The boy, a Massachusetts second-grader, was asked to draw something that reminded him of Christmas. He drew a stick figure on a cross, with X's for eyes, and, when questioned, said the figure was himself. The school ordered the kid to get a psychological evaluation, but his father Chester Johnson explained that he had recently seen a statue of the crucifixion and was probably just drawing from memory. Johnson is considering sending his son to a different school, saying, "You can't walk back in an establishment that didn't have confidence in you ... and continue to do business with them. He's been excluded from all the other kids, man."

Johnson sounds like he took parenting classes from the Dude, but he may have the right idea. Children's drawings have become a stock horror trope, signaling impending doom in everything from The Ring to Battlestar Galactica. This may be partly because of evidence that kids reveal abuse through their drawings. But some have questioned whether drawings are a reliable marker of child abuse, and one thing's for sure: kids say, draw, and do a lot of weird shit, and it doesn't necessarily mean they have an abusive home life, or a Jesus complex.

I was a pretty innocent kid, and my drawings of giant eyeballs on legs, while odd, didn't set off any alarm bells. My brother was and is extremely reticent, and apart from his perplexing "my brain is like it has two sticks in it" speech (age 3), I don't remember him freaking anybody out either. But we did grow up with a kid whose drawings of his family looked adorably normal — except that "Mommy" always wore a blue bra instead of a shirt. It turned out that his drawings revealed not his mother's actual sartorial choices, but his abiding love for Princess Jasmine. Tracie writes, "in the third grade I made a Mother's Day card at school where I drew a picture of my mom looking maniacal wearing curlers and a bathrobe on the front, and on the inside I wrote a poem about how I still love her, even though she hits me with a wooden spoon." And Anna H. says that when she was eight or nine, she wrote "sex object" on her inner thigh, causing her mom to weep out of the fear that she'd failed at feminist parenting. But now Anna runs a website where we take Perez Hilton to task for writing things like that (and worse) on photos of women. So I guess what I'm saying is, just because a kid makes a weird Jesus drawing doesn't mean he should be excluded from all the other kids, man.

Boy's Jesus Drawing Alarms School Authorities [AP, via NPR]

And Lego, of course. And for my sister: Stuffed animals. Simple toys, with nothing to plug in, no batteries required — these are the ones I remember really playing with.

Gibbs writes:

The best toys transcend, their survival a testament to their purpose and power. The Babylonians played board games; the ancient Greeks had yo-yos. The Chinese were flying kites 3,000 years ago. Crayola crayons were first produced in 1903. In 1916, Frank Lloyd Wright's son John, inspired by the way his father had built an earthquake-resistant hotel in Tokyo, invented Lincoln Logs. And many great toys are accidents or improvisations, a serenade by kids whose first drum set is a wooden spoon and a tin pot. Play-Doh was invented as a wallpaper cleaner. In 1943 a Navy engineer trying to smooth the sailing of battleships found that a torsion spring would "walk" when knocked over. If you stretched all the Slinkys sold since then end to end, I'm told, they would circle the earth more than 125 times.

I can't lie and say my brother, sister and I didn't play the hell out of video games growing up (Intellivision, because my Dad loved a bargain) but we spent a large amount of time playing with Lego, Matchbox cars, Play-Doh and, yes, Barbie dolls. And I don't know about this year's "hottest" toy, Zhu Zhu hamsters, but Play-Doh had the added benefit of being delicious! (What? Isn't that what they want you to do with it?)

The Power of Play-Doh [Time]

[Image via National Toy Hall Of Fame]

The bad news: A new study, reported today in Eurekalert, confirms what everyone already knew, that increasingly younger girls are worried about their weight and appearance. And we do mean young: while the statistics were already depressing, this study dealt with children aged 3-to-6. Indeed, according to a study by University of Central Florida psychology professor Stacey Tantleff-Dunn and doctoral student Sharon Hayes, nearly half of these pre-schoolers "worry about being fat." And a third of those tested said they were dissatisfied with their appearance. According to Vernisha Shepard, a psychotherapist and clinical coordinator for the eating disorders clinic at Texas Children's Hospital"It is getting more and more common for young girls to begin to have concern regarding their bodies," she says. "Girls as young as 8 are now talking about their bodies and show a concern related to their weight and shape. When summer comes and people begin losing the layers of clothing, more attention is drawn to how we look. Young girls are learning this and basing their entire self worth on their bodies and beauty."

