As someone who doesn’t have a kid yet, I talk a big talk when I say to let kids get dirty, get hurt, and make mistakes. However, I have a siblings that are 10 and 20 years younger than me. My brother and sister have happily let me throw them into the proverbial deep end knowing I’d be there to back them up when things got rough. Our fears manifest themselves in peculiar ways, the rules we create for young and old often say as much about our insecurities as what we think of others. Check this article out and consider what it means to let children light fires and play with sharp objects.
Photograph by Peter Yang for The Atlantic
h/t to Tim Bailey for the heads up on this article