Once there was a time when parents raised their children much differently than they do today. I was raised differently, and my own children were raised in the same fashion as I was. Somewhere along the line though, something caused a disconnect, and people began raising their children in manners totally contrary to what they experienced as youngsters.
Some saw their own rearing as something shameful, some saw it as nothing more than incorrect, but many changed the rules along the way and they started a snowball effect that, true to its moniker, will not slow or stop until the downward slope levels and the snowball loses kinetic energy.
One thing I remember being subjected to and what I also remember “inflicting” on my own children was the big lie. We lied about Santa, we lied about the Easter Bunny, and we lied about the Tooth Fairy. I can’t speak for my own parents, but I know I felt a twinge of guilt and foreboding about the day when my kids would, must, learn the truth. That truth was that these characters never existed and that we made it all up for them, yes, but also for us. Generations of parents have taken great delight in the joy in their children’s eyes.
Now I can just see many of you nodding along as you read while wondering where this all leads. I don’t blame you.
Here’s where it all leads; the big lie being fed to our kids today. What is that lie, you ask? The terrorization of our kids regarding global warming. Here’s what they’re being fed in schools, and I have no doubt, in homes by well meaning parents who have bought into the hysteria.
What happens when these kids grow up and learn that all they have been taught about anthropogenic global warming has been a big lie? While I have learned from experience as both child and parent, the “happy” lies about holiday spirits are easily forgiven and gleefully passed on to future generations. I doubt that false scare tactics will garner the same reception from the victims.
There is much more damage attributable to this Al Gore driven madness than mere economics. The kids are going to be dark cynics as they mature. What will they believe, or not believe, in subsequent years?
I fear that the practice of crying wolf may attain new stature in the damage it causes. When we are all elderly, we will rely on those we have lied to so blatantly as our first line of defense. Will they heed warnings, or dismiss them with a cavalier wave of the hand?
Perhaps it might be prudent to tell them the truth now, for all of our sakes.
-Woody
