Читать книгу A Spoonful of Sugar - Liz Fraser - Страница 19

Childhood is the time to be a child, to be treated as a child and not to be treated as equals with adults.

Ah yes. The old ‘treating kids as equals’ habit. This worrying trend is one I have noticed increasingly in the last decade, and it disturbs me. Kids often seem to be put on a level with their parents now: they’re asked what Madam would like for dinner, what time Sir would like to go to bed, what her Ladyship would like to wear, what Mummy can do to make her offspring’s lives absolutely perfect in every way, in fact.

Talking to some of my mum friends and just listening to conversations around me in the street I observe the same concerns, but it seems few people feel safe to say that they don’t want to treat kids as equals. That they feel there should be a ‘place’ for children, and another for adults. Perhaps there’s a fear that they’ll be seen as unkind, or cruel or even – Heaven forbid! – Bad Parents.

But hang on, give the self-flagellation a break: is asking what your child wants for dinner really treating him like a mini adult, or are we just trying to give kids a voice, and to listen to their opinions? That’s surely not a bad thing. I mean, they may poo their pants for several years and everything, and make your hair fall out, but they have feelings and we can listen to them!

Granny thinks it’s more to do with role clarity.

‘I think that in many ways the line between childhood and adulthood has become so blurred and this is causing a lot of problems, because you lose your authority.’

‘Such as?’

‘Well, where to start? The clothing that’s made for little children that looks like it’s fallen out of a seventeen-year-old pop star’s dressing room, the fact that parents cannot discipline children for fear of being told off themselves, the number of tiny tots who are dragged out to cafés every weekend to have a cappuccino with their parents – that’s no place for a small child! They want to play, and muck about, not sit in cafés while Mummy and Daddy read the newspaper.’

Now hold on – I happen to agree that there are far too many kids being hoiked off to Starbucks several times a week and are all but ignored while they’re there or given gargantuan muffins and pastries to keep them quiet. It’s very depressing actually. But we do it from time to time, and I consider it valuable – no, essential – grown-up time, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with having a nice sit down over a latte while my kids read a book, or draw a picture. Or, as we do most of the time, actually talk to one another without emptying the dishwasher, hanging out the laundry or picking up thousands of bits of Bionicles from the kitchen floor. Going to cafés means having unadulterated family time, and that’s a good thing.

But Granny doesn’t mean only this. She sees it as one example of the many ways children have crept into an adult world. Being given the same responsibilities and choices as we have.