Modern Morality
Apr. 28th, 2007 05:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
howeirdIt's 88° today, the apartment pool is packed with kids. Which made me flash on the one thing about modern "morality" which hurts me the most. Today, a man, especially a man my age, who shows any interest in children is immediately looked at as a perverted child molester. I used to be able to compliment a kid, tell his or her parents they have a bright kid, or a cute kid, or a talented kid. Do that these days and 90% of the time they run screaming, certain there's a threat.
It's very sad. I like kids. I try to treat children as potential adults. They are people who haven't had time to build a huge vocabulary, or read a whole mess of books, or go a lot of places, but who probably will some day, and are interested in what's ahead of them and around them. Most kids I've talked to are intelligent, have opinions and dreams and beliefs, and are looking either for validation or a clue to where that proverbial different drummer hangs out.
But the days are over when I can sit down next to a kid on a park bench, listen to his dreams, debate his beliefs, or even get a younger second opinion on how I see the world. These days I'd get arrested.
I have no children of my own, my nieces and nephews are far away (and grown) and though I have 13 great-nieces and nephews, they are Israeli and (a) don't speak my language and (b) are too far away even if they did.
Makes me very sad to be missing out on that.
It's very sad. I like kids. I try to treat children as potential adults. They are people who haven't had time to build a huge vocabulary, or read a whole mess of books, or go a lot of places, but who probably will some day, and are interested in what's ahead of them and around them. Most kids I've talked to are intelligent, have opinions and dreams and beliefs, and are looking either for validation or a clue to where that proverbial different drummer hangs out.
But the days are over when I can sit down next to a kid on a park bench, listen to his dreams, debate his beliefs, or even get a younger second opinion on how I see the world. These days I'd get arrested.
I have no children of my own, my nieces and nephews are far away (and grown) and though I have 13 great-nieces and nephews, they are Israeli and (a) don't speak my language and (b) are too far away even if they did.
Makes me very sad to be missing out on that.
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