Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

I would have thought they would have solely been discussing their studies, and plans for Sunday school.

Anyway, looking at the last sentence, the word "children" here is misleading. Teenagers are not little kids, but stories concerning them constantly use words like "child".

Since "child" is a bad idea, we need something else, but there's no good word for teens in this context; "offspring" is too distant and dehumanizing; "youth" seems male-oriented and is often a euphemism for minoritie (especially those in legal trouble); "minor" ignores 18 and 19 year olds, etc.

By the way, since this only involved 18 year olds and up, who are supposedly "adults" in our system, what was the problem, at least the non-violent talk?

Sloppy language leads to sloppy thinking, and this problem has contributed to our social mores and legal system revolving around the patently false premise of binary categories, child and adult, with the dividing line at 18 at which point the sexual capability, interest, attractiveness, and emotional maturity all suddenly arrive, having been entirely absent beforehand.

A much better approach, one that takes into account the realities of physical, cognitive, and emotional development, is proposed here:

http://www.slate.com/id/2174841/

And when it comes to violence, the same nonsense happens. We hear alarming statistics about "children killed by guns" and think of a 5 year old who dug up Daddy's pistol from the back of the closet. But in fact they lump in ice cold 17 year old gangsters shooting each other. These aren't "children".