How is it? I'll tell you how - it's that same ya-hoo that convinced an entire generation of people that:

-Children should never be told "no", or allowed to learn that sometimes you don't make the team or that you have to take responsibility for the choices you make

-We should all "pretend" to be respectful of differences through the use of "politically correct" (and, in my opinion BS) language, instead of *actually* learning and giving tolerance

-Policians should spend all their time with "image consultants" and "pollsters" so they can say whatever each special interest group wants to hear, instead of actually taking a stand based on what is good for the majority of their constituents, even when that position may be unpopular with some people

And if I can ever identify said ya-hoo, I will cheerfully lead the mob to throw him/her off the nearest cliff, because that person has turned us all into a bunch of milquetoast scaredy-cats, who never have any REAL interactions with each other for fear of giving offense, and it's a lousy way to live!

Hmmmm, apparently I've been stewing all weekend too, and didn't even know it till just now!

I agree with what Kristen said (as usual) except I offer one more addition: The yahoo who teaches our children that they have NOTHING to be ashamed of. Shame has somehow become a very bad word (I thank Oprah for much of this) to the point that all healthy shame seems to have gone out the window as well. There are still things that we all should be ashamed of ourselves for, even my five-year-old daughter. Yet we're told that's too negative to tell them that they sometimes have good reason to be humbled by their own actions.

That's why we have teenagers walking around with their pants falling down, overly plump tummies hanging out over their jeans and dropping the "F" bomb in public without a clue that there's anything wrong. Way to go yahoo!

David, what cave have you been in for the last 20 years? "Share" has been supplanting "tell" for at least that long. In 1989 my friend's boss "shared" with her (I know because she later "shared" with me) that she'd been fired.

Share your money with me. Share your sandwich with me. But TELL me your problems--I'll listen, but hell no I don't want to share 'em! Two different words doing two different jobs: what a concept! At least until what we in my house call "social-worker-speak" messes with the lovely clarity.

Thanks for sharing, Jane.

It's share banality!

Kristen and Eileen--why do you think parents are suddenly so soft with their kids, if they are? I'm tough on my kid for two very selfish reasons: 1. I want her to become someone I can be proud of. 2. I have my own interests, and she needs to shut up sometimes, and even go hungry for another 15 minutes, so I can read The New York Times in peace.

How could it be that today's parents don't share these selfish, basic impulses that keep me from indulging my daughter infinitely?

I've been wondering for ages why parents don't teach their kids that they are NOT the center of the universe, and don't help the kids become adults the parents can be proud of. And all I can come up with is a very scary thought indeed: that today's adults, in general, don't think more than one hour into the future. They're just trying to get through this day, this meeting, this tantrum, and hold little hope about tomorrow. I pray that I'm wrong, but if I'm right, what's to be done?

Interesting theory. But to what do we owe this sudden psychological shift in parents?

(And it doesn't explain the problem fully. In this case again Jane, my own shortsightedness helps remind Scout she is not the--only--center of the universe. I've said to Scout: "You need to go to bed right now, and not a peep out of you. It's 8:00 AND MOMMY AND DADDY ARE WATCHING THE SOPRANOS!")

David - if you re-read my comment you will note that I did not categorize "yahoo" as "parent" and that was intentional. Only the first item on my list applies to parents, and that arguably. I APPLAUD your reasons (both of them) for being tough on your child (though I'm willing to bet you're also a big fat softie at LEAST as much of the time!)

Jane - as to those parents who don't teach their kids that whole "you aren't the centre of the universe" thing, I agree with your perspective to a point. However, there are so many other potential reasons for this phenomenon that it would be simply annoying for me to list them all, and there are enough "blog hogs" out there as it is. So I'll just list the one that's my personal favourite. I see many current generation parents reacting to (and rebelling against) the parenting style they received in parenting their own children. That previous parenting approach was basically: "Because I said so!" "If you don't quit crying, I'll give you something to cry about" and, "Who told you the world was fair?!"

Oddly, despite the bad rap that past parenting approach is taking in today's "Aww, but it isn't my fault!" world, I see very few of the adults who were parented with limits and expectations and disappointments turning out to be serial killers, so it can't be THAT BAD as a parenting style.

