Nice. Do they sell a "Baby Lineker"? I'd quite like my drooling lump of sprog to grow up to be seriously tasty at footie.

Just a "Baby Southgate", which will make your baby grow up into a man unable to make PKs. :-p

Could it be a marketing ploy? How may parents are going to return it because their child isn't smart enough.

How may parents are going to return it because their child isn't smart enough.

Are you kidding? This is America! Land of the Class Action Lawsuit! Land of The Predatory Trial Lawyer! If our fuckbrain corn syrup poisoned kids aren't geniuses, SOMEONE HAS TO PAY! My guess is Disney are trying head off the legal predators by this move.

Well, we know from experience with feral children that an intellectually impoverished early environment is pernicious - for instance, ferals not only don't speak, they also lose the ability to learn to speak.

So it's possible that an environment tailored to enhance learning abilities might do so... and it's dead certain that every snake-oil peddler on Earth (that's noticed the possibility) will have his own program pretending to provide one. Fortunately, of course, only the best people run large corporations....

Odd, how many great minds have come from intellectually impoverished places and times. It's almost as if, since there wasn't any thinking being done, they
became the ones to do it.

Odd, too, how so many privileged ones, with all that wealth can provide in education and opportunity become dolts, or worse, well-trained monsters.

In my own ignorance, "political science" is also a contradiction in terms.

This recurring delusion that if parents do everything just right their kids will be some kind of perfect genius children is an invention of the psychological guilt industry that seems to thrive among upper middle class "perfect parents".

I was reading an article the other day talking about the fear that raising one's voice to a child causes as much damage as physical punishment. I can only imagine how damaged my little darlings must be if that's true.

This isn't about the kids---it's all about the parents.

These never-ending fears and guilts are part and parcel of the "children as accouterments" view of parenting.

Perfect people must be perfect parents who must raise perfect children, who can then be displayed to admiring peers, like the latest fashions or the trendiest new car, the beach condo in just the right area, the most desirable club memberships.

Of course the kids must be geniuses, artists, whiz kids, super athletes, etc., etc. How else can the long suffering parents prove their nobility and worth?

After all, they had to spend several hours a week with the noisy little mess-makers when the nanny was on her day off.

I am very fortunate in my children. None of them is perfect, although they are all better people than I ever was. I assume that is their mothers' influence, as I have very good taste in women.

It's one of my few claims to fame, along with my cute legs.

I followd the "Patton" rule---give it to them straight and dirty, then they'll remember. If they live to be a hundred, they will never meet a more demanding and critical supervisor than I was as they grew up.

On the good side, I never said no to aniother book from the bookstore. They heard that awful, but necessary, word enough every day otherwise.

Sometimes it was even said rather loudly. Oh, the horror....

Veryretired, you admit that you raised your children, but they are not perfect. Who can you sue to correct this fault? Or will your kids sue you in a few years?

I had a good idea last week. Why not sell empty containers, and call them 'Invisible Friends'? Make sure your child doesn't miss out on an imaginery experience! But some parents would probably sue me, not getting the joke, or complain that the friends taught their children to swear and misbehave. the best friend to prepare them for the real world would be a Lawyer! Miniature Rumpolds, anyone?

Disney has marketed green themes and anti-capitalism to children. Their cable entertainment has been biased towards creating the shock troops of the ascendant matriarchy.

So it's hard to feel sorry for them, even when attacked by the loony left.

If only everyone who has good taste in women had cute legs...

Lack of perfection is not a fault in a human being, it is what constitutes a human being as a real person.

As I have said here and in other comments elsewhere in the past, I am not a radical individualist because I love greed or money or rich people, or hate politics or society or compassion for my fellow citizens.

I am so very aware of my own flaws and failings that I could never imagine myself being the good king or able to be trusted with ever increasing power over others.

I reject the concentration of power because the desire for it is a cancerous flaw in and of itself, and those who somehow convince themselves they are more moral and more virtuous, and therefore able to wield such power wisely, are so delusionally lacking in truthful self-reflection and introspection as to make them more dangerous than any ordinary criminal to my well-being.

Children who believe they must be perfect to gain their parents' approval and love are placed in a nightmare world of either having to pretend to be someone else or live in constant fear and guilt that they will be judged unworthy. Usually it is both.

My kids tolerate me in my dotage because I always made it very clear to them that my love was unconditional, even if my approval of some of their choices was not so automatic.

Alisa---my oldest son has both also, but, alas, he just got engaged to a very sweet and intelligient woman, and is planning a wedding next autumn. If his plans fall through, I'll let you know. I doubt he will change his mind, though, he waited a long time to find her.

Nah VR, if I had a daughter - but I also have a son:-)

Alisa, gender bias is against political correctness. turn yourself in at the nearest PC office, please. As you're an honourable person, I know you'll do the honourable thing.