The Tyranny of the Crybaby

I wrote earlier about us getting the World We Deserve. I wanted to touch on the issue again as soon as I saw a recent news story from a Dallas suburb not far from here. Then, as if by magic, I stumbled across another news blurb featuring a 70+ year long psychological study that actually seems to show evidence of the point that I wanted to make.


Take a walk with me, and I'll try not to wander around too much.....

This is Taylor Pugh. Really cute kid, isn't he? Taylor is 4 years old, and is in pre-kindergarten in the Mesquite Independent School District ( a suburb of Dallas). You may have seen Taylor recently on the news were you live. For some reason this story has captured a bit of national (and even global) attention. Mesquite ISD has a pretty strict dress code. It includes prohibitions against boys having hair as long as Taylor's.

This is Taylor's Dad, Delton Pugh. He's a tattoo artist. Delton and his Wife don't like the dress code - and that has caused a whole chain of events to occur. Mesquite asked the parents to cut Taylor's hair, and they refused. Since they were in violation of the school dress code, Mesquite put the boy in ISS (In School Suspension), where he was taught by a teaching assistant but not allowed to be in the classroom with his friends. His parents appealed to the school board, but their appeal was denied.


The School Board did offer to compromise with the parents, though. They told the parents that if the boy wore his hair in braids so that it was up and close to his head - they would allow it. The Pughs decided that wasn't good enough. Now they are threatening to take their case to the State Education Board.


Over the course of this circus, the Pugh's have claimed that they didn't want to cut Taylor's hair because he liked it long "like his Daddy's". Later, they claimed that they had to have long hair because of some sort of Native American religious heritage. Recently, the story changed yet again as they claimed that the boy was growing his hair long so that he could donate it to one of those places that makes wigs for cancer patients.


Here lately I think that they have decided to just stick with the "we don't wanna" defense, but don't quote me on that. Given a bit more time I'm sure they'll come up with a whole new set of interesting reasons.


Now you can say that the dress code in Mesquite is too strict and I won't necessarily argue with you. You can argue that Taylor's hair isn't really disruptive to the classroom, and I won't give you much beef about that either. You can point out that hair length has little effect on grade point and I'll shrug and say you may be right. I've heard all of these arguements from both liberals and conservatives. The Libs tend to think the boy has a "right" to have his hair long, while the Conservatives think the "gov'ment" doesn't need to intrude into parenting issues like hair length.

So what do I think? I'll preface my opinion with a little background - since we really don't know each other....

I had long hair for many years. I have a tattoo. My Mrs has a tattoo. My Daughter has a tattoo. I threw away my razor when I graduated high school and I've had a beard ever since.

It sucks to have a beard and STILL have to shave every day to keep the fur from growing where you don't want it!

I am not against alternative lifestyles among consenting adults. If what your doing is not harmful to anyone, knock yourself out. I've had friends with every piercing you can imagine, and some you really wouldn't want a mental image of. I've met people who have augmented themselves with prosthetics to look like cats or lizards. I've had interesting, prolonged discussions with Pagans, Wiccans, Satanists, Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, Christians, Atheists, Agnostics, Discordians, and more - and have developed friendships with lots of these folks over the years.

Its important that you note these things about me, because I want you to understand that my stance on this issue does not stem from any "boys shouldn't have girl hair" feelings on my part.

The fact is, though, that the school district does have the right to set its own dress code. The rules were made by the elected officials on the Mesquite School Board. If the citizens of Mesquite decide that the restrictive dress code no longer reflects their community standards - then they can change the dress code how ever they want. They can use the proper channels to either run for school board themselves - with one of their platform planks being loosening the dress code, or they can back a board candidate that reflects their views. If they can convince enough of their fellow Mesquite citizens, then the dress code will change to reflect the evolution of the society toward looser dress code standards.

Alternatively, if this is an important issue to them the Pughs could move a couple of miles into a school district whose dress code was more comfortable for them, or they could put Taylor in a private school, or they could home school...

But the Pughs aren't having any of that. No sir.

They decided that the best lesson to teach their son is that the rules don't apply to him. If he wants to do something that isn't allowed by society's rules, then he should just disregard that particular rule. Nothing is more important than the desire that he has for what he wants, and that desire must be fulfilled IMMEDIATELY! No waiting around to work within the framework of law and society.... screw that shit.

Just do your own thing and expect society to conform to YOU.

So... why should we care about over indulgent parents and their failure to teach their child that some degree of conformity is necessary to exist and function as a part of even a "free" society?

Because their failure, and the failure of people who mimic them, has a price. Remember the psychological study that I mentioned before? Well, it shows that five times as many high school and college students are dealing with anxiety and other mental health issues as youth of the same age who were studied in the Great Depression era.

Scientists think some of the increase is due to too much emphasis being placed on "outward" appearances and wealth. I'm thinking we can probably attribute a lot of the increase to parents not equipping their children to exist in a "real world" that doesn't recognize them as it's center. My opinion seems to be supported by the following findings (emphasis mine):

The study also showed increases in "psychopathic deviation," which is loosely related to psychopathic behavior in a much milder form and is defined as having trouble with authority and feeling as though the rules don't apply to you. The percentage of young people who scored high in that category increased from 5 percent in 1938 to 24 percent in 2007.

It seems that the youth of America in 1938, even with their very survival in question due to the Great Depression, weren't as screwed up as we've managed to make many of our kids today. All under the auspices of being more "modern" in our approach to parenting. We wanted to be so much more compassionate and understanding and thoughtful than our parents and grandparents in how we raised our children.

We weren't (and aren't) doing them any favors. They are paying the price for our lack of fortitude. We aren't here to be our kid's buddies. We aren't here to live vicariously through them. Our job as parents is NOT to GIVE them everything they want in life.

Our job is to make damned sure that they have the tools and skills necessary to succeed in life and to have the opportunity to find happiness for themselves.

As an important part of that, we need to instill in them the understanding that while this country affords freedoms to its citizens on a level not seen anywhere else in the world - that does not translate as an obligation on the part of society to transform itself to reflect each individual person's beliefs.

See the distinction I'm making here? For too long, we have allowed ourselves to suffer needlessly under the Tyranny of the Crybaby.