Parents have no right to decide their childs future.

Though I appreciate Kyro's opening arguments, I am unconvinced that they allow sufficient room for complexity and nuance. Consider his thesis:"I don't think they should decide their future because children that soon develop into adults have their own minds."It is certainly true, to an extent, that developing children have their own minds; however, by focusing solely on childrens' developing rationality, Kyro neglects other dimensions of childhood identity construction. In Diana Meyers' Being Yourself [1], she argues that, in fact, there are five dimensions to the self, and that the best way to capture the truth about the development of an individual's autonomy is to take a decentralized approach which recognizes that placing excessive emphasis on any single dimension of human experience grossly oversimplifies human agency and identity. The dimensions Meyers lists are as follows:1. Unitary - The unitary self is the role typically assigned to agents, and denotes a view of the self as a kind of "central controller" which oversees decision-making. This view of the self casts individuals as atomistic, independent, self-directed, and inescapably rational, claiming that the self is a kind of essential homonculus in terms of which agency is represented, and in light of which actors are conceptualized.2. Social - The social self is an identity whose construction occurs in the context of social influences such as cultural norms or overarching social narratives (e.g. race relations, dominant economic theory, religion).3. Relational - Much like the social, the relational self refers to identity construction which occurs, rather than through formative social pressures, in the context of one's interpersonal relationships. In other words, relational theories of the self tend to emphasize that one cannot abstract an individual outside of her network of inter-agent relations without losing critical identity-conferring information.4. Divided - The psychoanalytic (or "divided") self refers very much to self-image, denoting the construction of an identity through a feedback loop bridging the gap between one's conscious thoughts and subconscious desires. There is a kind of mutual, level-crossing influence between the two by means of which agents constantly reevaluate, rehape, and redefine themselves, particularly with respect to the way they see and understand themselves.5. Bodily - The bodily self has to do with the role of the body in processing agential experience. Though bodily continuity itself may not be a necessary condition for the temporal persistence of a self, the persistence and internalization of bodily experiences, such as phantom limb syndrome [2] in amputees or recurring pains in trauma victims, demonstrates a uniquely psycho-physical dimension of selfhood.With this exposition in mind, let's step back into the argument. As I noted, Kyro seems to focus too much on the developing rationality of children, i.e. the unitary self, thereby neglecting other important concerns, e.g. the social and relational selves. Though a balance between each of these self-shaping forces is key for any individual, it is particularly critical to children to strike the right balance, as the influences to which they are exposed during their formative years determine, in large part, the sort of agents these children will become.Naturally, there are figures who specialize in assisting children in their development during this time. Teachers, doctors, and other traditional authority figures help parents to divide the labor of child-rearing, not only by means of the knowledge they possess, but also through the perspectives and norms which they can (and often do) pass on to the children with whom they interact. This being said, however, it isn't clear to me that, to an extent, parents should have a decisive say about the direction of a child's life. Certainly, there are cases in which parental intervention may be inappropriate. The parents of a grown woman of 25, for example, don't appear to have any clear justification for demanding that she wear something more conservative, even if they do disapprove of her taste in clothing. However, there are also cases where parental intervention seems not only permissible, but praiseworthy. Consider a child who wishes to eat McDonald's every day. We might think, in this situation, that it's perfectly appropriate for the parent to refuse.Yet, you may object, claiming that the parent's interest in spending his money in a more constructive way justifies his intervention. Should you object in such a way, consider a further proposition: inherent in the very nature of parenthood is the obligation to make choices for the sake of a child's well-being--choices which, invariably, will affect the way that child integrates into the wider world. Determining how to educate a child, for example, impacts the kind of curricula to which the child is exposed, the network of relationships the child develops, the kinds of norms he will internalize as he grows older, etc. In fact, merely interacting with a child runs the risk of that child internalizing some observed behavior, perhaps developing some pattern of behavior which influences the kinds of employment opportunities to which he has access. Teaching pacifism, contrasted with physical abuse, impacts the sorts of norms by which a child might choose to abide. Therefore, we must conclude, because parenthood necessarily involves at least some control over a child's future, that the right of parents to govern their children ought to be recognized. As noted prior, we must also recognize nuance: it is true that not all cases of parental intervention are justified; however, this does not mean that parents have "no right" to decide their child's future. Such a generalization fails to capture adequately the intricacies of parenting, e.g. deciding how to introduce one's children to notions of gender.At the same time, I sympathize with Kyro's fundamental contention that parents should not be totalitarian in governing the lives of their children. Sending a child to private school is one thing; meticulously planning which college a child will attend, what majors and minors a child will enroll it, what job to take, what romantic partner to have, etc. is, I think, a far cry from justifiable intervention. Though a bright line is, of course, difficult to establish, we might find answers in the development of unitary competencies. As an individual is opened up to his own independent agency, it might be prudent for the parents to take their places as advisors, rather than governors. When to loosen the grip on the reins is a contentious, complicated issue, perhaps one which parents and kids are best-served working out amongst themselves.If anything, the difficulty of drawing a line in the sand seems to highlight that, rather than making generalizations about parental responsibility, we ought to recognize that shades of grey do exist, and that, even if there isn't a clear threshold, there are at least some cases to which we can point and say "Yes, the parent does have the right to make the final call."[1] http://books.google.com...;[2] http://en.wikipedia.org...