Read This!

8-year-old girls dressed as chamber maids for Halloween. . . 9-year-olds dressed as “Miss-Behavin”. . .

Even Newsweek seems shocked that the hottest selling little girls Halloween costumes are, well, “hot.”
Before the trick-or-treaters come to your front door, read this – it’s scarier out there than you think!

http://www.newsweek.com/id/62474?GT1=10450

Happy parenting.

Rush Little Baby. . .

Can we, should we, work to make our babies the smartest on the block?

Neil Swidey wrote this feature piece for yesterday’s Boston Globe magazine.  He shows why the rush to turn our babies into “little Einsteins” may not only be a waste of time, it may have some pretty negative consequences!

Why are parents doing this, anyway?  You’ll like the piece!

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2007/10/28/rush_little_baby/?page=1

Happy Parenting!

No! Here’s a great piece in today’s Wall Street Journal

There is a lot of fear – most of it apparently unfounded – about kids and vaccines. Actress JennyMcCarthy has scared parents anew with her just out book essentially blaming her son’s autism on vaccines. I’m sorry for Jenny – but she is wrong to place the blame on vaccines. Today’s Wall Street Journal shows why. This is a great piece to forward to any new parents you know!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119344390330373531.html

Happy Parenting!

This week’s column and a little backstory

Well, I’d no sooner written about our “pornified culture” last week, when what was in the news? A Maine middle school making birth control pills available to 11 to 13-year-old girls. (There had been more than a dozen pregnancies in that age range in the last few years.) What really outraged me was that no one was making the case that 11-13 year old girls don’t have romantic fantasies about full sexual intercourse! If they are doing so, it’s not because they want to, and it’s almost certainly with much older boys and men who should be prosecuted – not enabled!

This is just another example of how we hyper sexualize our youth, particularly our girls.

But the flip side is that I know parents who naive enough to believe their children would never be enticed onto on-line pornography or get near a predator.

What to do? In this column I write about how wise parents I know see their kids and their kids’ sexuality, and how they talk to them about it.

Thanks for reading, and feel free to comment or send to a friend.

Betsy

My Column

(I hope you’ll listen to yesterday’s show on the same subject via my radio podcast, or on www.nationalreview.com)

Hi friends – I hope you’ll tune in to “It Takes a Parent” today. I’ll be talking to the brilliant Wendy Shalit. She wrote the very provocative book, “A Return to Modesty” in 2000, in which she argued for the feminine virtues of, essentially, keeping your clothes on and so valuing, and esteeming, one’s sexuality.

Now she’s written “Girls Gone Mild: It’s Not Bad to Be Good.” She interviewed hundreds of young women who are essentially rebelling against their mother’s generation – they are going mild, not wild! What’s going on and how, in spite of the culture, can we encourage our own daughters to “go mild” – and our sons to appreciate such women? Wendy and I will sort it all out. Be sure to listen today, 2:00 central, WYLL/AM1160 Chicago, streaming at wyll.com, or podcast here and on NationalReview.com after the show!

This week’s column and a little backstory. . .

Hi friends – here is this week’s column about the “pornification of the culture” as Laura Ingraham rightly calls it.  I’ve just had it with the stuff that can get onto my computer, even with filters.  I’m also furious at the billboards my children and I are forced to look at driving down the highway.  Some of the ads on buses and at bus stops aren’t a whole lot better.  But lately it’s the internet that really drives me crazy, read below  and you’ll see why.

What I didn’t get into in this piece (no room!) is that I think a lot of parents are very naive about what their kids are viewing, either purposely or accidentally, on-line.  They think “we go to church, my little Johnny would never do that.”  Yes, he would, because these images play on the good, God given sexuality in us that is supposed to respond to sensuality.  It’s just that instead of lifting up the good things about seduction and sensuality within marriage, these images degrade us and sexuality in general.   So it’s not just that this stuff is degrading, as I tell my kids, it’s that it portrays sex in a way that isn’t good enough for them!

http://www.shns.com/shns/g_index2.cfm?action=detail&pk=HART-10-18-07

Hi Friends – just an FYI that I’m scheduled to appear on “Hannity and Colmes” tonight, about 8:20 central time.  We’re discussing the middle school in Maine which has decided to hand out birth control to 11-13 year old girls.

Yes, they have someone defending the school’s decision.

Sheesh!

Betsy Hart

Hi Friends – I hope you’ll join me today on “It Takes a Parent” when I talk to Chris Clapp of “Enough is Enough” about what Laura Ingraham rightly calls, “The Pornification of the Culture.”

Sexual images are so available in our society, it’s almost become “the new normal.” We’ll talk about what we as parents can do about it, particularly when it comes to our own kids and the internet – and can we take it on as a culture, too? And next week, along the lines of the same theme, producer Lynne and I will be talking to Wendy Shalit. Author of the book which created quite a stir, “A Return to Modesty,” and most recently “Girls Gone Mild,” Shalit argues that girls should value themselves and yes, their wonderful sexuality by – gasp – keeping their shirts on for a change.

With 6 girls between us, Lynne and I are eager to get her insights. You will enjoy both Cris and Wendy, I know!

You can listen live to WYLL/AM1160 in Chicago, streaming at WYLL.com, or after the show to the podcast.

Have a great day!

The spiritual matters. . .

I just came across this very interesting piece on some recent findings by Christian pollster George Barna. (This was reported in The Baptist Press on-line, a really great source for all kinds of cultural news.)

Anyway, what Barna found is that a high percentage of parents with young kids who self-identify as committed Christians, are not particularly concerned about their children’s spiritual life – or their own.

Now that’s concerning! (Read Below.)

“http://www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?Id=26249.

For more information, visit www.barna.org.

Hi friends – Welcome to a new week.

We’ve got some comments rolling in on old movies and organic foods, as you’ll see to the right. Feel free to join in the discussion!

Later this week I’ll be rebutting the notion that “private schools are a waste of money” as USA Today claimed a study out last week showed. That piece will fit under “parenting tips.” (Hint: it really does take a parent!)

And producer Lynne and I are planning this week’s “It Take a Parent” show (Thursday), and I’ll be sure to tell you all about it ahead of time. Let’s just say that as moms of nine kids between us, we hate what Laura Ingraham calls, “the pornification of the culture.”

But what to do?

Stay tuned -

As always, I enjoy hearing from you!

Blessings – Betsy Hart