Here's how the test worked:

After chatting for several minutes, the playmate asked each girl how she feels about the way she looks. Thirty-one percent indicated they almost always worry about being fat, while another 18 percent said they sometimes worry about it....Half of the girls watched parts of animated children's movies such as Cinderella that featured young, beautiful characters and appearance-focused comments, such as Gaston telling Belle in Beauty and the Beast that she is "the most beautiful girl in town, and that makes her the best." The second group watched parts of animated children's movies such as Dora the Explorer and Clifford the Big Red Dog that do not contain any appearance-related messages....In a room that featured a dress-up rack of costumes, a vanity, dinosaurs and more, children then spent about the same amount of time on appearance-related play activities, such as brushing their hair at the vanity, regardless of which set of movies they watched.

The good (sort of) news? The kids weren't more affected by a film featuring a svelte princess, like the Princess and the Frog, than by anything else. So limiting princesses and Barbies alone isn't going to do the trick; indeed, they seemed to feel equally bad regardless of what they watched. And one can't help but wonder if conversations like those the children engaged in for this study weren't one more confirmation that this stuff is Important.

I'm glad, though, that this study got the princesses off the hook a little: it's always seemed to me too easy to blame Snow White when the pretty princesses are a constant that pre-dated the dramatic upswing in young kids' eating disorders. Do such films promote a conventional standard of beauty and equate it with virtue? Sure. But it's this in combination with Bratz, Pussycat Dolls, Obese and Pregnant and Man Versus Food that conspires to create a world of what the Atlantic aptly termed "moral panic." Ironically, if the problem with fairy tales is that beauty was "good," we need to realize that obesity has become even more resoundingly "bad," nowadays, and if kids pick up on one, they'll pick up on the other.

'Too Fat To Be A Princess?' [Eurekalert]
Bikini Babies [Recipes Today]
America's Moral Panic Over Obesity

Earlier: Girls And Body Image: It's Apparently Worse Than Ever

Harris feels that, lately, there's an unprecedented amount of vitriol directed at moms.

Maybe people were nicer to our moms, maybe people weren't. In one way or another, our culture has always been weird about mothers. Love/hate, Jocasta/Joan Crawford, supermom/"evil" stepmom, you name it. But right now, in some circles, it seems we're leaning toward hate. Yes, even when you control for the anonymous online jerkwad factor. And yes, even — perhaps especially? — as more and more blogs, books, sitcoms and movies, successful or not, explore with unprecedented candor the experience of being a (white, middle-class) mother.

In Harris' view, it's no coincidence that this is all about women.

And it's not only about "parenting," either. No, I am telling you, it's about mothers. (White mothers, generally, and usually urban ones — if in part because they're out and about on sidewalks and subways, not cloistered in carpools and playrooms.) You know them, or at least their epithets: "Stroller moms," the "stroller mafia," the particularly objectionable "stroller Nazis" — and while we're at it, the "helicopter moms" and "sanctimommies."

She adds,

Women — still — are not "supposed" to take up space. Mothers, in particular. We are — still — supposed to remain in the background, doing whatever it is mothers do, smiling. We grow a belly, we need a seat, we say "excuse me, please," we speak up (or, God forbid, blog), and we've crossed the line, said or asked too much, become "entitled."

Okay. I love children. I dote on babies. I plan to have kids at some point. I'm not a child-hating grinch with a vendetta against "breeders," as the haters would have it. And yet, I totally get the mommy rage. And Harris' reaction is disingenuous: It's not about the kids. It's not even about the stroller-blocking. It's about the parents. And as she makes very clear, it's a self-selecting, moneyed, privileged and child-centric group of parents - a tiny percentage of the parents in this country and in the world at large. Much of the baby industry may be geared towards this population, but it's still a very small one. Yes, I said parents. Now, while I'm well able to believe that there's plenty of societal ambivalence coming out here towards women, this is an equal-opportunity resentment. While it's usually moms we see, when one does see an indulgent helicopter dad (and do you ever!) it provokes exactly the same reactions. I could spin you a little yarn about a father, an ill-behaved, angelic flaxen-haired child named after a jazz musician and the artisanal bread booth at the greenmarket, but there's been enough snarking. And the problem with satirizing such a population (and again - it's a specific population, as Harris makes very clear) is that it's beyond parody.

