\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0One of the biggest put-downs people can bestow on another is to label someone childish. We presuppose that being a baby or a child is something to be avoided. The notion that age equals maturity is not always accurate. What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s so undesirable about a baby crying? The infant is merely following a biological urge to get fed. Crying is just testing a theory: the last time I cried I got fed; maybe it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll work again this time.<\/p>\n
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 It is true that babies cry, need to be changed and have tantrums, but I contend older people often are as culpable. Children have the excuse of being young and therefore behaving the way they do.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 We hear people exclaim, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Stop being such a baby!” when someone appears unhappy. To shed a tear for whatever reason, especially when the shedder is male, is unforgivable.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 But why don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t we ever say to someone whose behavior we don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t approve of, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re acting like an Enron executive”? or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re behaving just like a day-trader with insider information”? or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re acting just like an Exxon Valdez pilot”? or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re behaving like a petulant radio talk-show host”? Maybe I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m just looking in the wrong places, but I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t find \u00e2\u20ac\u0153childish” behavior that undesirable. My observations have yielded cases of extreme compassion, consideration, courtesy and cooperation among young people. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not necessarily as if their behavior somehow gets better and therefore more \u00e2\u20ac\u0153adult-like” as they age.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s desirable about an adult woman who lets her child bake in a closed car while she parties? What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s desirable about an adult sperm donor who impregnates a dozen women, denies responsibility, yet boasts about his conquests? What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s desirable about older people who prey on the young, trying to hook them on drugs or alcohol?
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 All these questions came to mind only recently as I watched an older sister pummel her brother.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 I watched because, although I wished to get involved, the kids\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 father was largely ignoring them, while the mother appeared to be cheering her daughter on.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 This event took place at the recreation center. The girl, around 8, was easily twice the size of her brother, no more than 5. Each time she poked and punched her brother she stared expectantly, hoping to coax a few tears from the child.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Watching the bullying was disturbing but not as much as the obliviousness of the father and the near-complicity of the mother. Both parents looked like over-the-hill jocks.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 The boy, at once angry, fearful and frustrated, appeared hopeful that somehow he could fight his sister back, but if he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d landed a blow, who knows how much harder the sister would have come back at him.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 For a while the boy tried to ignore the constant punching and pinching, hoping his sister would stop. She kept batting him on the head, not with a fist, but with her palm–anything to get a reaction.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Then she started her chant, one I hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t heard in decades, but which came back to me clearly, inasmuch as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m the youngest (or as some would say, the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153baby of the family”). The chant went like this: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Cry, baby, cry; stick your fingers in your eye; tell your mother to give you a piece of pie.” What a revelation that all the words to the taunting chant returned! But this isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t about my callow childhood; rather it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s about people\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s zeal to humiliate others, and the mistaken notion of what growing up really is. I wanted to say something to the parents about their daughter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bullying but feared being told to mind my own business, in the same way that cops hate getting domestic calls from wives or girlfriends to report their husbands or boyfriends.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 In church just last month, a participant in a skit told two other quarreling participants, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re acting like petulant children.” Now that ought to serve as a real put-down! To show their experience and implied superiority, people will play the age card and say something like, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I was in the military when you were still in diapers.” And the favorite, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re acting like a baby.”
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Interesting that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153baby” does double duty, as a term of endearment and also as a put-down: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re such a baby!”
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Though I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t advocate conditioning people, especially young males, to turn on the water-works for little cause, I vehemently resent the notion that males shouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t show their feelings.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 The one bit of interest the aging jock showed regarding his bullied son was to utter, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll make a man out of him.”
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 It would be interesting to revisit the boy in, say, 10 years, to discover what kind of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153man” he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s evolved into. Equally revealing would be peering into the earlier years of both parents.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Somehow, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s hard to buy the notion that bullying and being bullied constitute adequate rites of passage toward something called manhood. Perhaps there is some merit to the expression that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153what goes around comes around.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0One of the biggest put-downs people can bestow on another is to label someone childish. We presuppose that being a baby or a child is something to be avoided. The notion that age equals maturity is not always accurate. What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s so undesirable about a baby crying? The infant is merely following a biological urge to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}