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Progressives, in their never-ending crusade to force everyone to adhere to their religion, have added another commandment to their list of evils: Childism. They describe it as “anti-child attitudes” which lead to oppression of children.
What fresh hell is this? you may be wondering. Not so fresh actually: two psychiatrists, Chester Pierce and Gail Allen, proposed the theory back as 1975. They described it as “the automatic assumption of superiority of any adult over any child.” One can assume that this would include parents as well.
Apparently the theory didn’t become mainstream then. But in 2012, psychoanalyst Elisabeth Young-Bruehl resurrected the theory in her book, Childism: Confronting Prejudice Against Children. The book’s description reads, in part:
In this groundbreaking volume on the human rights of children, acclaimed analyst, political theorist, and biographer Elisabeth Young-Bruehl argues that prejudice exists against children as a group and that it is comparable to racism, sexism, and homophobia ….
Young-Bruehl has died, and her book is now ten years old. But progressives have rediscovered Childism, just in time for the Left to use it to usurp parents’ roles in their children’s lives.
In April, Rebecca Adami, associate professor in education at Stockholm University, resurrected Childism in an article at The Conversation UK. She claims that its roots are in racism and sexism:
Ideas about women’s inferiority to men or assumptions about race feed into ideas about children’s inferiority to adults. These are prejudices about who has and who lacks rationality, logic and authority. This prejudice stands in the way of children being heard and taken seriously.
Citing the 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, Adami claims that the UN didn’t go far enough:
But while the convention states that the rights it lays out should apply to any child without discrimination on the basis of factors such as race and sex, it does not define or address discrimination against children.
And …
The convention on the rights of the child also includes the instruction that the “evolving capacities of the child” should be taken into consideration when judging matters relating to children. This may silence children’s voices on their own rights, as a child may be deemed too immature or not ready to have a say in their life.
In case you want to read Adami’s theory on Childism in greater depth, her new book (of course there’s a new book!) The Rights of the Child: Legal, Political, and Ethical Challenges is available for purchase for $153. But it’s in hardback, which, I guess, makes up for the sticker shock.
Philadelphia social worker Danna Bodenheimer has seized upon Childism as a way to explain those cringey videos in which parents prank their kids.
You know the ones — where parents tell their small children that they ate their Halloween candy. Or even dress up as the Grinch to terrorize them at Christmastime. If I recall correctly, the trend began with Jimmy Kimmel asking parents to record their kids’ reactions when they’re told their Halloween candy is gone.
Take this video, for example, from just a few months ago.
Bodenheimer says in her own TikTok video that these are examples of Childism, which “subscribes to the idea that children don’t have real feelings, that they can be compulsively homogenized and it won’t harm them.”
No, it’s sheer child abuse. It doesn’t come from “Childism” or any sort of systemic oppression. Rather this emerges from a generation which has acquired these two beliefs: 1) that children are not gifts from God, but are expendable prior to birth; and 2) the ultimate achievement in life comes not from raising responsible children, but from attaining fame on social media.
But I do agree with Bodenheimer on this:
Long-term trauma and mental health issues could arise as these children have brains that are still developing …
The scientific theory of Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget has long instructed those who study child development that there are four stages of cognitive development. Piaget also found that a child can’t begin to understand abstract concepts until the adolescent years. Later, 2009 research from the American Psychological Association asserted that emotional maturity lags behind cognition in those same adolescents.
Yet anti-Childists insist that immature children must have authority to control their lives. And adults who would deny them that? They’re exercising bigotry similar to racism.
Abolishing so-called Childism does not protect the rights of children. Instead, it gives support to those who would abuse them.
Take, for example, the “Genders & Sexualities Alliance” club at a middle school in Ft. Collins, CO. A 12-year-old female student reported to her mother that her teacher invited to attend an “art” club. So she did. However, this was an LGBTQ club where an outside speaker told attendees that “what you hear in here, stays in here.” The speaker also told students that “parents aren’t safe, and that it’s OK to lie to them about where they are in order to attend this meeting.” The mother added:
She doubled down that parents aren’t safe [and] that heterosexuality and monogamy are not normal.
The school district acknowledged that such a club does exist, but would not address the mother’s allegations.
