I’ve been teaching for ten years, and you’ve summarized (especially in the response to Dr. Phil) so many of the things I’ve been attempting to demonstrate to parents.

1) Interrupting the feedback loop that is designed to teach children cause and effect causes irreparable harm.
2) For thousands of years, children were expected–by every culture on the face of the planet–to begin assimilating themselves into adult culture somewhere between 12 and 15. We’ve invented adolescence, and then extended that age further out to around 29 years old, all to disastrous results.
3) I am an adult. No child–mine or anyone else’s–will ever speak to me as if I am beneath them, but we can talk as equals all day long.
4) Treating people like adults tends to result in the production of adults, or–at minimum–the clear identification of those who are not yet fit to participate in culture as adults.

If you’re a reader, I imagine you’d love Free Range Kids by Lorraine Skenazy, Have a New Kid by Friday by Kevin Leman, or Weapons of Mass Instruction by JOhn Taylor Gatto. All seem to be aligned with your philosophical stance.

It is hard to blame Nyad herself–fifty years ago, would anyone have even thought that someone kneeling in prayer after a touchdown was a big deal? Definitely not. This is a symptom of polarization in this country. People with different viewpoints on issues are moving farther apart, and this leads to some increased tension among some people who take their beliefs (or lack thereof) very seriously.

I do have a comment on this: “I couldn’t understand why so many Christians needed a famous person to validate their faith. I always assumed Jesus–not Tim Tebow–was the centerpiece of the Christian faith.”

People throughout history have always looked for someone to be some sort of centerpiece for their beliefs. Christians are people too, and make the same mistakes. Muslims have always held Mohammad in the highest of regards (much as Christians have with Jesus in the past, but tolerance has gotten the better of them), yet at times they have put their faith in people like Saladin or Osama. Communists should be preaching Marx, but their heroes at the time of revolutions are Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, and Che. This is how people are, and how they will always be.