Conference moira::parenting_v3

    Well, Kate - I have a 6 yr old boy with a tail (had one for 10 months), 
    and a 4 yr old boy who has sported one for the last 2 months.  My boys
    are individual of each other - the older wanted a tail because his best
    friend (at that time) had one.  His new best friend doesn't, but he
    intends to keep it anyway.  The younger was asked every haricut last
    summer if he wanted a tail and up until recently he always said no.  
    He does his own thing and doesn't worry about what others think of him.
    
    I agree with you in that there will be some things I will have to
    control until my child can make his own decisions, but his hair and the
    color/style of his clothes (as long as they aren't offensive - but
    sylish) he can control.  I believe that there will be a time in his
    life when big decisions will have to be made, and as long as I can
    learn 1) to trust his judgement 2) be available for parental
    consultation 3) accept his knowledge-based decision then we will have a
    great relationship.  He will also learn there are certain things that
    are definate NO, certain things are YES and still others are AT YOUR
    DISCRETION.  He has done very well so far and I am very proud of both
    my sons!!!  Give them room to grow and sure enough they will!!
    
    I remember when I was a kid my mother would take us school shopping and
    by the clothes she liked.  Well, since she couldn't wear them it was a
    waste of money because I disliked her taste.  I don't want to force
    these little things on my kids.  I want them to be able to make
    grown-up decisions and feel good about themselves when they have.
    
    just one mother's humble opinion.....
    
    -sandy
    

    I agree that it can do no harm. I would, however, make the distinction
    between how my child comes to adhere to some fashion. In my case, I
    regret that fashion and consumerism exert such influence, and so would
    not suggest that my son conform to such a fashion as wearing one of
    those little rat-tails.  On the other hand, if my son on his own wants
    to "be fashionable" (and this is the case, as he asked to grow a tail 
    several months ago - he just turned 7), I see no reason to forbid him.
    That would not change his view of how he *wants* to present himself,
    and would be an unnecessary intrusion on his judgment.
    
    I will reserve my parental power to make choices for him to issues that
    are more fundamental, particularly those that affect others, and try to
    reserve that power for areas in which I believe he is not yet capable of
    making a reasonable decision. Easier said than done.
    
    Kit  

    Our rules are seemingly simple; clothes must be clean, neat, and
    comfortable enough to be played in.  If he wants to wear jeans ins some
    form or another every day the so be it!  T shirts are fine for rough
    and tumble.
    
    The tail on the hair is another issue though.  I just can't get into
    that anoying looking piece of hair down the back of the neck.  It just
    looks to me like someone gave the kid a lousy haircut.  (my opinion
    only)
    
    Lyn

    
    My son is only two, but we already let him make some of his own
    decisions (not that A two has many to make), but I will always 
    be open and honest with him.  I dont see any harm in a tail. when
    the fad goes out of style or he decides that he does not like it
    any more it is just a matter of having it cut off.  I also hated all
    the clothes that my mother bought for us kids.  I dont think that 
    you should make all the decission for a child, because dont forget that 
    some day they will be teen agers and adults and you dont want to have
    to worry can I trust them.  I believe that if you let your child make 
    small decisions that they will grow up to be there own indepent person.
    
    
    Della

    It's easy to forget that acceptable "style" is, to some degree, 
    a matter of local expectations, anyhow:
    
    Yesterday I dressed my almost-two-year-old daughter in 
    a new, American-bought OshKosh two piece shirt and shorts set, 
    and sent her off to her childminder. (We're in the UK.)
    From the response, you would have thought I'd died her hair purple.
    (Later) the childminder complained that "the shirt is too short
    to tuck in and the shorts are much too long; they don't
    fit and they look strange." Actually the clothes fit fine, are the
    right size, and just happen to be one of those shorty shirts and
    baggy pants outfits, if you know what I mean.  
    She didn't understand that Oshkosh has moved
    into designer clothes for kids, and that what we have here is
    trendy American style, not freakishness. :-) I tried to explain 
    to her shocked her further: "Those sort of styles for little ones?!"
    
    Now, I'm dealing with a rather provenchal woman, here. All the same,
    I have the choice of bending to the subtle pressure and
    dressing my daughter in acceptable British garb, or having
    her look "strange." Strangeness is in the eye of the beholder,
    I say.
    
    -Barbara
                  

    
    re: .5 and "those sorts of styles for little ones?!"
    
