Considering the date, I should do something newsworthy on terrorism. I refuse to, you'll get enough of that elsewhere today.
If you are a parent, you well know how to bore people to Olympic standard about your children. Photos, finger paintings, smudged macaroni artwork, little sayings they come up with, all grist to your mill. Every other child you meet may seem to be the spawn of Satan, but your own are gorgeous, intelligent and talented, no matter what the objective truth of the matter is.
The rest of us politely smile, admire the blurry pictures of a newborn ball of pink dough and either get on with our refreshingly child free lives, or resolve to bring our own pictures to work the following day to top yours with our darling and far, far superior children.
Such a belief is harmless, nay beneficial, as it stops most parents committing justifiable infanticide the fifth time they are woken in the space of three hours to look for monsters under the bed or to nail shut the cupboard that houses the drain cleaner and bleach.
Most of us look at the way we behave, give a wry smile and try not to be a completely besotted idiot. Some parents, on the other hand, don't. You have all heard of Stage Mothers. Women (or men-it is an equal opportunity disease) who use their children to fill in the holes in their own lives. It is sad, desperate and, once the child reaches 18, futile and destructive. Look at Tiffany, the Olsen twins, Lindsey Lohan or Micheal Jackson for examples. Though only one of those came out of the "using years" what you would call semi-sane. For too many of them, it seems "being able to breathe without constant direction" is about as good as they can expect.
What were you doing Christmas Day, 1996? Opening presents? Grumbling and rubbing the sleep out of your eyes as you put the turkey in the oven? Dodging the in-laws and a horde of excited children? Being one of the horde of excited children?
Her mother defined a Stage Mother. She got an awful lot of blame, well, pretty much all the blame, according to the trial by media she received. The case is still unsolved, though the entire family (now down to just the father, the mother died in 2006) were exonerated for her murder.
It was a tragedy, but it was 15 years ago and lessons have been learned, right?
Well, actually, no.
Let me borrow an iconic IMDB image for a moment.
How sweet and sexy is that outfit when worn by a three year old girl? Not as a one off in some beauty pageant, but on national TV. Excuse me while I go throw up.
Now I am not gonna be the one who rants about paedophiles around every corner. That perversion is thankfully pretty rare all over the world. But ....
Kids are kids. Let them be kids, for God's sake. As two FB members said when we were talking about this before I wrote this blog " I was playing in dirt and not caring if i had messy clothes."
As a father, I will bore you to that glazed eye state beyond tears with tales of my kids. I will also tear you in half lengthways if you try to sexualize them.
* Thank you Brittnie, Faith, Bénédicte, Brittany, Gemma. Lori, Amiee and Gina. Ya'all should chat to them some time on the FB page - solid, sensible and fun people to chat with.
If you are a parent, you well know how to bore people to Olympic standard about your children. Photos, finger paintings, smudged macaroni artwork, little sayings they come up with, all grist to your mill. Every other child you meet may seem to be the spawn of Satan, but your own are gorgeous, intelligent and talented, no matter what the objective truth of the matter is.
The rest of us politely smile, admire the blurry pictures of a newborn ball of pink dough and either get on with our refreshingly child free lives, or resolve to bring our own pictures to work the following day to top yours with our darling and far, far superior children.
Such a belief is harmless, nay beneficial, as it stops most parents committing justifiable infanticide the fifth time they are woken in the space of three hours to look for monsters under the bed or to nail shut the cupboard that houses the drain cleaner and bleach.
Most of us look at the way we behave, give a wry smile and try not to be a completely besotted idiot. Some parents, on the other hand, don't. You have all heard of Stage Mothers. Women (or men-it is an equal opportunity disease) who use their children to fill in the holes in their own lives. It is sad, desperate and, once the child reaches 18, futile and destructive. Look at Tiffany, the Olsen twins, Lindsey Lohan or Micheal Jackson for examples. Though only one of those came out of the "using years" what you would call semi-sane. For too many of them, it seems "being able to breathe without constant direction" is about as good as they can expect.
What were you doing Christmas Day, 1996? Opening presents? Grumbling and rubbing the sleep out of your eyes as you put the turkey in the oven? Dodging the in-laws and a horde of excited children? Being one of the horde of excited children?
If you were Patsy and John Ramsey, you were frantically looking for your abducted daughter, a beauty queen who had won multiple pageants. And who was 6 f***ing years old. Pretty much everyone remembers the tragedy of the JonBenét case.
Remember her? I do.( picture from wikipedia)
Her mother defined a Stage Mother. She got an awful lot of blame, well, pretty much all the blame, according to the trial by media she received. The case is still unsolved, though the entire family (now down to just the father, the mother died in 2006) were exonerated for her murder.
It was a tragedy, but it was 15 years ago and lessons have been learned, right?
Well, actually, no.
Let me borrow an iconic IMDB image for a moment.
Sweet!
How sweet and sexy is that outfit when worn by a three year old girl? Not as a one off in some beauty pageant, but on national TV. Excuse me while I go throw up.
Now I am not gonna be the one who rants about paedophiles around every corner. That perversion is thankfully pretty rare all over the world. But ....
Kids are kids. Let them be kids, for God's sake. As two FB members said when we were talking about this before I wrote this blog " I was playing in dirt and not caring if i had messy clothes."
As a father, I will bore you to that glazed eye state beyond tears with tales of my kids. I will also tear you in half lengthways if you try to sexualize them.
* Thank you Brittnie, Faith, Bénédicte, Brittany, Gemma. Lori, Amiee and Gina. Ya'all should chat to them some time on the FB page - solid, sensible and fun people to chat with.
Very well-written post, MM. Really liked it. :) Keep up the good work.
Yeah, I wanted to pulverize my ex when he took our 9 year old daughter for Glamour Shots- on the adult side since they had a sale going (!!??!! #%*%##!!!!)
When my aunt put my cousin in child beauty pageants, my mom and her sisters all wrote anonymous letters to her and stated that what my aunt was doing was child abuse. Not sure how long it went on, but I think she got out of the pageants pretty quickly.
Thank you MM for providing a sane view on this matter. I only wish my ex felt the same way. He and his new wife bought my 12yr old daughter a "Hooters" tank top as a souvenir. She brought it home from his house and wore it under her school uniform. I had a talk with her abut how it was inappropriate for her to be wearing it and told her she could wear it to bed only. When she forgot and wore it again the next week I made her take it off ...... then I cut it up and threw it away. I have not said anything to the ex because if they knew it bothered me they would go out and buy her a whole wardrobe of them......I guess I can't expect any better from a woman who thinks that dressing like a hooker to attend a grade school basketball game is perfectly acceptable and the man who allows/encourages it.
I totally agree. My daughter and I sometimes watch Toddlers and Tiaras for a laugh. Some of those kids are such stinkers.
When one of my sons was younger I was asked countless times why I hadn't put him into modeling. He and I were once approached at a large car show by some shyster who told us my son had a very marketable look, blah blah blah. My son looked at the man and replied "I have more tricks than just my looks," and walked away. I felt it was such a waste of a childhood to focus on looks when he could be using his other tricks- like playing with my other more average looking kids (joking- they were all beautiful to me) doing kid things..