Reply to Complete isolation of small children is abusive

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP is nuts. You do realize that it wasn't until very recently in society that we started sending kids under 6 to school at all, right?

Until K or 1st grade, the vast majority of kids in the vast majority of the world were at home with family the vast majority of the time. Some still are. This is...not a big deal, socially or developmentally speaking. [/quote]

Kids at home til K in the past had at least some of the following: neighborhood friends, music/art/sports class, siblings, nearby extended family, playgrounds, events, holidays/birthdays with guests.

For 5 months, my young child had none of the above, just mom and dad. Not normal.[/quote]

Music, arts, and sports for preschoolers are a pretty new idea.  [b]Historically many families lived in rural areas without neighborhood friends[/b] and every one of those families that didn’t have twins had an oldest child who at 3 or 4 didn’t have a sibling old enough to really play with, given that kids don’t move past parallel play until 3.5 or so.[/quote]

This is just not true. Where do people get the idea that in “the olden days” everyone was a farmer or a homesteader? Nope, people have always congregated and formed social groups. Cities and towns are the norm, not isolated farmhouses (and on a truly isolated farm, there would be tons of kids from the numerous families who lived on and worked the farm). Raising kids has also historically been a social activity shared among relatives, neighbors, and other community members. How do you all think children survived all these wars and famines you keep referring to? Through community.

What is ahistorical is nuclear families living far from relatives and isolated from their neighbors and communities. It is atypical for communities in crisis to ignore the needs of children in favor of hedonistic activities and raising capital— this runs counter to the human impulse to protect children for the sake of society. It’s weird. What is wrong with us?[/quote]

I have not referred to any wars or famines.

I also didn’t say all or most families lived rurally but plenty of kids today and in the past have lived without neighborhood friends. And plenty of farmers had farms where they either farmed alone, or with the help of others who traveled to them by day, or were single, or didn’t happen to have preschoolers. [/quote]

My dad grew up on a farm. He was the oldest. Didn't get a brother until he was 10. He mucked around the farm, helped my grandfather with farm work. Yes he went to school but it was a one room school with maybe 3 other kids his grade, he saw his cousins sometimes but mostly it was the family at the farm. They went to town for the afternoon on Sundays, that was the big outing. Had to get home to milk by evening. He's 90 now and crushing the pandemic at home with my mom. In his words "I know hardship. This is not hardship." [/quote]

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