Yes, there's a class element here. But, come on, it's not just a class thing: if this were just a bunch of wealthy parents with nannies and fancy baby clothes, it would be a very different matter. It's the combination of smugness and obliviousness, Berkeley ethics funded by serious money, of campaigning for liberal politicians while complaining about nanny problems. It's people talking knowingly about the obliviousness of the 50s and Betty Draper's terrible parenting and knowing they're superior, while a toddler rolls on the floor under other coffee drinkers' feet (also this weekend). It's not that people just mind the strollers taking up the street; it's then getting mad when you won't move for those strollers. In short, it's the narcissism of single people, but expanded to fit a whole family. As Neal Pollack told the Times, "'I don't think it's a bad thing that people want to continue a semblance of their pre-parenthood lifestyle...Going to rock shows and bars, he added, is "just what their lives were.'" This is really it in a nutshell: the sense some of these parents give is that they'll have it all, on their terms. There will be no concessions made: instead, the world will concede.

Harris brings up Park Slope, the nexus of all New York's fabled mommy-snark. There was a minor fracas in '08 when Union Hall, a bar and music venue in that neighborhood, asked moms not to bring strollers and mobile kids to the bar, because the space was not kid-proof and it was a legal issue. Parents across the blogs were up in arms - so much so that the bar had to take it back. This was, in some eyes, a good answer to Harris's question.

In sum, no one reasonable hates parents. What people don't like is inconsiderate self-absorbed parents who expect the world to be reordered. Of course, what's hard is that defensive, self-righteous and oblivious parents are more than matched by total assholes on the other side of the aisle, who shout their kid-hate from the rooftops. My initial reaction to Harris' piece was, what? We don't dislike moms! And then I read the comments. Here are a few, just from page 1:

"we don't want to hate you, but we will if you deserve it."

"I resent that my choice to be child-free subjects me to condescension and pity, even though I'm not the one taking up the whole aisle at Target with said SUV stroller and screaming, unruly brats named after medieval professions."

"Quite simply I hate your baby."

"Having children these days is something that highly uncreative women do to fill their lives. PERIOD."

"You write vapid, pointless articles about how hard it is to have a kid during the most wide-open, accepting and privileged time and place(s) in history."

"One child per person. Period. The right we all share is to ensure life for everyone not just our own."

Helpful as these comments are, they do serve to underlie the total fruitlessness of this argument. No one is backing down. It's like oil and water coming together, forming a translucent puddle on the internet. Now, in some lights, that oil floating on top of the water is beautiful. But most of us would rather step over it - and help our kids do the same. "I hate moms," sighed my friend Cora the other day. We were pushing her one-year-old in a stroller. And I knew what she meant.

Everybody Hates Mommy [Salon]
Look Who's Getting Rolled Out Of The Bar [New York Times]

The backlash against overinvolved "helicopter" parents has been going on long time, and Nancy Gibbs's description of such people in Time will surprise no one who reads trend pieces. They buy Baby Kneepads! They monitor their kids at college, and even in their jobs! When their precious daughter forgets a necklace she needs for her "coordinated outfit," they race to school to drop it off!

More surprising than these stock Generation-Y anecdotes is the news that some parents are pushing back, not just with rebellious mommy-blogging, but with actual classes designed to curb their overparenting impulses. Gibbs describes one such class:

Eleven parents are sitting in a circle in an airy, glass-walled living room in south Austin, Texas, eating organic, gluten-free, nondairy coconut ice cream. This is a Slow Family Living class, taught by perinatal psychologist Carrie Contey and Bernadette Noll. "Our whole culture," says Contey, 38, "is geared around 'Is your kid making the benchmarks?' There's this fear of 'Is my kid's head the right size?' People think there's some mythical Good Mother out there that they aren't living up to and that it's hurting their child. I just want to pull the plug on that."

Truly committed de-overparenters can get Kim John Payne, author of Simplicity Parenting, to "go into your home, weed out your kids' stuff, sort out their schedule, turn off the screens and help your family find space you didn't know you had, like a master closet reorganizer for the soul." Payne recommends that parents get rid of children's broken and outgrown toys, "pare down to the classics that leave the most to the child's imagination and create a kind of toy library kids can visit and swap from. Then build breaks of calm into their schedule so they can actually enjoy the toys." Paring down its possessions seems smart, but "toy library?" "Build breaks into their schedule?" These make fun sound like school, childhood sound like work, and de-overparenting sound a lot like, well, overparenting. In the same vein, "pulling the plug" on unrealistic ideals of motherhood is a worthy goal, but do parents really need a special class — complete with nondairy ice cream — in order to achieve it?