    True confession (try not to beat me up too much!):
    
    I must admit that I *sometimes* feel the same way.  For example, I 
    sometimes cringe when I see little girls dressed in child-size versions
    of "sexy" clothing (like an adult woman might wear to a bar on a 
    Saturday nite....I know nothing that OshKosh makes falls in to this
    category...but you know the kind of stuff I mean).   For little boys,
    it's damn near impossible to find pants that aren't olive drab or 
    faded grey (i.e.  mini versions of what a teenager might wear).  I
    mean, they're just little kids, they'll have plenty of time to wear
    adult clothes, why start now?   Not to mention, that these jeans carry
    price tags of $15-25....
    
    On the basenote topic, I'm all for allowing children to make their
    own choices within guidelines.  In fact, I think it's a critical
    part of their development.   That doesn't mean, however, that I would
    deliberately offer "trendy" choices as someone else pointed out.
    
    Carol 

    Allowing the kids to make their own decisions doesn't mean you
    need to suggest trendy things, or that you can't veto things that
    go beyond what you think is acceptable for that age.  
    
    For instance, if you really can't accept that your second-grader
    wants to wear jeans to school every day, you can lay down the rule
    of what sorts of things are acceptable, but allow the child to
    make his or her own choices within those limits.  And I think you
    should always let the kid have a choice about what to wear on a
    given day.  Even David gets to choose between the t-shirt in my
    left hand and the t-shirt in my right :)
    
    For us, the big issues were learning how to budget money and how
    to make choices, not about styles per se.  There never was much in
    the way of things we thought were totally unacceptable for Kat,
    but we did occasionally veto expensive trendy things that were
    either unreasonably beyond our budget or that she only wanted
    because of the advertising and the "all my friends are doing it"
    syndrome.  
    
    I don't think we ever restricted what she could buy with her own
    money. A certain percentage of gift money had to be saved, but if
    she wanted to save her allowance for three months so she could buy
    an ugly brand-name t-shirt that wore out in three weeks, that was
    her money and her mistake.  And she's been much more careful about
    checking the quality of her purchases since then, I might add.
    
    Steven so far hasn't had any problems -- he likes to dress
    reasonably well, so he wants polo shirts and sweaters rather than
    the t-shirts Kat lived in, and he likes the gray jeans .6
    mentions.  We find that Bradlees and K-Mart generally have similar
    styles at half the price.  
    
    When Kat got old enough to be into brand-names, we used to
    compromise -- if we had been planning to spend $30 on pants, we'd
    tell her she could either have 2 pairs of $15 Bradlees jeans, or
    one pair of designer jeans.  Sometimes she'd go for the designer
    jeans and sometimes she'd want quantity.  Even later, she had a
    fixed budget that had to cover all her school clothing, but within
    that limit she could buy whatever she wanted.  One year she did
    want only a handful of expensive items and wore them over and
    over.  It wasn't the choice I would have made, but it was her
    choice.  Now she gets a much larger allowance that has to cover
    all her clothing expenses for the whole year.  Except for winter
    coats and other exceptional expenses, we don't buy her anything. 
    
    Oh, and be prepared -- when your kid gets to be a teenager,
    whatever you do will turn out to have been wrong.  Kat looks at
    pictures of herself when she was in fourth grade and wails, "How
    could you let me go around like a TOMBOY?"  Telling her she *was*
    a tomboy doesn't quite cut it.  But at the same time her best
    friend is wailing to her mother because she always had to dress
    like a lady and now she doesn't know how to relax.
    
    --bonnie

    I agree with Carol (.6)!
    
    Without getting too deep here, though, I do think that some of my
    opinions are based on the feeling of "dressing" my kids when they were
    (and are) little, almost like playing house (get the shrink, please!).
    
    Anyway, to try to explain...  I feel there's so little time in which I
    get to dress my children -- really, how long does it last?  Three or
    four years?  My youngest, Chase, who will be three in July seems to
    really like his clothes.  It takes me weeks and weeks to find the right
    ones; I'm not crazy about Ninja turtles, and there are so many styles
    available that mirror what boys thirteen-years-old are wearing.  So,
    when I'm in a store and find a few things that I think are adorable, I
    buy them and keep building from there (it IS getting harder as he gets
    older!).
    
    I cut his hair -- he has very straight hair, so there are not a lot of
    styling options.  He wouldn't know to "ask" to have a tail, so that's
    not a problem.  I always assumed that when I saw two-year-olds in the
    mall with spiked, moussed hair or tails that the parents had chosen
    that "look" for them.  I encourage my child to choose what story he's
    like to hear, what movie he'd like to watch, what he'd like for
    breakfast, etc.  If he wanted to choose what outfit from his closet
    he'd like to wear that day, great, but when it comes to actually buying
    the outfit or choosing a hairstyle, it's still (for a little bit
    longer) my call.
    
