An epiphany

I've recently had an epiphany about parenting.  In today's society, everything and everyone is politically correct and if you're not, its offensive.  The parenting style that seems to be the most popular, at least in my circle of the world is attachment parenting and general tolerance for letting the child make their own choices.  I haven't actually done much research on the definition of attachment parenting, but it is basically gentle parenting that aims not to punish the child in any way but to allow them to explore and grow without too much interruption.  (That's a bad summary, but whatever).  Generally, I'd like to be this kind of parent.  Children are precious beings that should be cherished.  I agree that its important to treat children as individuals and show them respect, not just treat them as objects of our will.

We recently had friends over this weekend and somehow we started talking about their son buying a pink ball.  It led to a discussion of letting children choose who they want to be.  I am easily influenced by internet forums and online articles.  After having been exposed to some ideas that we should let children choose how they want to dress and how long their hair is, etc, I am on the fence about how I feel about this.  But one of our friends had a different take on the situation.  He said that it is our job as parents to raise our child with our set of values because if we don't, they will absorb whatever other values they are exposed to.  He also made a very valid point that boys and girls are different, as is obvious by taking a look down below.

It made me realize that I have the right and responsibility to raise my child the way I see fit.  It does not make me sexist if I don't want my son to dress as a princess.  I have the right to tell my son that he can't wear a pink tutu to school.  I am not damaging him in doing this, I am teaching him that he is a boy and not a girl.  Regardless of what popular society tells us, boys and girls are actually different.  I won't go into a discussion of the differences between men and women, but they are vast.  I believe that our sons should be raised to be strong men, who take care of their families and know how to change the oil in a car.

Anyway, it was just a profound realization that I need to decide what is right for our family and how we want to raise our children, not what the internet community says is the right way.  Its okay to disagree with someone else's views on parenting and make choices that are different.