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Show Kids Don't Like To Turn Off TV, Or Hood They Eat By DARYL J. McCARTY A survey of American children chil-dren shows that their chief complaints about parents are that Mom and Dad make them eat food they don't like and turn off the T.V. set. OTHER criticism of parents by the kids stems from unfair punishment, criticism of friends, forbidding snacks, unwillingness un-willingness to buy what the kids see advertised, making fun of them in front of others, taking away allowances, not enough time with the parents and too much argument about money. Some of those gripes indicate indi-cate that parents are doing a good job. AFTER ALL, if kids could choose everything they eat, some of them would exist on chocolate. If they could choose when to turn off the TV, some might sleep only two hours a night. If parents bought everything their kids saw advertised, the demand for sports cars, motorcycles motor-cycles and unaffordable walking-talking dolls would quintuple. AND PARENTS would spent themselves in paup-erdom. paup-erdom. Limits must be set for young people, and that's the job of parents. Living within those limits is the job of young people, peo-ple, and it takes a certain amount of character to do so. FOR THE purposes of this article, character is defined as "doing what you should do, even though you may not want to." Character is built in the home, and it should be expanded ex-panded in the schools. JUST AS kids have preferences prefer-ences about food and when they want to flick off the television televi-sion set, they also have likes and dislikes about courses in schools. So, if they are to get a solid education, they must take some classes they would really prefer to avoid. Taking that super-tough chemistry course-and course-and excelling in it-because it's a requirement for any student who wants to become a physician physi-cian is a demonstration of character. PARENTS WHO expect their children to eat nutritious foods and do their very best in school, are doing their jobs well. These are among the most important things you do for your children, even when they don't like what you're doing. |