How to read this site

The courage to dance
Cody Baldwin
How is the parent-child situation more complicated than the adult-adult one?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Taking criticism seriously
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
My child refuses to wear a coat in the cold! Help!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
The evolution of culture
David Deutsch
What do you mean by ‘theory’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Help! My baby hates diaper changes! Ideas for baby-pleasing solutions
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you mean by ‘having an agenda’ for your children? Are all wants for your children agendas?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Dynamic tradition and children
Ari Nielsen
I know what’s good for you
Roshan Ali
What Taking Children Seriously means to me—the freedom to make mistakes
Peter Corteen
In defence of screens and video games
Nicolás Samprón
What do you mean by ‘problem’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
The inefficiency of subjecting unwilling children to unwanted mathematics lessons
Mathophile
Welcome to Taking Children Seriously
Peter Strömberg
How do you tell pre-verbal children about dangers given that they do not understand explanations?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
The boy who would not be tamed
Peter Strömberg
Taking ourselves seriously
Cody Baldwin
Isn’t school necessary for children to learn?
Brad Matthews
New parent? Planning to have a baby and questioning the standard parenting ideas? Don’t miss this critical discussion!
Roshan Ali
Screens as a natural, integrated, positive part of life
Grant Goedde
How will credential-less children survive?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you mean by ‘fallible’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
“If you do X, I will give you Y”
Natalie Arielle
What if your baby keeps grabbing your nose ring and cannot be reasoned with?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How do you raise a child to believe in freedom?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Free to learn: the immorality of compulsory schools
Christian Dean
Instead of Cry It Out, try bedtime anarchy
Peter Strömberg
Will a child not made to do chores ever develop a work ethic? And if not, how will they ever have a good life?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Dead Poets Society: a film review
Arjun Khemani
Dead Poets Society is not taking children seriously
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Don’t think for them
Aniket Vartak
Limiting your children’s screen time?
Grant Goedde
What if your child runs into traffic?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Criticism scheduling and privacy
Lulie Tanett
The constraints of childhood
Aaron Stupple
Reluctant at drop-off yet later does not want to leave?
Grant Goedde
Why do you like IFS but not ‘Self-led parenting’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you mean by ‘coercionist’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
The can-do attitude versus the can’t-do attitude
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Fallibilism as a way of being and acting
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
A commitment to figuring it out
Michael Golding
Deschooling Society, by Ivan Illich: a book review
Arjun Khemani
The relationship-building power of explanations
Aaron Stupple
Don’t tell me I can’t: An ambitious homeschooler’s journey, by Cole Summers: a book review
Ville Vesterinen
What do you mean by non-coercive? What is the difference between coercion and non-coercion?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How is she sleeping?
Sarah Ryan
Surely it is cruel to force people to live with the consequences of the ideas and preferences they had when they were children?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely studies show that parents have little impact on how people turn out?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Why no ‘common preferences’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely kids need to be forced to learn maths?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Unless we get children try different things, how will they ever learn which things are fun and which are not fun?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Isn’t taking children seriously a risky experiment with children? Is there any evidence that it works? Has it been studied?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What is the psychological impact of not taking children seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How do you handle the issue of other people coercing your child?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Unnatural consequences revisited
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
When a solution is not found, is it always the parents who must bear the brunt of the sacrifice?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Are you advocating that the children should rule the parents?!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What about instilling values like freedom, fallibilism and the idea of taking children seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
The rationalist mistake
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How can I drop the anti-rational part of my mind that interferes with me taking my children seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How can I become more aware of anti-rational parts in my mind?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How can I overcome the antirational memes disabling my creativity, with my disabled creativity?!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If anti-rational memes are compelling me to coerce my children, what hope is there?!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Why did my mother’s coercive words fly out of my mouth?!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Why do parents coerce their children despite having been through it themselves?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If a parent has an aversion to something a child enjoys doing, how do you solve that problem?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If coercion has impaired my ability to correct errors, is taking children seriously even possible?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Why does it sometimes hurt to think about Taking Children Seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely we should communicate our disapproval to our children?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If we should take babies seriously, should we not take pigs seriously too?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Does taking children seriously mean not influencing them?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
