As I stated on my Facebook post a week ago or so earlier, if you want to point the finger at an individual for causing problems in today’s society, this is your man.
You may not be familiar with this man, but i will guarantee, you’re familiar with his teachings. He was the person that “wrote the book” on early childhood development, you may have one of the most widely available books on the subject in you library, given to you by a forebearer. His bullshit suggestions for child rearing has done more damage to society than just about anything I can think of, and trust me, I do A LOT of thinking on the subject.
He didn’t ruin the millennials directly, he ruined their parents, because the millennial’s grandparents raised their parents. Those of the greatest generation, especially those bearing children in the latter half of that generation and the baby boomers themselves were probably influenced the most out of the last four generations. In turn, they raised their children by his recommendations. Now, as we look back, and there’s a variety of different publications that will confirm this, we know that his methodology was soaked with bunk and myth, and tied together with the thread of truth. However, the greatest gen, the boomers and the gen’x’ers were not so familiar with the debunking of Spock’s Mythology.
Critics balked at the idea that parents would follow the whims of a mere infant, feeding or rocking the child at all hours of the day — or night. They warned that Spock was too “permissive,” and that coddling babies and children could eventually make them self-indulgent and rebellious.
Not only did Dr. Spock improperly influence America in general (perhaps the world) regarding child psychology, which itself had lasting effects from generation to generation (that wouldn’t read his later editions that attempted correction, but his suggestions probably KILLED BABIES.
Dr. Spock strongly advocated that babies not be put on their backs while sleeping. No one was in a position to argue with him. We mean, the dude was Dr. Spock. That’s why, once research in the 1970s showed that Dr. Spock’s advice could lead to SIDS, researchers thought it would be easier to ignore this information than to publicly disagree with Dr. Spock, who at this point was a baby-god.
Dr. Spock, himself a medical doctor, basically went to night school to further learn about psychology. He was infatuated with Freud. Most of what Freud relayed concerning “sex” and “youth” was debunked, yet, Spock’s writings remained a focus of parents, even though later editions of his works was changed
Spock failed to see the deeper problems of his philosophy, so subsequent editions continued to cultivate narcissism.
to reflect more accurate information, the parents didn’t read those changes.
Over the course of Spock’s lifetime, most of those Freudian concepts were debunked or otherwise abandoned by the medical profession. But who knows how many parents were unwittingly influenced by Freud’s somewhat bizarre ideas, without even knowing it.
While I agree, more involvement by the father figure is a good thing, which was a point Spock made in his works, he also:
adopted a more gender-neutral tone, expunging sexual stereotypes from the book.
Now, mind you, that’s not to say that he didn’t have some good things going, he did. But, and this is the catch, when you’re selling 50 million copies of your book that is chock full of garbage, with a little good splashed about here and there, the reader cannot get to the wheat for the chaff. Nor, mind you, would the average reader be able to distinguish the cream from the bunk. In other words, being “popular” isn’t the place to be, when the popularity of your content is based on fraudulent material, which his was. Don’t take my word for it, check these out:
Dr. Spock’s Child Care Controversy
Spock at 65: Five Ideas That Changed American Parenting
The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care, by Dr. Benjamin Spock
How Dr. Spock Destroyed America
It’s funny. While I am sitting here writing this, I am also checking for links and such to articles that contain better informed data from folks with a greater knowledge than I have on the subject matter. The funny part is, I never read this info from these educated individuals before I came to my own conclusions, based on the knowledge I had of Dr. Spock’s teachings. Only from the knowledge I had previously of the teaching of Spock’s, from comments and such from my own family and mother, along with things I heard from teachers in school, along with reading about Spock, his books, and the like, plus comparing what’s going on in today’s America, did I come to these conclusions.
It’s extremely disheartening to me to see this happening and the fruits of his labors. It will take at least 2 or 3 more generations to get out from under one of the greatest frauds in U.S. history.
As an afterthought, I read where one of Spock’s grandson’s committed suicide. I wonder if the thought of having a grandfather than misinformed so many people, to the point of ruining generation after generation of a country, drove himself to suicide at that thought. Would you? If your grandfather caused such turmoil, could you live with it? Something to think about.