    Anyway, soon he'll be making all the clothing and hairstyling
    decisions, which when the time comes, will be fine with me.  For now,
    I'll just enjoy.  Do I sound too calm??????  Why not, I'll have another
    little wonder to dress and comb in just about eight weeks...
    
    Dale

    Okay, I know I'm setting myself up here, but here's a (generally)
    opposing viewpoint.
    
    I think that up until a certain age (maybe 13-14) the parent should
    dictate what a child wears and how they wear their hair.  The reason is
    that there are too many people around who do not have any respect for
    authority.  Now I'm not saying to follow authority blindly, but I truly
    believe that there is too much freedom today with regards to our
    children.  I also know that this is a bigger issue than just a rat tail,
    or a dress code, but it all figures into the equation.  I think we need
    to instill some accaptable values into our children before we start letting
    them make decisions based on these values.  Now as I said, I know
    dress, or a rat tail isn't going to destroy a person, but for me it
    opens up a bigger issue about what kind of "rights" kids have.  As you
    have probably guessed by now, I am all for dress codes. :')  
    
    Mike

    I wish the US public schools would institute uniforms, which is common
    in many other countries.  It would minimize the competitiveness over
    clothing and help kids focus on the work at hand.
    
    I read that one inner city school started requiring uniforms, as part
    of a general overhaul program.
    
    Sigh. . .
    Laura

    Mike,
    
    I have a couple of thoughts here.
    
    The first one is that it was my parents' excessive respect for
    authority that made them defer to the schoolteachers who belittled
    them and made me feel like everything I was good at was bad and I
    was morally flawed for not wanting to work to be good at things I
    wasn't good at and didn't enjoy.  But that's an aside. 
    
    My main question is, if a 13-year-old is only just old enough to
    decide how to dress and wear their hair, how is that same child
    only 5 years later going to be able to go away to college and
    suddenly know how to dress for a variety of situations, manage
    their own budget, buy and maintain their own clothing and
    toiletries and perhaps kitchen, keep their own schedule, decide
    when to study and when to socialize, decide when and whether to
    party, what to do at the party, what to do after the party and
    with whom, eat a wholesome diet, keep their laundry done, get
    along with a roommate, and still keep their grades up?  
    
    Responsibility takes practice, lots of practice.  It sometimes
    takes getting things wrong -- it may sound cruel to say, but the
    best way to have your child learn why he should wear clean clothes
    to school is to let him wear dirty clothes one day and listen to
    what his friends say to him about it.  Steven did this when he was
    in kindergarten and he hasn't worn an excessively grubby pair of
    pants to school since.  
    
    My daughter -- who is as responsible and respectful as you could
    want -- went through a punk stage a couple of years ago, and you
    could see the enlightenment in her head when she went in to get
    her high-school schedule wearing her black leather motorcycle
    jacket and her black leather boots with the silver-tipped toes,
    and the secretary in charge of distributing schedules couldn't
    find Kat's schedule because she wouldn't believe that someone
    dressed like Kat was in the honors classes.  No amount of rules
    and restrictions from me could ever have taught her as much  about
    how people perceive you based on your dress.  
    
    --bonnie

re: .9

Mike,

     I almost get the feeling that you are overstating your case in order to
be controversial or to make some other point.  I'd like to understand if your 
position is as extreme as it comes across to me.
     Are you suggesting that saying "Do you want to wear the green sweater
or the red sweater?" is giving a kid too much freedom in regards to their
personal appearance?
     What "rights" DOES a kid have with regard to their personal appearance? 
None?  
     How much freedom should a kid have over their dress at 13?  
     If you're saying that up until a certain age that a parent should have
veto power, or that you will refuse to pay for $50 designer jeans, then I
won't disagree with you, and I doubt that many others will either.  It seems 
to me that a lot of the discussion is no so much over whether a parent should 
have veto power, but at what point they would exercise that power.
     If you're saying that you will tell a twelve year old exactly what to 
wear, and they have no choice in the matter, then yes, I will take the bait.  
     You seem to perceive dictating what a child wears as "instilling
values".  At some point, I perceive it as expressing a lack of confidence
that the child can make a reasoned, principled decision.
      What does your dress code say?  Neat and clean?  Navel covered?  All
female students wear a chador?  What if the dress code says "All boys must
have a rat tail"?  Or "all girls must wear lipstick"? 

re: .10

>    I wish the US public schools would institute uniforms, which is common
> in many other countries.  It would minimize the competitiveness over 
> clothing and help kids focus on the work at hand.