One dad, Matt, tells Gibbs that de-overparenting can be a tough transition. He says, "it's not every day that I consciously sit down and ask myself hard questions about how I want family life to be slower or better." But should the process of being a more relaxed parent really involve "hard questions?" Can't you just do it by, you know, relaxing? Can't parents just lighten up without making lightening up into yet another rulebound parenting project? When did parenting become a gerund anyway?

One point kind of gets lost in all the hysteria over helicopter parents: Gibbs writes, "It's a tricky line to walk, since studies link parents' engagement in a child's education to better grades, higher test scores, less substance abuse and better college outcomes. Given a choice, teachers say, overinvolved parents are preferable to invisible ones." And while she also says "helicopter parents can be found across all income levels," it's certainly easier to hover over your kid if you have the money for things like violin lessons, college admissions coaches, and de-overparenting classes. This is not to say that poorer families never have overparenting problems, but it might be wise to redirect some of the hysteria over helicopter parents towards making it easier for all parents to get an appropriate level of involvement in their children's education. Moms and dads who don't speak English or who work three jobs might not be able to harass teachers or overschedule their kids with extracurriculars, but they also have a harder time helping with homework and addressing kids' difficulties at school — and this might be a bigger problem than a few jerks with Baby Kneepads.

Can These Parents Be Saved? [Time]

Car repair? That's for boys. That look on his face says: "I'm thinking about overcharging you."

Cooking and cleaning? That's for girls. The young lady on the left might also be discovering that a frying pan can double as a weapon, but that's for advanced users.

Grilling? That's for boys. Even though cooking on a stove is for girls, if you cook with fire, you're following our ancestor, Homo Erectus. Early Man, not Early Woman!

Playing with your food is something both girls and boys can do; although only girls work at McDonald's.

Related: When I was four, I loved McDonald's intensely and thought it was a burger and shake heaven on earth. So when a teacher asked me — the only black kid in my pre-k class — what I wanted to do when I grew up, I said "work at McDonald's." My mom witnessed this interaction and, I think, almost died of disappointment.

Being a pretty princess, wearing make-up and jewelry? That's for girls.

And just because you're a princess doesn't mean you shouldn't bake, make toast or blend a smoothie. Duh. That's what girls do.

A plush pet condo, for girls ages 2 and up. Because it's never too early to be a crazy cat lady!

Something all girls look forward to: Graduating from a baking princess to a Queen Of Clean. Maybe someday she'll be in one of those sad mop commercials Sarah Haskins is always making fun of.

Don't tell Danica Patrick, but car racing is for boys. Falling in love is for girls.

Sports are for boys.

Except soccer. Girls can play soccer. And whatever that other thing is.

OMG progress: Girls can be doctors! Or star in primetime medical dramas!

But boys can be paleontologists, truckers, law enforcement officials or doctors.

Lilly's Kids [Official Site]

Earlier: All previous catalog posts

It's serious, people. Here's how the Telegraph puts it: "A study has shown that the wearing of inappropriate outfits is a serious problem for playgroups because the wrong dress can seriously disrupt a whole class." No, we're not talking baby minis and fishnets, but rather insufficiently warm wraps or fancy duds that are most definitely not play-clothes. Sadly, some kids are apparently worried about "ruining" nice outfits by playing in them. And, as the study's authors don't need to point out, playing is a really good thing for all kinds of physical and social reasons. Dr Kristen Copeland, who oversaw the study, said "stricter guidelines were needed "so that children's active play opportunities aren't curtailed". What would the guidelines be? "No Little Marc Jacobs or any other garment made for a swiftly-growing child that costs more than said child's tuition?"

The sad thing, according to EurekAlert, is that "the study shows that parents may need education about the importance and benefits of active play for children's development" - and this isn't benign neglect we're talking about, as much as specific instructions not to ruin fancy clothes. Maybe the fact that the price of fancy kid gear has stayed static even as other clothing has gone down has made it more of a prestige item than ever. But take heart: the luxury kids' market is actually on the wane. And if that's good for our children's physical and mental development, well, score one for the Recession. (We're guessing though that, if this is indicative of the parents' priorities, dressing the kids in Osh-Kosh isn't going to solve all problems.) Suri, however, will probably maintain her impeccable aesthetic, and now the tabs can bolster their faux sanctimony with a few "experts" while they're at it.

