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...that respect can only be given if they so choose, and so on...

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Darcy, unfortunately, in my 50 years of work expereience in just about every field you could name, including 12 years as what would these days be called a paralegal, but was just a lowly legal secretary back then, not to mention raising 3 girls of my own, I have heard those exact words a couple of times. I have heard words carrying that meaning countless times.

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And unfortunately, what you call "sterotypical behavior falsely attributed by adults" is all too common in this day and age. Not only among the clients in the law offices, who are in trouble for exactly that "stereotypical behavior", but also among the teen aged friends and acquaintances of my daughters, when they were visiting my home or speaking on the phone.

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I have grandchldren of high school age now, and the things they tell of goings-on among their peers make me shudder. So no, I don't think children are ENTITLED to a voice, unless they have earned it by good behavior, and they NEVER have the right to be "without repercussions". None of the rest of us are, why should they be? And btw, pointless repercussions are just as prevalent in "real life" as they sometimes are in families.

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Too many children these days think that there ARE NO repercussions, and that respect can only be given if they so choose, and so on. Anything that furthers those attitudes only makes life more difficult for them. I feel that while being exposed to clear lines of authority and respect which often accompany the BDSM lifesty is a good thing, being exposed to some of the practices which involve what someone else on this thread referred to as the "sex and kink" is not, at least until they are adults themselves.

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I know I sound terribly cynical, and I am. I live in a lower-middle-class neighborhood in a small midwest town. This neighborhood used to be very '50s vanilla, long after the 50s were gone. But, in the past 30-40 years we have had the preacher across the street arrested for drug dealing, two convicted male pedophiles living within a block, and a man who was arrested for performing castrations on males who volunteered for it and paid for it. (All they could get him for was practicing medicine without a license. And I have no idea why he or his clients were doing this, and I think I probably wouldn't want to know!) And those are just the ones I know about.

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My apologies for straying way off topic here, though itdoesrelate to why I feel the way I do about the topic.

Have a good day.

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it has been this slave's experience, since leaving that insulated bubble, for those that can't rely on maid service and a driver and full financial support regardless of where they drop their socks, it's best if they learn early to expect to take care of themselves, which includes pitching in with the housework and putting up with "wierd" behavior from roommates...even if they are your parents.

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a child belongs to a moral society

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ORIGINAL: bondmaid123

In addition, I do not think it's healthy for children to be "taught" disrespect, which I've seen happen in situations where the children end up higher on the pecking order than the submissive. 

I understand that domestic servitude is/can be a very visceral (and convenient) method to explore the power exchange dynamic... and that for some people total and complete humiliation, including secretly dreading/being thrilled by having to defer to the spoiled 3 yr old is a hugely fulfilling thing... but I wonder if perhaps sometimes people get caught up in the "kink" aspect of it and forget to consider the larger picture?   Time and place, and all that jazz.  I don't think we do our children any sort of service by raising them in a dynamic that allows them to abdicate *responsibility*.  In fact, I believe that if you "consent" to a situation which condones this sort of environment you're really (at least in your small way) contributing to the deterioration of society. 

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ORIGINAL: Hawkwindblues

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a child belongs to a moral society

The above is the core of the topic for me.

Personal freedom vs. societal standards are the ongoing parenting process.

Example:

Sunday around noon, we have a day out planned with a group of friends, we meet at a SMBreakfast, that is hold in a Cafe in public. One friend brings Ums with him.

I see them approaching and although we had before decided to not mix the two events and meet on the outside tables and the SMB is inside, it is not really possible to shield Ums. Secondly on that special day, there are some overt displays (cuffed ones and the like) from the night before, because it is summer, sm party season or whatever.

I wanted to leave immediately, my friend not, we settled on he attended the SMB for some time and i and some of our group stayed outside with the Ums. My reaction was caused because my parents showed me a lot of things to early, and i can renember some shocking pictures.

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ORIGINAL: breatheasone
See THIS is the thing.... kids EVEN TEENS are NOT mini adults! (i'll say that again because its important) KIDS ARE NOT MINI ADULTS!!!!

They do NOT have the maturity, the life skills, or the like, that adults do. because it takes TIME AND EXPERIENCE to get that. People who treat theirs kids like their contemporaries should have their heads examined. And before anyone says...no i am not advocating overly sheltering them either.

