Don’t treat children like your luggage
Reading and hearing so much about human “disconnection,” teenage depression, road rage, drug and gaming addiction in this age of electronic “connection” is enough to make one hopeless. But there is hope to make humans treat each other humanely in the future. Of course, our children are “the hope” and the future, but in order for them to do anything better, parents have to equip them to do so.
Tons of research show that children who are breastfed, held, talked to and interacted with are far more empathetic and intelligent, far more equipped to handle life than children who are isolated. And yet, today’s babies are hauled around in car seats all day long like luggage. Mothers plop them down and dutifully ignore them as they ogle their iPhones, perhaps reading the latest dire headlines about more violence and the rising wave of illiteracy.
For Pete’s sake, hug your children. Hold them, don’t carry them in plastic seats. Give them the attention they need, now. Now is your only chance to do so. How are children supposed to grow to treat other people like humans if they have been treated like luggage so early in their life?
Shannon Mikus