Designer Baby Clothes Could Stop Children Playing [Daily Telegraph]
All Dressed-Up And Nowhere To Go [EurekAlert]
Buying Recession Proof Kids Clothing [NordicDesign]
High-End Kids Clothes Languish [Wall Street Journal]

Kaufman, who has a three-year-old son, notes that he understands the frustration people feel when they're subjected to out-of-control kids or lousy parenting methods: "I can't stand bad parents or bad children, either," he writes, "There are parents who are over-permissive to the point of absurdity. There are kids who are just hyper or obnoxious." But Kaufman argues that society, as a whole, confuses "bad children" and "bad parents" with kids who are just tired, or cranky, and parents who are doing their best to keep their kids under control, as "anyone who's been in charge of a toddler for more than three minutes knows that even the most perfect parent in the entire world can't prevent or stop every tantrum."

I'll admit that in my early twenties, I was one of those people who would start pouting as soon as I walked onto a plane and saw a toddler squirming about in his seat. "Oh great," I'd hiss to my boyfriend, "he'll be crying in ten minutes." I had no concern for the parents or the child, who were probably just as stressed about the flight and what would happen in the air; I saw them as an inconvenience to my own traveling, as if they should hop aboard the Magic School Bus or some such to reach their destination instead of flying on the plane with the rest of us. I was a complete crab when it came to crabby children, and I instantly blamed their parents for not being able to "control" their kid's tears. In short, I was a total jerk.

As Kaufman notes, there's a big difference between getting annoyed at a parent who allows little Suzie or Timmy to kick the seat repeatedly as if it's some type of adorable behavior and getting annoyed at a parent who is desperately trying to get Timmy to stop throwing his tantrums. It wasn't until my niece was born 7 years ago that I began to understand this; watching my sister and my brother-in-law handle her tantrum phase was rough, as I knew they were great parents and my niece was a great kid, but tantrums happen, and, as Kaufman notes, "Toddlers have to have tantrums. It's how they learn boundaries."

Now, whenever I hear a kid crying on a plane, my thoughts immediately move to sympathy for both the child and the parent; maybe the kid is teething, maybe she's just exhausted, maybe she's scared, poor thing. Every child, in some way, has become my niece or my nephew, and their parents my sister or brother-in-law. I am not a parent myself, but by trying to put myself in the other person's shoes (or even in the kid's shoes) has made me a much more understanding person. Of course, this doesn't mean that I still don't get extremely annoyed when I have to sit in front of someone who thinks it's just charming that little Billy likes to throw Matchbox cars at strangers, but taking the position that all crying or slightly obnoxious behavior in public on the part of children and/or their parents automatically makes them "bad" people isn't fair to anyone.

I don't think we live in a child-hating society, but I do agree with Kaufman's argument that the public does often make enemies of parents and small children who are just trying to live their lives. "I don't like screaming in my ear, either," he writes, "I also don't like people who wrestle the armrest away from me, people who lean their seat ALL the way back, and people who claim their suitcase is a purse and cram the overhead compartment with too many bags. But that's life. That's what traveling by air means. Heck, that's what it means to live in this world." Yes, kids can be annoying, but so can everyone else. It took me years to realize that the eyeroll from the 20 year old who thinks she knows everything can be just as painful and irritating as the screams of a 3-year-old who just needs to take a nap.

Why Does Our Society Hate Children [PsychologyToday]

The report, which will be released today by the Josephson Institute of Ethics, surveyed 7,000 people in various age groups nationwide about their past behavior and their personal ethics. They found that teens who admit to cheating on exams in high school are much more likely to lie to a customer, cheat on taxes, or lie to their spouses. Additional findings, as reported in the L.A. Times include:

Teens 17 and younger are five times more likely than those older than 50 to believe that lying and cheating are necessary to succeed (51% vs. 10%), those in the 17 and younger group are nearly four times as likely to deceive their boss (31% vs. 8%) and three times more likely to keep change mistakenly given to them (49% vs. 15%).

More young adults ages 18 to 24 reported lying to a spouse or partner than did the 41- to 50-year-old members of their parents' generation (48% vs. 22%), more made an unauthorized copy of music or a video (69% vs. 27%) and they were more likely to have misrepresented or omitted a fact in a job interview (14% vs. 4%).

