Stupid Things in the News

[misslynx]

1. U.S. warns that baby slings can suffocate infants (and its follow-up Baby slings recalled over infant suffocation fears)
   
   OK, I have no problem with warning people about, or recalling a potentially unsafe product. But the warning seems to be way too sweeping -- if there are concerns about specific styles or models of slings, or people not knowing how to use them properly, how about focussing on that specifically, instead of "OMG slings suffocate babies!!1!"?
   
   For heaven's sake, babies have been carried around in slings and assorted sling-like things in most cultures for most of human history, which isn't acknowledged at all in the article, with its flippant comment about them being "popular and fashionable", as if they were just some kind of trendy yuppie fashion statement.
   
   I suspect it's partly the residual anthropology student in me (that was my original university major, back around the dawn of time), but I really find it crazy-making when people insist in treating things that have become the norm in Western society just in the past century, or even the past few decades, as they were somehow The Inevitable And Natural Way Things Are Done, and anything else, no matter how widespread worldwide or how many centuries/millennia it's been around, as some weird aberration (this is by no means limited to parenting-related stuff -- I see it in a lot of different forms).
   
   It's particularly annoying in this case because babies in contemporary North American society experience less human contact than in any other past or present human society. We seem to have somehow adopted the idea that the natural state for a baby is to always be ensconced in some kind of container -- stroller, car seat, bouncy seat, crib, playpen. Sure, most of these things have their uses, but I can't help wondering what the long-term psychological effects are of babies spending most of their time strapped into one plastic contraption or another, isolated from human touch, when for the vast majority of our evolutionary history, babies spent most of their time in physical contact with a parent or other caregiver. It's like we've been conducting some kind of bizarre, society-wide sensory deprivation experiment.
   
   I also can't help noticing that when there's a safety problem with some particular type of stroller, crib or whatever, no one ever seems to assume from that that all strollers/cribs/etc. are dangerous and no one should use them, despite the fact that these things have a considerably shorter history of safe use than their alternatives. Instead, they (quite sensibly) target just the specific products that have experienced the problems. In this instance, yes, the recall in the second story was limited to two brands, but the warning in the first one was much broader.
   
   At least Health Canada seems to have reacted to the whole thing in a more sensible way - by putting out a fact sheet on how to choose and use slings safely. Maybe the US could learn something from that...
   
   BTW, I was actually a little edgy about posting about this at all, since due to the amount of guilt foisted on parents these days (mothers in particular), it is next to impossible to discuss any parenting-related issue in any way that involves having an opinion, without people feeling like if they've done something differently than you have, you must think they're a bad parent and/or be attacking them. That is not what I'm trying to do here. I'm far more concerned about overall societal trends, and irresponsible fearmongering, than anyone's individual choices, 'K?
   
   
2. Coming to Toronto’s libraries: video games
   
   Who the hell thought this was a good idea? It's already next to impossible to use the kids' section in the libraries half the time, because the computers they have in there, supposedly for educational use, are constantly in use by older kids playing online games, which inevitably seems to involve at minimum a lot of loud talking, and frequently shouting and swearing. You can't read a book to a smaller child because the atmosphere is too disruptive, and constantly having computers going with bright, flashy animations of people killing each other in a variety of creative way diverts kids' attention away from the books even if the gamers are somehow managing not to yell their heads off. And apparently librarians actually telling people to be quiet is passé -- I don't think I've ever seen that happen, no matter how much noise the gamers were making.
   
   I suppose that just having a video game lending library isn't going to increase the noise factor much, unless the kids checking them decide they've just got to play them then and there, but they're apparently also planning to start "gaming programs" at a variety of libraries, with no details on what that'll involve. And some of the logic in the article just seems really dubious to me:
   “It may be the only time a young person comes in. It can act as a magnet to attract people,” said city Councillor Adam Vaughan, who sits on the library’s board.
   
   “Once we get them in there, you can be darn sure that our librarians will be hard at work to introduce them to everything else the library can offer.”
   Uh... the hell? Has Adam Vaughan ever met a teenager or preteen? Or been to a library? Most video-game addicted kids don't read at home, even if there are plenty of books there -- why are they magically going to start reading if they're playing games in a library? And as for librarians introducing them to books or whatever -- I use the public library a lot, and I have yet to see any of the staff interact with any patron, adult or child, beyond checking out books for them and telling them if they have fines. They stay behind the desk and deal with the people that come up to it, and the only time they venture out is to reshelve books once in a while. They don't make any effort to stop the preteens yelling their heads off while playing World of Warcrack or whatever in the kids section, but we're supposed to believe they're going to be trying to make them read books?
   “The events turn non-library users into library users. It’s not so important how they use the library, it’s that they use it."
   Again -- the hell? How is it "important that they use [libraries]" but not important how? Does spending your life zombified on the couch with a game controller in your hand suddenly become healthier or more productive if you got the game out from the library instead of buying it, or if you're playing it in the library itself? Maybe the library has some kind of magic aura of virtue that automatically enobles anything done in it, no matter how otherwise useless?
   
   I'm not against video games in themselves -- I've got my fair share of games on my computer, and have occasionally let Aidan try educational ones online (and once, Tetris on my netbook, which he apparently likes to play by dropping all the pieces into one tall stack as fast as possible, and shouting "Game OVER!!!" in tones of manic delight as soon as it hits the top). But I do think they can be incredibly addictive if not carefully managed (ask me about the younger of my two nephews sometime), and I really, really don't think they belong in libraries.
   
   The whole thing just sounds to me like they're pretty much admitting defeat at trying to instill any sort of literacy in most of the younger generation, and are now willing to settle for faking it by replacing actual books in the libraries with useless crap, so that they can congratulate themselves on "getting kids into libraries", even though getting them in there won't mean anything any more.
   
   I guess this means I have officially turned into a Cranky Old Lady. Well, so be it.