(cawff, cawff...)

Another depressing and important topic. (4.00 / 1)

From your link, though:

What has changed is our awareness of child soldiers, boosted by monitoring, reporting, and even Hollywood spectacle. And this has coincided with a dramatic change in the perception of childhood, at least in the industrialized West, where early years are seen as a sacred time reserved for innocence, learning, and play. The West's view of children as needing nurture is an outlier in much of the rest of the world, where children are also an economic resource -- on farms and in households, markets, and factories.

I agree with that analysis, but it raises serious questions. In reading through the entire page, I wondered if this was an argument for or against the current treatment of children around the military, especially in the Third World. It seemed he was arguing against the idea of child soldiers; but if many societies do not make the distinctions that Western industrial nations do, what would be the argument/action to take in those societies? Would the distinctions between "children" and "adults" even be understood? He himself cites the grey area of the age of seventeen in our own country.

Very interesting, Mr. O. Thanks.

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by: vox humana @ Wed May 27, 2009 at 22:49:54 PM CDT

As a former starter of alternative schools, I'd love to talk about the role of children. (0.00 / 0)

I tend toward Summerhill, but I realize the power of peer, and gender roles.

What was that SF novel, Childhood's End? And Heinlein's conceit about breeding for longevity? And Michael Valentine Smith?

human children (starting in New Athens with the Greggson children) begin displaying telepathic and telekinetic abilities and as a result, become estranged from their parents. Karellen then reveals the true purpose of why the Overlords came to Earth. They are in service to the Overmind, a cosmic mind amalgamated from ancient galactic civilizations, freed from the limitations of ordinary matter. The Overlords are not themselves capable of joining the Overmind, but the Overmind has charged them with the duty of fostering humanity's transition to a higher plane of existence and merger with the Overmind.

One of the few dreams I allow myself...

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by: Ormond Otvos @ Thu May 28, 2009 at 01:31:19 AM CDT

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Sounds like mysticism to me. (3.00 / 1)

amalgamee

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by: vox humana @ Thu May 28, 2009 at 13:52:08 PM CDT

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The other dream being (2.00 / 1)

the one where you steal people's handles to try and make yourself relevant and generally act like an asshole?

"Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it", Helen Keller, communist.

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by: DavidByron @ Thu May 28, 2009 at 14:01:23 PM CDT

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Boring. I'll leave the asshole role to you. (0.00 / 0)

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by: Ormond Otvos @ Fri May 29, 2009 at 17:49:39 PM CDT

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