The gifts we give children shape them and reveal what we expect of them

By David McElroy · December 25, 2011

For many children, the passing of years is marked by when they got for Christmas. There was the train set when I was 3 (which you see above), walkie talkies and a “spy kit” when I was 9, chemistry set and electrical experiment kit when I was 11, and books for most years thereafter. The things I got seemed to reflect who I was and how the people around me saw me. I wonder how much our childhood gifts shape us?

I’m thinking about this because of different presents I’m seeing for kids around me today. Two contrasting examples stand out, because they represent entirely different approaches, at least in my mind.

A couple of my friends have a beautiful and charming young daughter named Linnea. Among Linnea’s Christmas pictures this morning, there’s a whole series of her with her 36 new containers of Play-Doh. She looks happy, and it makes me imagine all the things she’s going to pull out of her little imagination and bring to life with those little pieces of modeling clay.

A 12-year-old neighbor of mine named Joseph came running over to me excitedly a couple of hours ago to tell me that he had gotten an iPhone 4S for Christmas. He knows that I have an iPhone and he’s told me about wanting one before, so he couldn’t wait to tell me about his.

Nobody could accuse me of not thinking the iPhone is a great gift. (An iPhone that I gave someone four years ago stands out as the Christmas present I’ve been most happy to give so far.) But as I thought about different things that kids can get — and what those things represent — that Play-Doh looked better and better.

It’s not really fair to compare what you give a 12-year-old and what you give a 3-year-old, but these still represent different philosophies, it seems. One represents being more passive — consuming content — while the other represents a blank slate that can become anything. Many of the things that kids receive today — smartphones, gaming devices, media players and so forth — are all about being passive. I wonder if that is going a long way toward creating a generation that’s more comfortable consuming content than creating it.

Linnea’s parents are both artists. They don’t do it for a living, but they’ve both made films and have creativity and insight about the world around them. It seems to me that the dozens of containers of Play-Doh reflect that creativity — and they reflect that they want her to create, rather than just be a passive consumer.

I don’t object to kids getting iPhones — although it surpasses everything I could have even imagined when I was 12 — but I wonder whether we help them in the long run with presents like that. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe it’s not a big deal. But I just know something inside me says they’d be better off with someone that would encourage them to make things instead of consume things.

Decades after I got that train set when I was 3, I still have parts of it. The engine and tender sit proudly on a bookshelf near my desk. That’s it below. I used and abused it as a kid. I pulled the engine out. I broke parts of it. I fixed what I broke. The cow-catcher from the front is missing today. I learned to imagine it was something more than it was. I made up (and even recorded) stories that would embarrass me for you to hear today.

But that train and others that followed were things that required my imagination. They helped shape me. They made me a creator rather than just a consumer. I think that’s a good thing.

Linnea might not still have her Play-Doh decades from now. (I suspect it will have dried out by then.) But I suspect she will keep a sense of imagination that will be fostered by parents who want her to be creative. Joseph will be a consumer with his iPhone, but there will be no lasting impact. I know which one I think got the better present today, even if Joseph wouldn’t understand that.

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We are ruled by the dumbest and most incompetent people among us — and we have a system which allows stupid and irresponsible people to force the costs of their idiocy onto smarter and wiser people. Can we get away with that? Yes, for quite some time. But we eventually reach a point at which the dumbest of the dumb — who are habitual liars and mentally ill fools — lead us to the disasters and destruction that some of us have seen coming for years. We are approaching that point. And yet most of the idiots around us still wave their rhetorical banners of support for the evil people who are leading us to ruin — and all of them point their fingers at someone else, never noticing that their own enthusiastic support of evil is to blame. When things finally fall apart, blame yourself for your blindness to the evil, not whoever happens to be in power when it happens.

I’ve been making some changes to the site lately and there are more changes coming in the days ahead, so don’t be surprised if you some small differences. This is not a wholesale redesign, but rather the addition of some features. Since they’re smarter than I am, I’ve put Oliver and Alex in charge of the technical work, which you can see in this action photo from the control room of our media complex. I recently added a series of landing pages for readers who randomly discover the site from an Internet search. I’ve also changed the YouTube link at the top of the page to go to the new YouTube channel for video essays that reflect things I’ve already published here. (Here’s a little bit about both of the YouTube channels I’m working on.) In addition, I’m trying to move away from using Instagram, so I’m experimenting with photo plug-ins that will eventually allow me to host the pictures — cats, dogs, sunsets, whatever — that I often take. So don’t be surprised to see more changes. Thanks for your patience. Let’s hope Alex and Oliver know what they’re doing.

I have no use for the theocratic and repressive government of Iran. The people who run the country are cruel at best and evil at worst. The Iranian people deserve freedom. But I have no personal quarrel with anybody in Iran. While I’m not thrilled about a future Iranian government having nuclear weapons, I’m just as concerned about nukes in the hands of politicians in Israel, Pakistan, India, China and Russia. I’m not even thrilled with the U.S., Britain and France having them, either, because I don’t trust any politicians to be responsible with such terrible weapons. All I can say with certainty is that American taxpayers have no business attacking Iran, especially since we’re being forced to pay for this attack in order to benefit the politicians of Israel — and nobody else. If Middle Eastern countries want to fight among themselves, that’s none of my business. It’s not the business of the U.S. government, either. I have no quarrel with anybody in Iran — and having the government which claims to represent me launch an unprovoked attack against a sovereign country will only make all Americans less safe in the near future. This attack is poorly conceived and morally unjustified. Remember that when the Iranians launch attacks that we will then condemn as “terrorism.” What the U.S. is doing right now looks like terrorism to me. And let’s not forget that the attack is the latest in a long line of unconstitutional wars by various U.S. presidents — who have no legal power to declare war on their own, according to the U.S. Constitution.

A child having a tantrum understands only one thing: Did I get my way or not? He doesn’t understand the issues involved. He doesn’t understand the reasons that went into a decision. He doesn’t understand any of the things that mature and reasonable adults have to understand in order to live healthy lives. By his reaction to the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling to strike down his disastrous tariff scheme, Donald Trump shows himself to be — once more — a screaming child having a tantrum. Outside the world of mob bosses who expect to get their way every time, normal adults don’t act this way, but Trump isn’t normal. He’s an angry and vengeful man who has narcissistic personality disorder. And we are in danger as a result. Trump doesn’t understand the legal issues involved in this ruling. He doesn’t understand economics. He doesn’t understand rule of law. He doesn’t understand that he can ever be wrong. All he understands is that he didn’t get his way. And he is now a narcissistic and raging little boy who also happens to hold life-and-death power over most humans on this planet. He’s dangerous — and the system which gives him that power is even more dangerous.

Is it an attempt to blur the gender line between men and women? Or is it some weird tribute to the traditional Scottish kilt? It’s hard to say, but fashion designers keep pushing for men to wear skirts in the last few years. Both men and women in modern fashion seem oddly androgynous, as though it would be offensive for a man to look manly or for a woman to look feminine. A CNN article about the latest fashions from Paris caught my attention Monday and left me wondering about the ugly clothes the designers are hawking. If a man wants to wear a skirt — or a kilt — that’s OK with me, but I’ll stick with a traditional dark suit with a white shirt and tie. (Well, when I’m not wearing t-shirts and sweats, of course.) I always wonder who actually buys the outlandish garb from fashion designers anyway. I would be humiliated to be seen in any of this stuff, but I obviously have no sense of high fashion.

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