In what ways is Taking Children Seriously different from simply taking everybody seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What kind of children is Taking Children Seriously not a good idea for?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What ages is Taking Children Seriously most powerful for, or how does its value change with age? When is it almost too late?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you do about vaccinating your children?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Equal relationships with our children?! How are parents and children are equals?!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What is wrong with loving limits for children?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Do children taken seriously ever ask permission?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What is the relationship between Karl Popper’s epistemology, the ideas of David Deutsch and Taking Children Seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How did Taking Children Seriously start?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How do you teach table manners?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How do you determine what food to give your children?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How can we express approval when our children do something good without manipulating them by implying that we would disapprove if they had made a different choice?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What if my child both hates school and likes being in school with all his friends?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely the lack of that extra money is a comparative disadvantage?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Is Taking Children Seriously only for the rich?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Our 15-year-old wants to hitchhike to Outer Mongolia by herself. We think she is not yet “street-wise” enough. What should we do?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely it is not coercive to have a rule that whenever our child goes out, he must first tell us where he is going and for how long? What about being a responsible parent?!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If my five-year-old were allowed to open the garden gate, she would be off wandering all over the neighbourhood and might be run over or kidnapped or murdered etc.
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
At what age should children first leave the house on their own, visit their friend next door on their own, go to the cinema on their own, hitchhike from coast to coast on their own, etc.?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely suffering and frustration make us stronger?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Why not say that the policy is non-coercion except on important issues?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If we are fallible and not omniscient, surely it is exaggerating to say it is always possible to solve problems without coercion?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What to do when your child says “Go away” or “I don’t want to talk about it”
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What if… ?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
“What if…?” questions revisited
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Is hiding medicine in your child’s food wrong?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely it is necessary to coerce children to avoid them doing unsafe or unethical things?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How can we communicate urgent information to our pre-verbal toddlers?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How do you take babies seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely children need discipline to teach them self-discipline?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely children need to learn to deal with restrictions to prepare them for life in society?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you mean by ‘creativity’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you mean by ‘knowledge’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Why not argue for Taking Children Seriously in terms of rights?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Who am I to criticise someone else?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If criticism is valuable why not be more critical?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely criticism is always good?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What if your child wants to drive?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What if my child wants me to help her murder someone?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
I’m a vegetarian. What if my child wants to eat meat?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How do you intervene non-coercively when one child is attacking another?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Is coercion always wrong?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What if my child wants to buy every toy in the shop, and does not consult me?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you have against gentle coercion?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Do children not taught that they can’t always get their own way become entitled and inconsiderate?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Is the purpose of taking children seriously to avoid the harm coercion would do?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Is it necessary to reject authority?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How is a compromise not a real solution?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How can I tell if a proposed solution is a real solution?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How do you solve problems where there is a conflict of interest?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If I am not allowed to coerce my child, surely I am being coerced myself?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely coercion is ok when the parent is right and the child is wrong?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you have against coercion?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely children are not born knowing right and wrong?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Does Taking Children Seriously mean children always getting their own way?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Surely it is natural for parents to control their children?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
If children are people just like adults, why should we treat our children any differently from how we treat adults?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How is the word ‘parenting’ not taking children seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Which parenting style is Taking Children Seriously? Authoritarian, authoritative, permissive, or uninvolved?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What do you mean by ‘paternalism’?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Children fending for themselves like adults?!
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
What is Taking Children Seriously?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Why does parenting feel so hard?
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
How to read this site
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Friendly criticisms of Kiss Me, by Carlos González
Sarah Fitz-Claridge
Taking Children Seriously: a new view of children
Sarah Fitz-Claridge

For those who requested, this page lists some articles and posts from the archives, for historical interest:

From the archives

If you are new to Taking Children Seriously you might like to start here instead, with the first page of the Taking Children Seriously FAQ:

How to read this site