls “hypercautious parenting that exaggerates the dangers in life,” teens these days are waiting longer to get their driver's licenses, drink alcohol and have sex. At face value it would seem this is an improvement from our youth, but is it? Emily’s sense of impending doom and danger is so deeply ingrained that she can’t really reflect on this purported footloose and fancy free past, but perhaps Alexina can, rebel that she was and almost still is.
The Only Way Out of the Child-Gender Culture War (The Atlantic)
One thing that we have never quite been able to wrap our heads around is why people in this country are so fixated on having a say in what other people do with their bodies and, well, lives in general. This article offers a balanced look at the conversation and research around gender-affirming care in the United States and other countries. The title provided so much hope that we couldn’t not read it….until we learned that the author’s “way out” of this culture war is through scientific evidence…and then it feels a little less hopeful because from where we sit, it doesn’t seem like so many Americans actually care much about evidence, or medicine, or science. But many Americans love this word…what was it?..oh, “freedom,” and maybe one day we can all agree that making medical decisions with one’s doctor falls under that same umbrella.
To the two of us who have kids that have yet to enter the age of social media, this feels like a gift: one less thing for us to have to restrict, manage and argue with our children over. The proposed legislation, which has bipartisan support, not only enforces age restrictions but also bans social media companies from using algorithms to recommend content to users under age 18. With all the controversial and upsetting content floating around on social media, this seems like a no-brainer. But we are curious; what do you all think?
This one particularly resonates with Alexina at the moment, as she spends most of her waking hours breastfeeding and can remember a time with her first born when she worked at a children’s hospital that didn’t have a pumping room for employees. She found herself locked in a supply closet 3-4 times a day waiting for that let down. Yes, it was private, but it sure wasn’t secure. We are both happy to see this law go into effect for future mothers, but Emily is still waiting for pumping rooms set up for tandem nursing to become ubiquitous.
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