Yet anti-Childists would insist that such undermining of parents is perfectly appropriate. Because a 12-year-old has equal rights to their parents, who are guilty of bigotry should they deny the child what they want.
It would also leave the door open for online predators to groom young teen boys and girls into sexual activity. “Mom, I love him!” should suffice. Besides, it’s not pederasty, merely an “intergenerational relationship.”
Finally, let’s not overlook those who promote medical transgender surgeries on minor children without parental consent. To be anti-Childist, one must declare the wishes of the child to override that of the parent, even if it means permanently altering a child’s body.
I am reminded of the words of the great Russian author, dissident, and Orthodox Christian Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. In 1983, he addressed the Templeton Foundation in London after receiving its Prize for Progress in Religion. Forty years later, the speech’s essence still rings true.
Solzhenitsyn said in his Templeton Address:
More than half a century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of older people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: “Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.”
Is this not what is happening now? The contemporary zeitgeist has forgotten God, and instead worships the Self. It listens to progressives, who claim they can create a utopian society with their own erratic tenets of faith. Rather than adherence to the Ten Commandments, progressives have concocted new sins, like Childism, which rejects the natural inclination of parents of all faiths to guide their children.
Forgetting God and replacing Him with progressivism explains the great disasters which have befallen the country.
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Cameron says: Let’s be blunt: It has nothing to do with “rights” but everything to do with “control.” They will sacrifice everyone and everything in their vain effort to force Heaven on Earth.
GWB says: And you nail it.
GWB says: proposed the theory back as 1975
Yep. And as someone not yet in my teen years, even I thought, “How stupid can you be? There has to be something else they’re going for here.” Only later did I hear the proverb that there are some things so stupid only the “well-educated” can believe them.
resurrected the theory
I think the proper term would be “re-animated”. That’s the term for what Frankenstein did and others who raise the dead for nefarious purposes, I think.
prejudice exists against children as a group
Ummmm…. and? Yes, it does. They are little barbarians who crap everywhere and eat off the floor and scream at all hours for attention. Also, they don’t know much of anything, while often insisting they do.
IOW, they’re Progressives. Who wouldn’t have a prejudice against that?
This prejudice stands in the way of children being heard and taken seriously.
No, what stands in the way of them being heard and taken seriously is the fact that they don’t know diddlysquat (unless they listen to and learn from the adults) and they’re incredibly self-centered and emotional. They have to be raised properly to stop being all of those things.
Citing the 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child
Which is one of the most idiotic proclamations ever from the UN. And that’s saying something. And I knew that at the time, as a recent college graduate.
a child may be deemed too immature or not ready to have a say in their life
Because they still want to touch the stove. And they can’t dress themselves. But, obviously they can know what gender they are, regardless of their biological plumbing. This is Progressivism run rampant, reductio ad absurdum.
No, it’s sheer child abuse.
Sometimes. But some of it is helping to teach the children. (One of the important things growing up is trusting the adults. The other important piece is learning not to trust anyone unless they’ve earned it. And that sometimes they’ll still mess with you.)
BTW, I think having the Grinch steal their presents if they’re bad children is a great idea. Teach them consequences for their actions. Our son had a very poor Christmas one year because he was obnoxiously greedy and materialistic on his birthday. A bunch of already bought presents just went into storage until the next year.
a generation which has acquired these two beliefs
I will agree with your two points, however. (And acknowledge that you and I might be speaking of different levels of “pranking”.)
a child can’t begin to understand abstract concepts until the adolescent years
Baloney. Most of that kind of malarkey from child psychology is forcing human beings into a mechanical mold so they can be treated as any other physical manifestation of the laws of physics. It’s scientism and progressivism in action, turning people into widgets.
2009 research from the American Psychological Association
By that point the APA had become horrifically captured by the extreme end of Progressivism. They were already losing their collective minds by the 90s.
Yet anti-Childists insist that immature children must have authority to control their lives.
If you look carefully right here, you can see part of the problem. Like a great many other things, Progressivism makes a fallacy of composition*. They take specific occurrences of problems and apply a universal solution, as if the problem were universal.
