In Reply to: Re: Morning after pill for girls of 11 posted by John on July 29, 2005 at 22:00:27:

I agree with you that kids need to be able to take responsibility and that maybe they're too mollycoddled at times.

Thank God some of the darker aspects of the 'good old days' have gone, but sometimes I think that the baby has been thrown out with the bath water.

We no longer send little boys up chimneys or send young girls out to work in mills, and while that is to be welcomed, I think teenagers would really benefit from being given the responsibility of holding a part-time job of some sort (appropriate to age of course). However, now kids cannot get a job to keep them busy in the summer until they are 16 ....... Another example of this over protectiveness of children is the ban on running in school playgrounds (obviously lawsuits are feared) and the best one I ever came across, a ban on fruit and nut mix as part of a school lunchbox because one kid out of hundreds in the school had a nut allergy! Rubbish! (That one is a pet gripe of mine!)

It would appear that the more rules we impose on our youth, the less capable they become of ever learning from their mistakes (because they simply cannot make any).

Got that off my chest ........... Thank you!