weekend viewing

"When children are defined as consumers they have no protected place in which to grow.

- Mary Pipher, "The Shelter of Each Other."

Hey, just for a bit of light viewing this weekend you could check out this documentary below; "Consuming Kids: The Commercialisation of Childhood." Oh yeah, as you can read by the title, it's a goodie.

Although this is set in the U.S and it isn't at quite the same level in little ol' NZ yet, I'm not kidding myself that those influences aren't present here in our lives now. Parents need to know what they and their children are up against.

Gunter and I do our best at choosing not to parent in competition with the multi-million dollar budgets of corporations.

Who would if they knew?

We don't do TV, we don't do malls and we don't buy branded toys. Having a limited budget, living in a small house and living slightly out of town all help with this.

For us it's a huge relief not to do battle with these images, products and messages in our home. In our attempt to carve out some safe spaces in which the children can freely play, imagine and discover for themselves, we hope they will able to cultivate their own unique ecosystem of the mind.


I know.... now you are thinking we live in a cave, with only sticks to play with in the sand and loincloths for clothes or better still, we are over-protective homeschoolers who have isolated our children from the modern world.

But in fact, there is a whole wide world out there with real people having real relationships and working with endless possibilities that are all beyond the marketers grip.

Going outside is a really good start. Moving away from screens is essential. Deciding to chat to your neighbour can bring unexpected surprises. Living with gratitude for all we have right now maintains a baseline. Remembering that more things will not give our children better lives but will in fact deprive them of freedom, imagination and creativity.

Things won't give our children better lives but loving relationships most definitely will....that's the mantra.

If you ever needed a reason to get rid of the TV, take a peek at the doco - although as one of the contributors did mention, "TV is just soooo 20th century."

Now if I could just step away from this screen, close the lid and get outside.

Happy Sunday people.

---------------------------------------------

Late addition: I'm over at the Lyttel Town blog posting about Black Beauty peaches tonight, just incase you want to try out the best jam recipe ever.