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ORIGINAL: Darcyandthedark

So what happens when we shelter children and try and stop them from learning?  A generation of young people with high teenage pregnancy rates, a low turn out and understanding of political issues, a one in five percentage of teens with genital herpes and 80 percent of a population (at least in the states) of people with cold sores to name but a few things.  These are the 'repercussions' that teens and children should be given and informed about - not pointless curfews and other such nonsensical 'repercussions'.

the.dark.

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ORIGINAL: Darcyandthedark

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ORIGINAL: breatheasone
See THIS is the thing.... kids EVEN TEENS are NOT mini adults! (i'll say that again because its important) KIDS ARE NOT MINI ADULTS!!!!

They do NOT have the maturity, the life skills, or the like, that adults do. because it takes TIME AND EXPERIENCE to get that. People who treat theirs kids like their contemporaries should have their heads examined. And before anyone says...no i am not advocating overly sheltering them either.

Hi candy
I know you will disagree with me - but they are in a sense.
To be honest, by your assertion, many adults aren't really adults because they have little in the way of 'life experiences'.
I know children and teens who have lost a parent and have that 'life experience' that I haven't experienced yet.  Some children raise sick parents, have disabled ones and are their carers.  Cope with illness themselves.  Are raped.  Endure bullying.  Have a handle on their sexuality, even knowing that they are gay or hetrosexual or bi.  Some can plant fields and know how to raise animals better than any adult, because they have worked on farms from a young age.  Some go off to africa to work with christian aid organisations and raise money for charieties.  Some are even representing their countires in sport.  Hell, some even know war, famine and gun crime.
Children and teenagers can have just as much or sometimes even more life experiences of people twice their own age.

the.dark.

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ORIGINAL: breatheasone
Geez i'm sorry you picked out that ONE thing. The thrust of my point is that, just because kids CAN SURVIVE travesty, DOESN'T mean they are equipped to handle it. obviously i know life experience isn't the only thing that makes one mature. but it is a BIG part. Just because someone CAN survive something...doesn't mean one has to TEST that.

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ORIGINAL: Darcyandthedark
I know children and teens who have lost a parent and have that 'life experience' that I haven't experienced yet.  Some children raise sick parents, have disabled ones and are their carers.  Cope with illness themselves.  Are raped.  Endure bullying...
Children and teenagers can have just as much or sometimes even more life experiences of people twice their own age.

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ORIGINAL: AnimusRex

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ORIGINAL: Darcyandthedark
I know children and teens who have lost a parent and have that 'life experience' that I haven't experienced yet.  Some children raise sick parents, have disabled ones and are their carers.  Cope with illness themselves.  Are raped.  Endure bullying...
Children and teenagers can have just as much or sometimes even more life experiences of people twice their own age.

I disagree. There is a premise here that I find false, that abuse and harsh treatment of young people forces them to mature at an accelerated rate.

It would be wonderful if that were true! But sadly, no. Being beaten or raped or forced to endure the Holocaust as a child, doesn't turn the survivors into mini-adults at the age of 13. Having your childish innocence and naivete beaten out of you, doesn't magically give these survivors the wisdom, the perspective, the judgement and discernment that adults have.

What happens to survivors of childhood abuse is that they end up being still children, except children with emotional scars, children with anger and defensiveness and inability to bond; but they also still have the lack of understanding of consequences, the lack of perspective, the lack of judgement.
This is why it is considered unfair to execute child killers, or to use child soldiers in war. Science has shown that this is biological- that adolecent brains literally are not completely formed to the same level as adults, that children are not capable of understanding long term consequences like adults- regardless of their history and and background. They think mostly in terms of short term gains, and constantly seek shortcuts to hard long term problems.

And it is that very same short term shortcut thinking that leads adolecents to self-initiate themselves into the world of adults, on the flawed premise that if they could only have sex, or get drunk, or smoke cigarettes, then they would suddenly, magically, turn into adults.
Haven't we seen this? The teenage stud who finally loses his virginity, then swaggers around school with the bravado of a man- or the girl who is convinced she became a woman that night. But they are still adolescents, still unfit to be given the keys to adulthood- to be given contracts, to vote, to be forced to live with the long term consequences of actions.

No, abuse doesn't have magical powers to let children skip over the messy adolecence, and make a shortcut into adulthood. It just produces damaged children, who are still children.