So, if some men beat their wives, then “women are oppressed by their husbands” and the solution must be some sort of universal solution. The solution is never something like “Well, we should deal with those men in some fashion” and rather “Well, we should remove all power from all men over all women.”
So it is here: some parents prevent their children from developing by not allowing them to gain gradual control over their own lives, therefore all children must be made autonomous. Which, to anyone not blinded by their religious doctrine (progressivism), is patently stupid. But these people are “experts” – really it means they are doctrinaire to the point of absurdity. So, away we go with overly broad statements about child autonomy. (It’s also necessary to protect their more absurd ideas. Letting any portion of it slip means the whole construct eventually goes sliding down the California hillside.)
(* I will gladly stand corrected if I used the wrong fallacy there. There are so many.)
She doubled down that parents aren’t safe [and] that heterosexuality and monogamy are not normal.
Understand this is a religious doctrine. Treat it as such – the school is trying to evangelize your child into fundamentalist progressivism.
promote medical transgender surgeries on minor children
A great many things pushed on children these days is to groom them for two of the prominent pillars of Progressivism: hedonism and transhumanism. The goal is the triumph of human will over both nature and morality.
“Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.”
I would disagree only in this: they have denied God. They haven’t forgotten Him so much as attempted to shut Him out in order to practice their deceits in darkness.
I’ve gone on too long, or I’d QFT that entire last paragraph, Kim. Excellent post.
Scott says: “Yet anti-Childists insist that immature children must have authority to control their lives.”…
Ok, so lets get rid of the drinking age, min age for a drivers license, and my favorite, remove all age restrictions for purchase of a firearm! (the morons pushing this bovine excrement are the ones that insist we raise the age to purchase a firearm are they not??? ) Doesn’t that make THEM guilty of “childism”?
Kim Hirsch says: Last week I was watching Gutfeld’s program when the panel discussed the 13-year-old who stopped the school bus when the driver had a health attack of some sort.
Kat Timpf pipes up: “There shouldn’t be any restrictions on drivers licenses anyway.” I shook my head. Then again, Timpf has said that she no longer believes the Catholicism in which she was raised. Her god is now Libertarianism, apparently. Sadly, there are some on “our side” too.
Cameron says: Put her in a walled off city with no restrictions on kids. Five minutes later, she’ll recant her beliefs.
NTSOG says: I often referred parents and young teachers to Golding’s novel “Lord of the Flies” in the hope it would help them step back from the little ‘treasures’ and understand why children need strict adult care, guidance and a structured upbringing until they were of such an age – usually early twenties – as to be reasonably safe and functional in open society – for themselves and others.
Cliff says: Amen. See also “Lord of the Flies”.
GWB says: Even better, Scott:
Force children to get their own health insurance!
That should make some heads explode.
DEEBEE says: Obamacare has already taken care of that. And then there’s Medicaid
GWB says: Actually, no. 0bamacare actually put children on their parent’s insurance until 26.
That was my point – require them to get their own.
NTSOG says: “Abolishing so-called Childism does not protect the rights of children. Instead, it gives support to those who would abuse them.”
Yes. That was my first thought. Such a ‘philosophy’ also exonerates so-called progressive adults from any responsibility for what [evil] consequences may befall a growing and developing child. The responsibility for a child’s misfortune would lie entirely with said child who would be deemed by such P-adults to be competent in all ways. And to Hell with the consequences – for the child. It sounds like a policy for paedophiles and members of NAMBLA.
Cameron says: Back in 19 *coughcough*, I was in an Abnormal Psych class and NAMBLA was mentioned. The teacher saw the look on my face and said “You know who that is?”
“Yes.”
“And your thoughts?”
“Nothing a bullet to the brain wouldn’t cure.”
Both class and teacher looked at me in horror.
Scott says: One of the main reasons I’m in online classes for college… I think in person classes would be very similar to that experience for me..
NTSOG says: “I was in an Abnormal Psych class and NAMBLA was mentioned.”
Discussing NAMBLA and the rest of the sexually deviant folks running around in Western societies should be standard practice and normal when studying Abnormal Psychology.
I have quite a few memories of what I thought and felt as a child.
Thank GOD my parents didn’t subscribe to this garbage!
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