A Moment of Academia. Sort Of.

Here are my two children as defined by the exceptions to their normal rules. In general, Zaya doesn't read fiction, and Mim reads only fiction. However, they each have their own areas where they're willing to concede that the other might have merit.

Zaya is reading H.G. Wells's War of the Worlds, and explaining to me how the gravity and atmosphere of our planet would destroy the aliens.

Mim is reading Our Century in Pictures, published by Life magazine. If I'm in the room, she asks me about every other picture, and particularly any picture involving a dead body.

So, this might be a bit controversial, but it's one of those things that sort of happened. Zaya is a bit obsessed with alien races and there isn't a lot of information available in his science books on them. Mim loves to hear about the past, and what man has done to man.

My rationale (particularly for Mim) thus far has been as follows:

There are millions of children in this world for whom death is familiar and life-changing. There are children who suffered through the holocaust, the purges in Russia, the genocide of Rwanda...the list goes on and on. If those children can experience actual tragedy, and overcome, my child can handle hearing about it, and even seeing pictures. I believe she will be a stronger and more compassionate person for it.

If later therapy proves me wrong, so be it.