The Josephson Institute of Ethics issues regular surveys on the ethics of teens, and they report seeing a steady increase in the number of kids who admitted to cheating, lying and stealing in the past years. However, this is the first study that has linked teenage dishonesty with adult misdeeds. Robert A. deMayo, a professor of psychology from Pepperdine University, believes that the erosion of teen ethics may be linked to the growth of new technology, which provides a huge amount of feedback that reinforces negative behavior by normalizing it. "The young do that in a widespread fashion and say yes, they know it's wrong; yes, it's stealing, but everybody is doing it. It becomes normalized, it becomes almost irrelevant that it's against the letter of the law," he said.

The question of teen morality feels especially salient this week, after the horrible gang rape of a 15-year-old girl in Richmond. This morning, Anna N. delved into the reasons why something like this could happen, and while the bystander effect may play a part, there was clearly much more going on than simply diffusion of responsibility. As much as I don't want to draw a parallel between this study and the Richmond case, it is difficult to read about teen ethics without immediately going back to this terrifying example of a group of young adults who lacked the basic human decency to report a violent assault.

But here's the thing: Kids - and teens - usually have to learn this behavior somewhere, and while peers do play a huge part, so do parents. Rich Jarc, director of the Josephson Institute, says he's worried about the implication of their recent findings: "When you see that teens are five times more likely than adults to think it's OK to cheat to get ahead, we have a problem. Just think if five times the number of people in business, politics and banking hold those beliefs. That's alarming."

It is alarming, but on the other hand, these teens did not spring fully formed into the world. Perhaps even more importantly, teens have always cheated on tests, lied to people, and even stolen. The study examines is based on self reports; is it possible that more teens are simply admitting to their misdeeds than ever before? Based on purely anecdotal evidence, this seems somewhat likely. I will admit, I was kind of a cheater in high school myself. I cheated on tests, cheated on a boyfriend, and routinely lied to my parents. However, my desire to cheat was vastly overwhelmed by my compulsive honesty. No sooner had I told my parents a lie than I would turn right around and confess, which made their job of reigning me in far easier. Judging from the growing trend of confessional journalism - pioneered by none other than the loathsome Liz Jones - people are becoming more and more likely to put it all out there in some (possibly misguided) desire to unburden their conscience. Maybe we're going to see a generation of liars and cheaters, but maybe we are looking at the next generation of obsessive and somewhat self-destructive truth-tellers.

Fortunately, deMayo points out that there is a silver lining: Teens today are much more tolerant than ever before. He notes that many young adults express more positive views about ethnic and gender rights than previous generations. "We want to denounce young people as immoral, but certain basic values that represent American ideals of freedom and equality seem to be on the rise with young adults." At least we have that.

Seeds Of Adult Dishonesty Sowed In Youth, Study Says [L.A. Times]

Writes the New York Times' Hilary Stout,

incongruously and with regularity, this is a generation that yells..."I've worked with thousands of parents and I can tell you, without question, that screaming is the new spanking," said Amy McCready, the founder of Positive Parenting Solutions, which teaches parenting skills in classes, individual coaching sessions and an online course. "This is so the issue right now. As parents understand that it's not socially acceptable to spank children, they are at a loss for what they can do. They resort to reminding, nagging, timeout, counting 1-2-3 and quickly realize that those strategies don't work to change behavior. In the absence of tools that really work, they feel frustrated and angry and raise their voice. They feel guilty afterward, and the whole cycle begins again."

So, those unenlightened generations who did hit their kids maintained a calm silence at all times? Doubtful. Yelling is apparently traumatic for kids, but having come from such a family - no hitting, plenty of exasperated yelling - at least part of the issue seems to be that it's so ineffective. Yeah, it might mean Mom's mad, but in our house, that was as bad as it got...her being mad. Yelling implied a lack of control that wasn't scary, but certainly didn't suggest authority. On Supernanny, a show to which I'm addicted, if only because she makes parenting look so deceptively easy, Jo arrives at a house full of screaming, ineffectual adults and insolent brats and with a little consistency, plenty of hugs and a few rounds on the Naughty Mat, gets the house running like a well-oiled Duggar machine. (And say what you will about Michelle Duggar, the woman doesn't raise her voice.) The issue isn't "corporal punishment" versus "total lack of discipline," and it seems a little problematic to make the choice seem so diametric. Indeed, isn't that parenting coach (!) kind of implying that spanking is the only solution that "works" - albeit "socially unacceptable?" Many a formerly slap-happy Supernanny success story could tell you otherwise - at least as of two weeks after filming.

