...with the understanding that an opinion is only worth the same as any other opinion.

First, the movement towards praising children, as I recall it (being 50, I'm old enough to remember), was a reaction to the lack of praise and indeed, prevalence of continuous negative criticism masquerading as discipline that prevailed in the generations before. As usual, we have not fixed the imbalance, but have moved too far in the other direction. A little praise for a job well done is a wonderful thing. If we paid any attention to behavioral psychology at all, we would know that random reinforcement does more to motivate than either consistent reward or consistent neglect.

Personally, I've tended to stick with honest criticism. This is what you did well, and this is what needs improvement. And, when warranted, this is where you really screwed up and never do it again, or, what the hell is wrong with you? Get out of my sight! So I've got a temper...

Praise is good. When earned. There's also nothing wrong with "Nice try. You'll do better next time."

I also think that parents being there is an important factor in raising children, but actually, children are remarkably resilient, and so any consistent adult (not merely grown up) presence will do the job. It's about having actual conversations and an example of gratification deferred and sacrifices made for the child to witness and to internalize. Also, later, a real adult to rebel against comes in very handy in adolescence, partly because there are real character issues to test when an adult is around, and partly because, when an experiment in rebellion fails, there's someone there who will do their damnedest to catch you before you stumble in front of the train. They will let you hit the ground pretty hard sometimes, though.

And I believe that the technology problem is overstated. It's a symptom rather than a cause, and a closer look at the studies of technology and ill health among the young would probably reveal that. It's not that they are watching too much TV, but it's that they aren't getting other activity. Including, I might add, sleep. It's not that they're spending too much time in front of computers, but that they aren't talking to live people, and live people who are older than they are.

Anyone who puts a TV set into a kid's room is, IMHO, absolutely crazy. Computers are a little different -- I got my first typewriter when I was 10 -- but nobody under the age of 16, again IMHO, should have unsupervised access to the Net.

Family viewing, as long as it's not of the shut-up-the-screen-is-more-important-than-you variety, is a really good way to deal with tech. It integrates real people, who are more important, into the ubiquitous information and entertainment that children cannot escape.

Board games are also good, though we haven't played one here in a looooong time.

The analysis of the fan culture is a little myopic, too. There have always been celebrities, and of those celebrities, there have always been the prodigy and the prodigal, the saintly and the notorious. What is different now, and pretty awful, really, is Andy Worhol's prediction of 15 minutes of fame come true. What we lack is not judgment so much as modesty and a sense of privacy.

Re: the gender perception in primary child care, your observation is actually based, I think, in another reality: employability and income. If a man takes time off to raise children, he will still find his career path pretty much ruined unless he consults or is otherwise self-employed. Corporate structures still don't take men seriously who consider child care to be important enough to break from a career for several years. Indeed, some companies look askance at men who take a 3-month paternity leave.

Women, on the other hand, are employable after a long break, but their breaks are also expressed in lack of promotions and unequal pay scales. Women can make just as much as men as long as they are willing to structure their lives the way men do, i.e., in slavery to corporate life. Something's gotta give.

Also, children are not alone in their isolation-based emotional problems. They are behaving in ways that echo their parents' own sense of social masking and isolation. Some of it comes from the children's circumstances, but some of it is imitative. Children do many things in imitation of their important adult models without really understanding why. Two examples: I know someone who had a bipolar parent but who is not bipolar, yet on psychological tests will still, in middle age, show some moderate bipolar tendencies which are always identified later as learned behaviors. I also know someone who was well-adjusted until she spent many years married to an abusive bipolar man. She became bipolar herself, and is taking medication for an emotional illness that she has basically learned through adaptation.

It's deceptive to say that we have more mental illness. I don't think we know whether or not this is really true. I'm pretty sure we see more of the mentally ill, and are thus more likely to identify psychological symptoms that are merely neurotic. Previously those with mental illness were kept confined in the house (or they confined themselves there), put in institutions, or convicted of crimes resulting from their illness and locked up that way. An increase in diagnosis of these problems is something I count as progress. The next time you watch To Kill A Mockingbird, try to put the racial awareness on the back burner and look at its depiction of mental illness and its effects on small communities. I think it may throw a little light on what we experience now.

Of course, as with other things, we're swinging too far in the other direction.

About religion: I see no difference between a religion that urges us to put up with evil in the world so that we can reap a reward in the next and a religion that urges us to look at everything as an affirmation that we are good enough the way we are. We can withdraw into the ascetic contemplative spirituality of hermit life, or we can go out and make the world better. That's it. The old religion, with its threats, is no more worthwhile than the new one with its palliatives. Children benefit from the example of adults doing good in the world with no thought of immediate reward for themselves, but because they wish to make the world better. Other adults benefit from that example too.

With that in mind, I'm going to get off my keister and go do something. ttyl