Thursday, February 14, 2013
Domecon Babies
Imagine there were babies in an orphanage. And there was a college nearby, that wanted their female students to be able to practice the 'Domestic Arts' under scientific conditions.
Imagine then that these women lived in 'practice apartments', and got to 'check out' an infant from an orphanage, like a book from the library!, for a year and take turns raising it under very strict scientific guidelines.
Yeah, that would never happen here in the states, right?
http://rmc.library.cornell.edu/homeEc/cases/apartments.html
This during a time when babies were forced to cry themselves to sleep. When holding a child was called 'coddling'. Experiments in extra love, or no love at all! what will happen when we do this, or that? And because these children were orphans, they had no voice.
Shameful.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
What the hell happened to those babies, I wonder? How did they turn out? I can't imagine.
ReplyDeleteJessie, There are a few links on that page, I'm going to research a bit to see what they were like as they grew up.
DeleteEven up through the 60's orphans and adoptees were treated like lab rats. There are so many adoptees that aren't ALLOWED to see their birth records, and these kids are now in their 50's and 60's! It's a disgusting thing. And many of these orphans were adopted by narcissists - oh, that entry will write itself...
Oh. That just made my heart sink into my feet.
ReplyDeleteHaha my alma matter!
ReplyDeleteSome of the moms don't look that bad. Maybe they were nice! I like that caption on the last photo...in the green scrapbook, "Men are such a bore!" What a surreal 1950s experiment. Ah, science. Why weren't there any men or boys in there majoring in Dad? Don't they need to practice to be fathers too? If you're going to complete the surreal zoo exhibit.
I heard a commercial the other day in the 99cent store that made my jaw drop. It came on the radio. It started with all these woman voices quoting things like, "I will no longer take abuse from my children!" "I will no longer let my child walk all over me!, "I will not be treated like this!" and the program went on to tell you to send your children to them where they will turn them into completely different people who now behave. Literally, that's what they said. Based on their five or six-step whatever educational behavior training program. I was like...omg, who is listening to this. So surreal.
Lisa,I've seen that commercial on TV! It's like some horrifying boot-camp for wayward teens. Like an episode from 'Scared Straight'
ReplyDeleteI've heard it too. Crazy. The thing is that most of the parents who buy into that garbage refuse to accept that, 99% of the time, it's their own fault if their children are that misbehaved. Children aren't born bad. They just aren't.
DeleteLike where the hell are the parenting bootcamps? Has anyone ever heard a commercial for that?
I wasn't misbehaved at ALL even though i had a broken home and Gladys worked. you know why? two reasons one I had very clear defined boundaries with both my mother and father early in life and i respected them and those boundaries the other reason is they both scared the shit out of me. not in there going to abuse me kind of way but i knew if i got out of line I was going to pay for it
ReplyDeleteMike, you were the most non-misbehaved child in the land. I think it's because we gave you clear, realistic boundaries with FAIR consequences. And those boundaries never shifted, if it was wrong today, it will be wrong tomorrow, world without end.
DeleteThe consequences were sometimes swift & terrible, sometimes mitigated by the fact that you had ingested 100 pounds of Halloween candy and were exhausted, but NEVER was there a time when the breaking of the rules didn't result in some kind of punishment - even down to early bath and bed, no TV.
It was a benevolent dictatorship, not a concentration camp. We never tried to be your 'friend' or any of that crap, but we truly LIKED you. Once you learned the rules you rarely broke them (you didn't necessarily LIKE them, but you didn't outright defy us either) and a warning was all it took. You were FUN to be around, still are!
We are friends now, it's an adult relationship with respect given BOTH WAYS. You (Mike) have opinions and knowledge that I ask for. I miss you as a little kid, but man I love the grown up you turned into.
It all starts at a VERY young age for a child - say even while they're breastfeeding. The first *bite* and they get pulled away, and told a stern 'NO!'. This startles the baby, they probably cry, the mother repeats a stern 'no biting!', and then a cuddle and kiss. AND ON IT GOES. From that age up boundaries are stated and enforced, without hitting, without screaming.
The parents who need the business advertised in that commercial abdicated their authority LONG before the kid turned into a 'surly teenager', OR these are narc parents who hate to see a child develop a mind and opinion of their own.
Parenting is not for the weak. It's a rough job, lol. Luckily the tyrant you are guarding smells like strawberry shampoo and giggles in your lap, grows up to be a Very Nice Person. Makes it all worth it...
Gladys, have you been able to locate any of the domecon babies?
Delete