Thursday, January 27, 2011

Roar of the lion father

Amy Chua is still getting huge publicity for her extreme child-rearing book. Anthony Esolen has another view:
While some of Ms. Chua‘s more extreme parenting experiences have led some to wonder whether her book is intended as a work of satire (it appears that it is not, at least not completely) Mr. Esolen‘s book actually is intended as a satire. And while Ms. Chua criticizes modern American parenting as providing insufficient control and discipline, Mr. Esolen attacks the overscheduling and overregimentation of modern childhood. Indeed, in many ways, Ms. Chua has advanced precisely the argument Mr. Esolen is satirizing.
The same guy wrote Ten Arguments against same-sex marriage.

Reasonable people can disagree about these child-rearing issues. The courts and psychologists have no business preempting the parents.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

and therein lies the rub: the courts and shrinks aren't reasonable people. There is no one way to raise children, but these people think otherwise and it's their way. Must be nice to be so sure on something so subjective.