I think it's because parents (selfishly) want to be "friends" with their kids and are afraid that telling them the truth (YOU ARE NOT THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE) might get in the way of that happening. The truth is, however, that our job should never be confused with being their friends. Our job is to teach them that they are here to be part of a community (family, school class, town) and in order to survive well they must be enjoyable to be around, and how many CENTERS OF THE UNIVERSE are enjoyable to be around? None. So these parents, sadly, are not doing their kids any favors, in fact they are harming them by not pointing out the foolishness in their thinking.

So David, your telling Scout to go to bed because Mommy and Daddy are watching the Sopranos just reinforces that she's part of a community (family) that doesn't center around her. And the benefit is that she's all the more secure when she knows mom and dad are doing well (even if "doing well" means watching the Sopranos together).

Put simply, I think my job is to show my kids that they are loved SO THAT they can turn around and love others within their "community" and to help them spot the foolishness in their own thinking and make wiser choices. And I believe the opportunity to be friends still exists, but it's certainly not my goal.

Right on, Eileen. The parent's job is to prepare the kid to exist peacefully in the world (and the community) as the parent knows it. The parent can't do any more than that—but it's unconscionable to do anything less.

I'm just wondering why THIS generation of parents has decided to rebel against their parents or feels more of a misguided need for their childrens' friendship than generations of parents previous.

Maybe parents are having fewer friends lately and need their chilren to be progeny and drinking buddies both?

I think there are a few reasons for this...here are my theories:
(1) We don't live near our nuclear families anymore, so we look to our kids for our family connections where our previous generations had their siblings and cousins at their fingertips and treated their children as kids.
(2) We don't neighbor as much due to automatic garage door openers that allow us to get in and out without as much as a wave, telephone ID that allows us to screen calls, television that replaces the need to go outside for entertainment and conversation - so we selfishly look to our kids for our "connection" and friendships.
(3) Oprah.

Eileen, you may be onto something here, although I cannot let it pass that you used the term "neighbor" as a verb. Enough said about that.

If what you say here is true it does explain a hell of a lot. If my only purpose in life was Scout and my relationship with her—I would probably treat her very differently, and she would have a fundamentally different dad. She would only see me in one context--Daddy--and not in the full context of my complicated life. Which she deserves to see too, I'd say.

So we seem to be coming to the conclusion that the problem with parents today is that they need to GET A LIFE.

Here's one more reason - many people have become enamoured with, and needy for "stuff" and so the $$$ required to pay for all that stuff (two SUVs, outrageously expensive house, $140 sneakers per kid, etc.) means both parents have to spend the bulk of their time working instead of parenting.

Parenting is an enormous, important, and damned demanding responsibility. If you choose to take that on, you may need to make some sacrifices, like giving up the second SUV and managing on no-name sneakers, so that you can work part-time maybe, and spend time actually parenting your kids instead of working 80 hours a week to pay for "stuff" to give them in lieu of your time and attention.

And before all the parents yell at me, I'm NOT talking about the parents who both need to work just to make ends meet. I'm referring to the families who cannot bear to eat, wear, drive or play with, anything that doesn't have a designer brand name on it!

From Merriam-Webster

NEIGHBOR

–verb (used without object) 9. to live or be situated nearby.
10. to associate with or as if with one's neighbors; be neighborly or friendly (often fol. by with).

David, is this just a pet peeve of yours?

I don't like "parent" used as a verb either. Or "impact" or "task." (And don't go quoting the dictionary, a merely descriptive device that now recognizes "irregardless" as meaning the same thing as "regardless.")

Is "to neighbor" a pet peeve? Sure.

Of mine, and of every other believer (you included, I am sure) that a mastery of the current English vocabulary renders the invention of terms like "to neighbor" unneccessay and cheesy both.

I totally agree with you on impact. Drives me crazy how people use it as a verb. Task? I've never heard anyone use that as a verb, but usually these errors start out east, then slowly move west, until we embrace them just the same.

Like the word "EMO" took two years to make it out here when my hip young niece told me what that meant on a visit to Ohio one summer.

