No Place For Kids!

I love kids. Always have. Always been partial to spending time with them. They give you back many times more love, affection and learning than you can ever hope to give them. I love their innocence, their blue sky imagination, their simple communication and their pure heart.

In my earlier blog “Child is the father of man” I had alluded to how we poison their environment and how we should get out of their way so that they can achieve their full potential. That was a few years ago. Today perhaps I’ve become more cynical or maybe the world is indeed an even crazier place today than what it was back then.

I look around me and the society which we as adults have created is no way the right place to bring up kids anymore. Children need our time (we don’t have any), they need space (we don’t give that), they need environment that doesn’t condition (we don’t know what that even means anymore) and above all they need support and encouragement and not comparison and manipulation. And yet for each and everyone of these needs; modern society delivers the exact opposite. Don’t get me wrong: there are parents, grandparents and carers out there who are doing their best, trying their hardest and hoping for the best. But these good samaritans are up against a vast majority that don’t care, have their eyes shut and would rather confirm to societal norms than do what’s best for the child. They are not bad parents or people / not at all - it is a potent mix of extreme conformism and protectionism.

Let me elaborate: children have it difficult right from birth because adults for their own reasons have delayed childbirth and induced biological risk. Once born they are injected with meds and chemicals that do more harm than good (but there are Pharma companies and govt to be satisfied) doesn’t matter if children are impacted adversely more than they benefit. If they make it unscathed past these first two milestones there is an entire army of companies and obliging parents waiting to target the child as a market segment rather than a unique individual. These companies and the parents are hellbend on making the child a walking talking billboard of brands and products rather than skill and competence. 

Talking of competencies we then put the children through a system (which we call education) which sucks out every last ounce of imagination from these poor souls and replaces that with grades and peer pressure. That is if the child manages to survive the modern epidemic of ADHD and to dodge the occasional bullet which is in vogue these days (my comment on mass shooting is out of pure disdain towards our modern society because the shooters are a product of it). 

What our society does is take the blank canvas called children and made them into nameless and faceless SSNs. And the process just keeps getting worse generation on generation because children of today are going to be parents of tomorrow. They don’t know what they don’t know. Little wonder therefore why we are on a downward spiral.

How can the way we bring up kids today and prepare them as adults be good for our society?We are degenerating in the name of progress. 

Most of the things mentioned are in reference to developing and developed societies. Spare a thought for the countless children who by virtue of being born in poorer parts of the world will experience problems very different from these, whose future will be limited by access to basics, healthcare, food and learning. Who will be thrown prematurely into the workforce and their childhood curtailed. Who will forever stare at the chasm that separates the haves from the have nots. Most of whom will never stand a chance.

Where did we go wrong? When did this decay become terminal? When did we replace toys in their hands with guns, candies with medicine, sports field with a digital maze, and time they needed with gadgets. A friend of mine once joked that children these days talk to parents less and to Siri/Alexa/Google more. When the truth on that statement hit, it was a joke no more.

I’m an optimist at heart but even I struggle to see the silver lining and shudder to think where all of this will go in a few decades. Just one thing makes sense to me - this world is no place for kids anymore.