However it’s meme’d, you gotta admit: “Dis. Tew. Much.”
Granted, ear-piercing is ‘okay’ (I guess) once a child is past the oral and phallic stage of life and growing into becoming a toddler-about a year old or so.
While I’m all for barrettes, ribbons (a small amount of hair beads) and any kind of bells and whistles we feel we need to make or add to our babies cuteness-some things a just tooooooooooooo much.
When it comes to pain and preference-my rule for kids is simple:
- Acknowledge that they experience pain but can’t fight it like you or me
- Let them be kids until they are old enough to have a (permanent) “preference” for how they want to look—and even worship…(but that’s another blog topic).
Kids are innocent. The only way for them to express pain is in screams and tears. They aren’t able to articulate themselves until around age 3-5 and (until around tween years) aren’t able to intelligibly discern (to any capacity) what they want or feel is “best” for them—especially when it’s being decided by an adult or person they recognize as an authority figure over them (i.e., especially their parents).
I don’t know if you’re like me, but when it comes to things so permanent like: chemical hair processes (or dreadlocks just the same), I’m one of those people who, no matter how ‘cute’ or ‘adorable’ a child under their tween years looks in either; I’ve always felt that just because it’s the adult/parents decision to groom them (like them?) or the way things have always been done around the household, that doesn’t mean a kid should have to bear wearing a certain look because the parent said so—especially when, for a kid, there’s always ‘pure’ options for them until they are old enough to decide how they want to look.
A petition started by a woman named Susan Ingram calls for a legal age limit placed on ear piercing. On the petition under the