For Some Parents, Shouting Is The New Spanking [NYTimes]

Because the kids in Milk are cool. Really cool. But also: The photography is fun, the fashion is well-styled and, in many ways, Milk kicks Vogue's ass.

Obviously child models are cute. But when shooting them on a blank background, the results could be meh. Instead, Milk pulls off vibrant, interesting portraits.

Instead of models jumping, you get models hamming it up. What's not to love?

There's an attitude here, and it says: "My allowance is paltry. Step it up."

So fresh-faced and fun!

Do you think she has a blog? Do you think she has a Twitter account? Do you think she knows who Madonna is?

I'm fully aware that these kids are being paid and that a professional photographer and stylist are creating the look of this shoot. And still: I'm fully buying the character this kid is playing. He's into chess, cheese and Wes Anderson movies.

If you don't let her watch Breakfast At Tiffany's again, she is going to hold her breath.

Um, can I hang out with you guys after school work?

She's obviously cooking up mischief.

Tyra asked her to be on America's Next Top Child Model, but this young lady was too busy.

"Really? You invited boys to your party? Seriously? How disappointing."

Ah, childhood — full of unicorn dreams and playing in abandoned car graveyards.

"For my next trick, I'll make Brussels sprouts disappear!"

"Attention! Playing with life size trucks is more fun than playing with toy trucks. Pass it on!"

I want to wear this tomorrow. Is that lame?

Just one example of how the photography is more inventive than Vogue.

Dear Anna Wintour: The tiny gauntlet has been thrown.

Earlier: Milk Magazine: Memoirs Of A (Child) Geisha
Milk Magazine Gets In Your Face With Breast Milk

Confession: Dancing baby videos do nothing for me. Otters holding hands? Yes. Diapered tots? Nah. But Anna forced me to write this story. So I had to watch a lot of babies. And I think I might be coming around! And in any case, as Ada Calhoun writes for Time, the global phenomenon has reached a fever pitch:

Baby Cory's famous "Single Ladies" video has spawned SingleBabies.com, where you can donate to the New Zealand toddler's college fund. (You can also follow Baby Cory on Twitter, or be his friend on Facebook.

So why do babies like "Single Ladies"? Because, Time's Calhoun finds, the song is super simple.

"The song is very Teletubbies," says Tony-nominated musician Kenny Mellman. "If you listen to it, there is very little music. It's all drum and Beyoncé's voice." Kara Shall, communications director of Baby Loves Disco, agrees. "Young children love songs with good rhythm and repetition, and 'Single Ladies' certainly has both," says Shall, whose company once a month in 21 cities turns bars into child-proof discos. (She also notes that her own children, ages 5 and 2, are big fans of the Beyoncé song.) In addition —

OK, I'MA LET YOU FINISH, BUT APPARENTLY BABIES ARE MAKING THE GREATEST VIDEOS OF ALL TIME. A gallery of highlights, below.

The Original! Baby Cory's video has more than 2 million views.

This kid has excellent hip action.

Award this little girl extra points for an authentic costume.

Diaper butt helps with the choreography.

A broken leg will not stop a kid from the mesmerizing chorus, "If you like it then you shoulda put a ring on it."

This baby gets by with a little help.

All the Single Babies: Why Do Tots Love Beyoncé? [Time]

Nine-year-old Caitlin McDermott told a reporter: "We don't need men. We girls can do what we feel. We girls are as strong as boys. Girls can stand on their own feet."

An 11-year-old told Monica Hesse of The Washington Post: "We have more rights than other women around the world and we should use our rights to help others"

Another 11-year-old named Gabby Cano said: "Please stop polluting. We only have one world."

But it wasn't all serious business at the Tween Summit. Attendees were exposed to video games like "Charm Girls Club," made by conference sponsor Electronic Arts. Hesse writes:

The players frantically wave a Wii remote at the screen, where gorgeous avatars are busy styling their hair. The winner is the player who teases the virtual locks into the highest bouffant.

Empowering! Other sponsors included PBteen, Disney Book Group and Dove Go Fresh.

Plus, USA Today reports that the exhibit hall "had a definite tween flair, with lots of pink and purple balloons, a gaming lounge and pale pink sofas." Because you simply can't have a Tween Summit without pink sofas! Duh!