     Remember that many of the countries where uniforms are required have 
cultures that value conformity.  The fact that they wear uniforms is a 
reflection of the culture, not an imposition on it, as it would be here, in 
many situations. 

>    I read that one inner city school started requiring uniforms, as part
> of a general overhaul program
  
And in many cases, these are stopgap measures, aimed at preventing gang
members from wearing uniforms that signify gang membership.  In some cases,
wearing a certain brand of sneakers isn't a matter of social ostracism, it
may literally be a matter of life and death.  But I don't know of anyone who
believes that requiring uniforms will make the gangs go away, or eliminate
the reasons for their existence.    

Clay

    Perhaps my case is overstated, but I see elementary school kids going
    to school in shorts with torn t-shirts etc and I'm thinking What the
    heck is going on here.  No, I am not saying that you pick out your
    childs clothing every day until their 12 or 13, I am saying that you
    should have rules which need to be followed.  Certain dress is
    appropriate for certain situations (although I'd like to find out who
    invented the tie and tie theirs real tight.  It had to be a female who
    was angry at some male ;')).  It just seems to me that kids today have
    too many rights and not enough structure.  I agree that there is a
    happy medium somewhere in the middle.  
    
    
    RE: Bonnie-I don't know about your experience, but I had changed a 
    heck of a lot between the ages of 13-18.  As I had between the ages 
    of 25-30.  5 years is a great deal of room for change.
    
    
    Mike
    
    

    >RE: Bonnie-I don't know about your experience, but I had changed a
    >heck of a lot between the ages of 13-18.  As I had between the
    >ages of 25-30.  5 years is a great deal of room for change.
    
    I agree -- I wasn't talking about changes so much as I was about
    experiences handling difficult situations within protective
    limits, changing my rules to accompany the changes in the person. 
    
    My own view is that I'm trying to raise my children to be
    independent, responsible adults who can make thoughtful decisions,
    stick by their convictions, and live with the consequences of
    their actions.  To me, that implies practice in making decisions
    at the appropriate level for their age, where the consequences are
    acceptable.  I also assume that in at least some cases those
    decisions are going to be things I don't agree with or approve of.
    
    For David, at 20 months, an appropriate decision is which of two
    t-shirts he wants to wear.  For Steven, it's choosing to wear a
    long-sleeved shirt even though it's going to be a scorching day,
    and living with being too hot all day.  Turns out he *wasn't* hot
    except in the bus on the way home; his classroom has the air
    conditioning turned up colder than he likes it.  So my judgement
    in this case would have been wrong. 
    
    I don't think I'm talking about "rights" so much as I am trying to
    respect each child's boundaries as an individual.  I try to give
    them room to safely explore and develop their full humanity,
    including the moral strength that comes from making moral choices.
    
    --bonnie

    Pat and I seem to tend to fall back on the way we were brought up when 
    making many decisions about Michael.  We've read a number of things in
    the books that we simply don't believe because of personal experience. 
    Some of them are real hot buttons in this conference, and I won't start
    a rat hole here.
    
    But...  One of those things is dress.  We grew up in a time when pretty
    strict dress codes were enforced by the schools (neat jeans and
    tucked-in shirts for boys and dresses - no pants - for girls).  But in
    addition, both my wife and I were *guided*, not mandated, by our
    parents, about both purchasing and wearing clothes.  However, if we got
    out of line too far (e.g. a miniskirt up to her hips, or for me wearing
    jeans to church) a firm hand brought us back into line.  Today, the
    "out of line" could be updated to things like dying the hair green or
    getting one ear pierced.
    
    No, I have no intention of telling Michael exactly what he must wear. 
    But I also have no intention of just letting him buy and wear any ol'
    thing he chooses.  There must be some middle ground somewhere; my
    parents found it, my wife's parents found it, and if I'm lucky and try
    real hard maybe I can find it too.
    
    Steve

    re .15 - I agree.  As long as I am paying for it I should have some say
    in what my kids wear.  My 9 year old is able to pick things out for
    himself, he tends to look like the other kids, neon colors or black.
    and sneakers.  I will tell him what clothes are appropriate to wear to
    school and which are appropriate to wear for play.  He will be going
    off to a private school next year where there is a dress code of sorts
    and I will expect him to abide by it - therefore our purchases will be
    guided by it.
    
