The Story.

    I'm all for making a world that's safe for children. The installation of pillow flooring would be a good thing. Wrapping every sharp corner in bubble wrap, converting all cars to bumper cars with a maximum speed of 12 mph, and installing cameras in every classroom are just for starters. But there are some things children cannot and probably should not be protected from.
     One of those things is death. I know I say it now and it will probably be different when the "death talk" has to happen, but hopefully I won't feel the need to lie about death. It happens to everyone, it's going to happen to you, there's nothing you can do about it. Sorry. But some people are going out of their way to sterilize fantasy in order to make reality less abrasive. Let me give you an example:
     The classic children's tale, Peter and the Wolf is pretty gruesome. People and animals are devoured, a wolf is skinned alive and disemboweled, horrors and atrocities are committed. But people felt they were too scarred by the telling of this story when they were young, and so made changes to make it more palatable; Disney being the least of the perpetrators. Huge changes are made where at the end of the story, no one gets hurt, life is wonderful, and carnivores are really just vegans that haven't learned the joy of eating vegetables yet.
     I hate to break it to you, but life isn't like that. Wolves kill and eat animals. It's what they do. What do you think those teeth are for? Like I said, I'm all for making the world a safer place for our children, but is it really any safer if we lie to them? Reality can be cruel, but it can also be beautiful. To disparage one is to minimize the other. To swing the pendulum too far the other way is also unacceptable. Using fear to control our children is just another way to lie. Instead, how about we try doing what we expect our children to do: Tell the truth. If we can't do it, how can we expect it from them?