Youth Leaders

Sat Oct 9 10:08:46 PDT 2010

Hello Tree
I have never agreed and disagreed more strongly with the same thought
before.  It took me some time to sit with your ideas as I unpacked my own
reaction to your statements.  I do not believe I misunderstand your beliefs
about how you think childhoods should be protected and sheltered and I don't
disagree with you in theory.  They should be protected and sheltered. There
is no going back to stolen childhoods and childhood can be stolen. I do
think childhoods can be stolen  under the guise of protection and shelter.
   I do think there are developmental stages and that it's important for us
to go through all those stages as we grow because we will use those stages
as scaffolding as we become ourselves.  Having said that I also believe that
we all come to be with a different set of tools and brilliant abilities.
 Those unique qualities of self allow us to move through different
developmental stages with different abilities and different times.  Here is
where I take exception with what you are proposing and Waldorf for that
matter.  Each brings our own time to the equation.  Some are ready to take
on experiences interacting with adults and their world in very competent
ways at very young ages.  In fact, they need to have those experiences to
find the self they came to be.  I know for myself I was already organizing
anti-war events by the time I was 11.  No one expected, pushed or even
encouraged me to this.  I felt compelled by what I saw in the world and a
deep need to change it.  I am grateful that as difficult as it was for my
parents to allow me to do these things because they kept me on the path to
myself.  My daughter was crying about flowers picked that didn't want to be
picked by the time she was 2, raising money for pre-schools in Central
America by the time she was 7 and comfortably reading essays she wrote to
political demonstration with crowds of 50,000 people by the time she was 11.
 My son on the other hand is 22 and still not ready to navigate the world as
an adult.  He needs more time.  The issue for me is not whether I think a
young person should participate in certain venues normally occupied by
adults.  The issue is where the children are driven to go.  What do the
children think?  Are they there because their own heart has passion and
commitment or are they there because someone else thinks that is where they
should be?  Childhood should be protected and sheltered.  I agree with that.
 I also think it needs to be driven by the child's passion and commitment
not the adults sense of what is appropriate for a child.  I am thinking
about the recent hoopla about the 16 year old girl who wanted to sail around
the world and all the talk about child abuse.  There was a time when she was
out of radio contact and all the world was a twitter about what happened to
her because the loss of contact came after a bad storm in the Pacific where
she was.  After some days they found the boat and team rescued her.  Her
mast broke in the storm and with that her satellite communications were
down.  The questioners went on and on to her about her safety and whether
she was alright and whether she should be out in a boat sailing by herself
and her reply was "It was just a storm".  This child can only become herself
through the sea and if you deny her the sea you deny her herself.
I am just saying it is for the child to chose the direction and the speed
and the adults to do what they can to facility the possibility.
Pat Black

On Sat, Oct 9, 2010 at 8:11 AM, Tree Fitzpatrick <
therese.fitzpatrick at gmail.com> wrote:

> Michael, and other comments. .. I don't think anyone commenting actually
> understood what I tried to say so I conclude that I failed to communicate.
>
> Young humans are not yet fully evolved humans. What all young people need,
> including the most precocious of them, including ones that get asked to sit
> on the board of the Jane Goodall Institute, is to be children.  It is only
> by being children than humans can become fully realized adults.
>
> The world needs fully realized adults to achieve our shared, highest
> destiny. When we push children out of childhood and into the adult realm,
> those people rarely, if ever, get space later in life to go back and fill in
> the gaps of what was missing.
>
> Michael, yes, indeed, children can bring a lovely element to any open
> space. . . but that does not mean that it is right.  Children should not be
> asked to participate in adult matters.  Ever.
>
> The damage contemporary society does to childhood is a very serious,
> long-term consequence to humanity. If we do not keep children asleep in
> childhood so they might do the inner work of their inner beings, we will
> have a human future full of unrealized 'grown ups'.  It is casual,
> nonsensical folly to bring children -- unformed adults -- into adult
> discussions. It is wrong on a gagillion levels.
>
> We are all so caught up in rushing towards the future. One thing we humans
> cannot 'rush' is the slow development and incubation of fully realized human
> beings:  that development takes place in childhood. It is irrationally folly
> to bring children into adult decisions.
>
>
> On Fri, Oct 8, 2010 at 3:06 AM, Michael M Pannwitz <mmpanne at boscop.org>wrote:
>
>> Dear Tree,
>> from where I sit (public) decision making as presently practiced, for
>> instance in Germany, is ineffective, creates larger problems, is
>> lobby-infested, dogmatic, expensive, not even a good show... who would want
>> to be part of that?
>> What I have experienced often in "formal" open space events and in the
>> "normal" open space of everyday life (like the 1,5 year old daughter of a
>> neighbor visiting and taking over our household, very effectively involving
>> us in her life and experiments, curious, decisions?-easy for her....pure
>> joy)is that kids of all ages thrive in it.
>> But then, thats not decision making in the sense of sitting on a "board"
>> of whatsoever.
>> Day-care children, grade school kids, highschool kids, teenagers... are
>> the greatest gift to an open space event, so I encourage their taking part
>> and it seems to always have been productive, fun, healthy...
>>
>> Have a great day
>> Greetings from Berlin
>> mmp
>>
>> Tree Fitzpatrick schrieb:
>>
>>> There are many things off kilter in human culture. One thing that I think
>>> is
>>> off kilter is that adult humans now routinely encourage non-adult humans
>>> to
>>> participate in things like 'public decision making'.  Where did we get
>>> the
>>> assumption that a young person has the capacity of a fully evolved adult
>>> human to make informed decisions that might have long term consequences
>>> on
>>> the child, other children, the community, the culture, etc? Children are
>>> not
>>> yet adult.
>>>
>>> We encourage children to 'awaken' to adulthood far too early.
>>>
>>> I am appalled that many now take it for granted that children (a
>>> non-adult
>>> is still a child) should sit on something like the Board of Directors of
>>> something like the Jane Goddall Institute (whatever that is, I imagine
>>> Ashley meant Jane Goddall).
>>>
>>> This is a major flaw, I think, in evolving culture and it has endlessly
>>> complex repercussions.
>>>
>>> Children's job is to be children, to developo their own personhood fully
>>> so
>>> that they will one day take a place in adult community. Children awaken
>>> to
>>> adult considerations much too early. TElevision has been a huge culprit
>>> in
>>> this regard and now, of course, the internet.
>>>
>>> A child's main work is being a child. It's just not right to cavalierly
>>> get
>>> youth input into decisioins that children cannot, just cannot, really
>>> know.
>>> A twelve year old, a sixteen year old, is not mature enough to make
>>> complex
>>> public decisions and it is wrong to ask them to:  asking children to
>>> participate in grown up life as peers with the adults dishonors children
>>>
>>> I get my main attitudes about children from having sent my child to a
>>> Waldorf School and having been a student of Rudolf STeiner for over
>>> twenty
>>> years. Much of what is wrong with human culture can be traced to the
>>> practice of stunting youthful inner development under the guise of
>>> awakening
>>> children too early to adult concerns. This is why we now have an
>>> education
>>> system in USA that is focussed on test scores instead of the inner
>>> development of children. There is a story in today's NYTImes about how
>>> publishers are publishing less picture books and how parents pressure
>>> four
>>> years olds to listen to long stories and skip picture books so they will
>>> have better test scores later. . . this dynamic is connected to including
>>> youth in public decisinmaking.
>>>
>>> I know this is a very popular trend and I know Ashely Cooper is deeply
>>> invested in the world and I know she is a good caring person intent on
>>> making positive contributions in the world.
>>>
>>> I get to have my opinion, yes?  I am worried about the millions of humans
>>> who are children today who are not cloud-gazing and spending their
>>> summers
>>> hunting rocks and birds' nests and who are told, when they are twelve,
>>> that
>>> they can contribute to public decisions. Grown up humans have a duty to
>>> children:  to let them be children. Otherwise what we are creating is an
>>> army of humans who are not fully developed humans who will make good wage
>>> slaves for the elite billionaires running the tea part movement. Thinking
>>> caring loving people should not participate in pushing children into the
>>> adult arena while children.
>>>
>>> On Thu, Oct 7, 2010 at 6:51 PM, ashley cooper
>>> <mail.easilyamazed at gmail.com>wrote:
>>>
>>>  Hello Open Space friends,
>>>>
>>>> I have fallen off of the OSlist for awhile, but I wanted to share with
>>>> you
>>>> a talk from a recent TEDx event that I hosted,
>>>> TEDxNextGenerationAsheville<http://www.tedxnextgenerationasheville.com/
>>>> >.
>>>>
>>>> This event was all about spotlighting the ideas of young people and
>>>> giving
>>>> them a public stage from which to share and be heard. It was also an
>>>> invitation for there to be more collaboration between youth and adults.
>>>> Chase Pickering spoke about the role of youth in leadership and how
>>>> young
>>>> people can contribute to public decision-making and serve on Board of
>>>> Directors (which he did with the Jane Goddall Institute). If you are in
>>>> a
>>>> position to invite a youth to serve on your board of directors or
>>>> advisory
>>>> board or encourage the clients you work with, please consider Chase's
>>>> advice!
>>>>
>>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27IJpZVP1qs
>>>>
>>>> You can also watch Birke Baehr's talk about the food we eat. He is an 11
>>>> year old who is passionate about food and whose talk has gone viral and
>>>> been
>>>> viewed over 200,000 times in less than 2 weeks.
>>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7Id9caYw-Y
>>>>
>>>> Sending fondest regards from Asheville, NC, USA,
>>>> Ashley
>>>>
>>>> P.s. If you would like to respond to me personally, please send it to
>>>> easilyamazed at gmail.com . I have not been checking this account
>>>> regularly.
>>>> Thank you.
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>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> --
>> Michael M Pannwitz, boscop eg
>> Draisweg 1, 12209 Berlin, Germany
>> ++49-30-772 8000
>> mmpanne at boscop.org
>> www.boscop.org
>>
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> Love rays,
> Tree Fitzpatrick  (check out my new address)
>
>
> . . . the great and incalculable grace of love, which says, with Augustine,
> "I want you to be," without being able to give any particular reason for
> such supreme and unsurpassable affirmation.  -- Hannah Arendt
>
> 2175 Kittredge St Apt 615
> Berkeley, CA 94704
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