Having spent 8 years assisting my mother in her day care center while I was in high school/college, having run a day camp for children 4-11 for a summer, having 2 children of my own right now (2 and 4), I can honestly and truthfully say that I have NEVER seen a young child deliberately hurt another for pleasure until they reached an age that is comparable to kindergarten/1st grade. Children don't understand the meaning of inflicting pain for pleasure. Most of them, when incidents occur, would respond to my request on why they did what they did with "he took my toy" or "he bumped me" or some such. Invariably, that was the root problem. Just protecting what they perceived as theirs. The problem children I dealt with were never younger than 6, and I can usually pinpoint the source of their schadenfreude - the parents. Invariably, the parents, when confronted with a question regarding the source of the action, admitted they may have done "something" that led their child to act in a violent manner. Sometimes they told me it was none of my business and they'd raise their child as they saw fit (gee, wonder why their kid is a problem).
I would never inject my own opinions into the conversation, just point out that there was some difficulty.
On a similar note, my son recently engaged in a bit of "destructive" behavior when he was pulling jackets off racks and throwing them on the ground (he's 4). When I questioned him on it, he told me he was following his friend. Turns out, he was. But his friend was pulling off coats to get to his coat, and not picking them up. My son, hoping to solidify his relationship (which he felt was troubled - he desperately wanted this kid to like him) imitated him, not realizing his actions were "wrong". It's interesting, but he didn't do it for the joy of it, but to ensure that his friend remained close. Naturally, we had the long "if your friend jumped off a cliff" speech.
I don't consider what I said presumptuous at all. It is a well documented and written history. Adherents believe what they want. Somebody here once posted that Libertarians want to shirk responsibility. To some degree, that is what some Libertarians ARE libertarian for. Of course, they are mistaken. Would you assume it to be presumptuous if I repeated the history of Libertarianism and you only knew what you'd heard from free loaders?
Rand...well, you got my answer.
God, He doesn't "care" in the sense that a referee doesn't "care" about the outcome of a game. If a referee insinuated himself constantly into a game, the game would likely be fixed, right? I don't think God is into fixing this....I think He wants us all to make our own choices - for better or worse. He'll intercede if we ask Him honestly and fairly to intercede. |
