The Broken Doll Gambit

I was talking with a friend the other day and he thought there was a parallel between the way we treat our little children and the Catholic Church. The biggest one being, when children ask, "Why?" we say, "because I told you to."

My friend says that is just like when the priest says, "because The Pope says so." It's not really much of an answer.

Which is a pretty good observation but, also, why this stuff should only be done by professionals.

It did get me to thinking, however. What if we really did treat our little children the way Catholics are treated by their church? Like, when a child does something wrong, instead of punishing the child (or even better yet, teaching the child why the behavior is wrong), what if we set up a system where they can endlessly repeat the same mistakes with virtually no consequences?

You know, like Billy breaks Suzy's doll so he anonymously confides in a relative stranger who basically says, "You know what, Billy? Just say the alphabet four times, count to 20 three times, and don't worry about it."

How cool would that be?

Pretty soon, little Billy (and all of his friends) would be breaking things with impunity. They would probably branch into other areas of mis-behavior. They may even begin stealing dolls and holding them for ransom. Or forcing them to perform at tea parties. Or maybe hiring out targeted acts of doll destruction. You know, just to keep them in line.

My God, where would it end?

Fortunately, all of this is just humorous speculation and kidnapping, prostitution, and murder for hire cannot be excused by some anonymous stranger in a darkened booth with a wave of his hand and some nonsensical command to repeat a rote expression ten times.

I mean, c'mon! Where would that end?

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