Quote: (05-17-2019 02:30 PM)Days of Broken Arrows Wrote:
I don't like it when people tell others what "normal" people should be doing at any age.
Here we are, grown men, posting about a teenage girl on a forum. Is this normal? Why aren't we all married raising kids? Where are our wives? Why do I keep having to make this same comment over and over?
Let's not be hypocrites. She's an outlier; so are most of us. If her folks aren't pulling strings, then I have no problem with what she does. Here is why.
1). I was idiosyncratic as hell when I was 13. My parents demanded I be "normal" and banned me from things I loved and was good at. It took me till about age 35 to recover. Everyone else leapfrogged past me in my field because they were supported, not called abnormal.
Adults should not ban kids from things because it doesn't fit into some narrow concept of conformity. My normal might be your insane. Her normal might just be an obsession with politics -- which she is indulging.
From what I read, people like Mary Matalin and James Carville were into politics like their high school classmates were into rock stars. Maybe this girl is the same way. Some people are natural readers and/or commentators.
2). If we're going to direct anger at teenage girls, it should be refocused to Instagram where there are lots of them screaming about the Alabama abortion law and "My body my choice" while showing their bare butts.
It's these girls who have the demeanor and cynicism of 40-year-old divorcees. And in my opinion, it's these girls who are going to bring a world of trouble to the world when they hit adulthood.
In the age of social media, most teenage girls are going to put themselves out there in some way. But if I were the parent of one, I'd be much happier to have Soph as my kid than the Junior Insta-Thots my friends are raising.
I get what you say and I thought about it also. Being this precocious, smart and rational she probably has asperger, or high IQ or something like that.
How many 14 year olds talk so rationally and eloquently about this kind of topics? Not many. And how many 14 year old girls on top of that? Even less.
So yeah she's an outlier as you say, you can't put her in a box and tell her what she should do at her age if that doesn't suit her.
If her liberal atheist parents let her think and do what she wants like she is saying in the Infowar interview, i think this is good. It enables her to express her potential without restrictions. How many people couldn't do or express themselves as kids cause they felt they were not permitted?
But on the other hand, if the parents are not behind her videos, it seems to me that they give her too much freedom. I mean there are people who went to jail for posting the wrong opinion on the internet, so why would you let your kid upload videos on such controversal subjects?
Parents of this 14 year old should encourage her and stimulate her with her passions but at the same time monitor her.
It's a ruthless world out there and a 14 year old girl will get eaten alive.
I think that's why some posters here are disturbed by her.