    As a note the year ofter I graduated from high school the "dress code"
    as dropped. I consider that to be the end of civilization as I wish it
    to be!

    re: .14 and .15
    
    Nobody in this string said at any point that parents shouldn't, if
    necessary, set limits on what their children wear.  I said I had
    never found it necessary, that other tactics had worked better for
    me with my daughter, but that's setting a different kind of limit,
    rather than that I didn't have limits.  The reason I can now let
    her have complete freedom about what she buys with her money is
    that I know she's not going to choose anything that's too far out
    of line.  It was a stage arrived at gradually, not a state that
    existed from birth.
    
    From what I see among my neighbors, it seems that a lot of the
    push for dress codes or uniforms in schools is coming from parents
    who are trying avoid the responsibility of teaching their kids
    about appropriate dress in all its forms. 
    
    Too many parents aren't willing to deal with the kids' pushback
    about trendy and expensive clothes, negative peer pressure,
    exploitive advertising, and all the other issues that swirl around
    the way we as people dress.  Maybe they don't feel comfortable
    because they never learned it themselves.  So they try to push it
    off on the school to enforce.  
    
    --bonnie

    Bonnie, I'd have to say that your neighbors are probably a misread on
    your part or not the reasons that most people are for uniforms.  It
    puts the kids as even when starting in school.  Now, a parent that
    cannot afford the $100 tennis shoes may have relayed this information
    to their kids, but you know how cruel kids can be.  I think this is a
    valid reason for dress codes, probably one of the most valid that there
    is.  I remember the kids in school who couldn't afford the latest and
    greatest, and I remember the rash of BS they recieved.  Now you may say
    they should "suck it up" and don't worry about what the others think,
    but at the early ages it can cause a great deal of unnecessary pain and
    anguish when it could very easily be avoided. 
    
    
    Mike 

    Mike, 
    
    I have to respectfully disagree.  
    
    First of all, you misunderstood my point.  I'm not talking about
    the parents who can't afford clothes, and when I said they were
    afraid to deal with the issues, I wasn't talking about taking
    insults.   I was talking about some parents who don't have the
    guts to say no to $100 tennis shoes or $50 designer jeans and want
    the school to step in and say it for them so they don't "have" to
    keep buying them.  
    
    Second, I was on the receiving end of the BS about not having good
    and stylish clothes, and it's not one of the best reasons for a
    dress code.  A dress code doesn't do anything to solve the
    problem.  If all the boys have to wear suits and all the girls
    have to wear dresses, some will wear expensive suits and dresses. 
    If they all have to wear uniforms provided by the school, some
    will wear expensive shoes, or diamond hair clips, or carry leather
    notebooks.  
    
    Conforming to the dress code at my high school also cost me quite
    a bit more than simply wearing a clean shirt and jeans would have. 
    I don't come from a background where women normally wear nice
    dresses.  A uniform might help that problem, but I doubt that 
    enforcing a surface conformity is going to do much to make society
    more equal. 
    
    In my daughter's school, there don't appear to be all that many
    poorer kids clamoring for a dress code.  It's mostly the middle
    class parents who don't have the guts to turn off the money tap.
    
    One example is the prom.  At first Kat tried to tell me she had to
    spend a couple of hundred bucks to split a limo with some of her
    friends.  We said fine, if she wanted to earn her own money for
    it, she could spend it on a limo.  After some hemming and hawing,
    she and her date decided they could just go in his Jeep instead. 
    But several of her friends' parents are dumping the bucks for the
    limo and complaining that the school should have a rule against
    taking limos to the prom.
    
    That's the kind of abdication of responsibility I'm talking
    about.
    
    --bonnie

    Bonnie,
    
    Why is it that if people don't think the way you do, it that they
    "don't have the guts" to do something, or they want the school system
    to step in and take over for the parent.  I suggest to you that there
    are people who are sincerely pro school uniform for valid reasons, and
    are not spineless jellyfish who cannot stand up to their children.
    
    
    Mike

    I didn't say there weren't people with valid reasons.  I said that
    among my neighbors, the majority of them seem to favor uniforms 
    because it gets them off the hook.  The majority of them admit
    they exercise little or no control over their own kids' clothing
    budgets and wardrobes.  They claim to have no choice.
    
    I won't say there are no valid reasons for uniforms.  I haven't
    heard a convincing reason yet, but that doesn't mean the reason
    doesn't exist.  
    
    --bonnie

    Hi Bonnie,
    
    I guess my point is that just because they are not valid in your mind
    does not automatically invalidate them, that's all.  Anyway, I see many
    good reasons for school uniforms.  Maybe the poorer kids wouldn't have
    to steal money/clothing or kill someone so as they are to be "in style".
    
    Looks like we'll just have to leave it at that, I don't think we are
    going to convince one another.  Have a good day.
    
    
    Peace,
    
    Mike