But neighbor I like, mostly because I love the concept of doing more of it. Our neighborhood is incredibly good at this, mostly because they are old houses that don't have attached garages, so we're forced to ... well ... neighbor. We still have 4th of July parade/games/potluck, open house get-togethers and Easter Egg Hunts in the park. Many of our neighbors left for college then returned and bought a house int he very neighborhood they grew up in - sometimes from their parents. It's unheard of in most communities, so I love what we've got going on here. It's not uncommon for my neighbor to stop and tell me "I say Nathaniel riding his bike without his helmet." And I appreciate it. It's the whole "village" concept in work.

I love my neighborhood too, Eileen, and I love my neighbors. But if anyone told me I was doing a good job of "neighboring"—I thought we were drinking!—I would put down my gin and go back to my house and not come out for a year.

The word "curmudgeon" is coming to mind. Would you like to task me to look it up for you so you can be impacted by the reality of yourself?

Somewhere out there, Al Wilson is turning over in his grave (if he's deceased, that is).

And if I have to explain this one any of you, then you're not as old as you profess to be.

Robert

Robert, Cool! Obviously, I'm not as old as I thought I was (Woo Hoo!!) because I have no idea who Al Wilson is.

Would you please explain for the "young uns" among us?

Many thanks!

Al Wilson hit the charts in 1973 with the soul ballad, "Show and Tell."

"These are the eyes
That never knew how to smile till you came into my life (do-do-do-do-do)..."

Robert

Dear Eileen:

I'm certainly not the "nay, bore" type of precisian as a grammarian, but I find myself in agreement with the curmudg. . ., ah, with David in this discussion of "neighbor" used as a verb, for at least three reasons:

(1) I hate the abstractness of the word "neighbor." As David suggests, whenever you're talking or drinking or laughing with your neighbor, you are NEVER "neighboring" her, you are simply laughing, talking, or drinking with her. Why do we have to turn every definite, nameable activity of mankind into an abstract process? WHY? "Neighbor," no matter how many centuries of its use as a verb may have sanctioned your approval of it used in this way, strikes me as one of those illegitimate uses of nouns as verbs. You know what I mean: the hateful "socialize," "party," "finalize," etc.

(2) Although I could never think this of you, Eileen, I suspect that when some people use these bloodless general terms, they do so at least in part to dignify what they think are very ordinary activities. If I'm trading stories with my neighbor about the the loose morals of the couple two houses down the street, how much more flattering to me to describe my chatter as "neighboring" rather than "gossiping."

(3) I have never seen "neighbor" used as a verb by good writers. I would never use it as a verb myself, because I like vivid, concrete words describing things that actually exist and acts that actually took place. When you "neighbor" someone, what have you done? Anything or everything.

Eileen, please join David and me in our "neighbor watch." Keep this transitive, transient, intransigent intruder out of our neighborhood.

Bill, I'm sitting here with tears of appreciation and admiration streaming down my face.

Dearest Bill: I'm a believer. I've been won over, but for the record it is my deep respect for you, not David, that turned me around. I will never walk that "neighbor" route again. You've saved a wretch like me.

P.S. HOW did you know about my neighbors with the loose morals?

Well okay, Eileen, but "Bill Sweetland" is merely the pseudonym I use when I want to kick it into overdrive and win an argument that "David Murray" appears to be losing.

Sweetland is a pseudonym for you, Murray????

HA! In your dreams. There is only one Sweetland, as those of us who have jousted with him can attest.

Robert - I certainly agree there's only one Bill Sweetland, but... "joust"?? I can't imagine of what you speak.

Surely you aren't referring to our kindly, supportive, cuddly Ragan Bill Sweetland... are you???

;-)

P.S. David - sorry about the emoticon - just close your eyes and pretend it's not really there!

"Neighboring." Emoticons.

You people are going to drive me to an early grave.

Awww, c'mon!

Just think, how boring would your life would be without your merry band of kooks, oddballs and weirdos (Okay, and all the other people besides me, too) to entertain you here everyday!

Sheesh. Only eight days ago we were "wonderful freaks."

We're starting to feel like family.

How about "capture"? I was at a meeting last week and the meeting organizer asked if I or another woman were going to "capture what we talk about." Ummm, how about "take notes"? I hear "capture" all the time and it drives me nuts.

If I tell you to take notes, I'm being bossy. If I "encourage you to capture" what we say I'm giving you "choices."

We're all becoming like our Aunt Sally, who says, "Bless his heart" when she really means: "He's going to hell."