It's true that tweens are plugged in — a YouthTrends survey shows that 39% of girls played a game on a video game system in the past week, and 29% of girls gave product advice to parents in the last week — but that doesn't mean that tweens are frazzled. As Perri Klass writes for The New York Times (after speaking with Dr. Dimitri Christakis, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Washington who is studying children and the media): "Parents are digital immigrants… children are digital natives."

Luckily, you get the idea that the positives outweigh any negatives. The Youth Trends survey shows that 52% of girls have read a book for fun in the past week. And when Monica Hesse from WaPo asked about sexting, a 14-year-old named Angelique Gaston said, "Ew," and then proclaimed: "That isn't what we're doing. The media bases ev-er-y-thing on sexuality."

A Summit For Tweens: It's All About Empowering Girls [USA Today]
At Girls' Summit, An Image Betwixt And Be Tween [WaPo]
18 And Under: Texting, Surfing, Studying [NY Times]

In a juicy profile, New Yorker's Rebecca Mead goes inside the behemoth teen taste-maker Alloy, a sort of sinister junior Clear Channel that's responsible for much of the YA bestseller list, including the multimedia Gossip Girl and Traveling Pants juggernauts and, more lately, The Vampire Diaries. And do we ever see the pink, undead, bratty sausage being made! Here's how Mead describes the efficient hit-factory:

[Alloy] pack-ges about thirty novels a year for publishers, and also generates television shows and a growing number of ideas for featurefilms. In order to do all this, Alloy has developed a process with an industrial level of efficiency. Ideas are typically suggested in weekly development meetings and, if they gain the approval of Morgenstein and Bank, are fleshed out into a short summary by an editor. A writer is asked to create a sample chapter on spec; if Alloy executives are happy with the sample, they put her (or, on occasion, him) on contract. The writer hashes out a plot with Bank, one or two other editors, and Sara Shandler, Alloy's editorial director-an alumnus of Seventeen, who, at the age of nineteen, put together the anthology "Ophelia Speaks".

It's always kind of creepy to see unabashed marketing at work, and especially when it's aimed at an impressionable age-group, however lucrative. Of course, cash-in teen-lit has a long pseudonomynous history, from Nancy Drew to Sweet Valley. And the Alloy execs would just say they're giving kids what they want. One Alloy exec defends it thusly: "Editors and publishers can get hung up on what's good for kids...At Alloy, they always think first about what kids want to read." Which, of course, isn't always - or indeed, ever - an improving tract. And the idea that the body of literature informs and shapes said nascent tastes, paving the way for a lifetime of dutiful buying - well, that's conveniently ignored. Yes, kids want candy and Easy-Mac: because they've seen ads designed to attract them. Not because it's what's best for their development, or some genetic imperative of childhood.

Sure, some of the series sound really interesting (I really want to read the second "Wish" book that they map out in the piece), and the Alloy execs say we're moving away, culturally, from the excess of "brat lit" into Twilit territory because "more serious, angsty literature is where girls are right now. Morbid, dead-girl lit." And some of the book are even of historical interest! Mead mentions a new novel about
"a boy who acquires superhuman powers after being tortured during the Civil War." Then there's the new gilded-age Gossip-Girl-esque series, the cover image of which Mead describes:

The result is a look that no woman in the Gilded Age would have been immodest enough to wear beyond the boudoir or the brothel, though the Alloy team felt that the sartorial anachronism was entirely forgivable (much like the heroine's request for "ciggies"-slang that would take another sixty years to emerge). "Girls today would not relate to the more severe necklines and covered arms and horrible hair styles that girls were wearing at the time," Sara Shandler says. "We tried to do the imaginary-princess version." Or, as one of the publishers competing for the book described the gown, "the ultimate fuck-me prom dress."

And there, of course, is the rub. There's a continuing belief that kids can't relate to anything unlike themselves. Richer versions of themselves, 19th Century versions of themselves, maybe magic versions of themselves - but the feeling seems to be that kids are such incredible narcissists that any truly expanded horizons are more than they can handle. And the problem, of course, is that it's self-fulfilling. The other day I passed a poster at the bus stop bearing a still from the new Where The Wild Things Are movie. "Read," it ordered - seemingly without irony. Alloy would totally agree.

The Gossip Mill [New Yorker]

In this Today show segment, you'll see that she teaches ballet, tap jazz, hip-hop, etc — to students between 2 and 12. She's awesome. Clip above.

Related: Amiya's Mobile Dance Academy [Official Site]