From: nelson_p@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson)
Subject: Re: Self Appreciation (was: Re: Elle MacPherson causes rape?)
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 18:33:24 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Corporation, Chelmsford, MA

In article <1992Nov18.161617.16132@news.nd.edu> slarsen@berlin.helios.nd.edu (susan larsen) writes:
>In article <BxvvL0.FCI@apollo.hp.com> nelson_p@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>
>>  And, as I pointed out in an earlier posting, while it's true
>>  that we are all under social pressure to conform to certain
>>  roles and behavior and consume certain products, that pressure
>>  *can* be resisted!    Women have to face enough *genuine*
>>  harassment and discrimination that it's alsmost criminal when
>>  they actively promote a set of cultural values that further
>>  denigrates them.

>I agree completely with this on a personal level but.......
>
>Bear in mind that there are very few societal rewards in 
>resisting the mainstream.  It is indeed sad to see 9 yo girls 
>getting indoctrinated at so early an age, but as a mother of 
>an 11 yo girl I see daily the effects of peer pressure from 
>more traditionally reared girls on my own daughter.  The 
>question arises, am I fair in trying to rear my daughter in 
>a non-mainstream fashion when she will have to compete with 
>others of her kind who have been indoctrinated more fully 
>in "the way we've always done it"? 

  This issue was one (though not the only) reason we decided 
  not to have children.   If we raised the child with our
  value system we might have:
   
  1.  succeeded and produce a child who, while bright, scholarly,
      and inquisitive, would have rejected the much of the
      commercial, status-seeking, consumption-oriented life
      of the typical suburban child and adolescent, and thus
      become a social outcast among her peers.

  2.  Failed, and ended up with a stranger, hostile to our
      values, living with us.  


> If my daughter is not exposed to cosmetics, how will that impact
> her later in life when she goes around to job interviews, for instance?

  My wife doesn't wear cosmetics and she's a successful product
  manager who spends a great deal of time in customer contact 
  or at trade shows.    She's in her 40's, dresses conservatively
  and is always well-groomed.   But this doesn't require cosmetics,
  perfume, or high fashion.  


>If the people really wanted to buck social pressure, yes they 
>could.  Practically speaking though, that pressure exists in 
>the first place because people put it there.  I think most 
>people would rather just shuffle along in life, never really 
>questioning who they are and allowing the mainstream to define 
>their existence.  Most folks don't much care for change and 
>if they get activated, it will more often than not be to stop 
>change, not forward it.  So, this creates a great social force, 
>full of rewards and punishments, to maintain a status quo.  Am 
>I doing a parental service to my child by pushing her to run 
>counter to that force?              

  These are hard questions.  Every parent has to ask them, but 
  a look at the value system extant in today's junior high and
  high schools show just how well the answers are working out.


>her is that what really counts in the end is to be true to 
>yourself.  Whether that self is a go along kind of gal or 
>a raging rebel, I want that decision to be hers, not mine. 

  My only caveat is that children and adolescents are very
  impressionable.  *Somebody* or *something* will end up
  raising them and shaping their values.  It will either
  be the parent or it will be their peers, Madison Avenue,
  TV, etc.

  It's idealistic to think that a typical, let's say, 11
  year old, can "make decisions" with the same confidence and 
  self-authority as an adult.    This was one of the points
  of the Northeastern University study on teenage violence a
  couple of weeks ago that I mentioned:  they concluded that
  kids today are "incompletely socialized" due to a "lack of
  parenting"  (their terms).   They said parents are not a big
  enough force and factor in the lives of their kids.



---peter


Xref: sparky soc.women:20112 soc.men:19747