Useful Idiots

Stalin liked youth.. called them useful idiots.

Wrote an email to my nephew last night. I spewed during the stupor of insomnia.
During my spew I realized I should explain something that all parents and teachers should know.

Here it is in a nutshell.... "We all grow up"

What does this mean? (Get ready for a longie.)

We are born with only part of our brain developed. It takes 25 years (+/- 6 years) for this to happen.

During this stage of brain development we acquire certain abilities in our thinking power. I want to relate what I learned in a college course called "Human Development"

Part 1. Growing Up

Just out of the womb, we can't see. We depend on our parents to protect and feed us. As time goes on, we slowly acquire the ability to control our body, crawl, walk, talk....

Can youth think? Not in the same way as adults can...

Case in point.......

A toddler who just learned to walk walks up to a coffee table having two identical glass candy dishes on it side by side. The toddler grabs for one of the dishes and daddy says "NO NO NO! Don't touch that, it'll fall on the floor and break! You'll cut your feet." The toddler realizes at that point that that candy dish is a NO NO. The other identical dish next to it is still "Fair Game"... there is no "NO NO" on that one.

What I'm trying to say is that children cannot think abstractly (= If this...then that.)
Why can't they think abstractly? Because they do not have that part of the brain needed to think abstractly. Children under the age of 12 (average) learn Yes/No rules. They collect rules as they grow up and decide whether they will obey or disobey them.

Infants need to be self centered.... Me Me Me! It's their best way to survive. This self-centeredness will very slowly decrease throughout life. (Even 50 year olds have quite a bit of self-centeredness in them.)

The miracle of our lives is that we progress through several standard processes that prepare us for life, from the wildly imaginary (and undoable) fantasies of a child to the miraculous inventions of our time.

At about age 12, the cerebral cortex (the abstract thinking part of the brain) begins to form. By age 13 a teen will begin this mental high of 'Hey! If this then THAT! WOW!'

These WOW's will make them think they're smarter than their parents who just know Yes/No rules...ugh!

The insanity begins.....

As the cerebral cortex grows, the portion of the brain (the amygdala as I was taught) that controls behavior in a teen causes the teen to favor two main drives... pro-creation and being a member of a group. (Remember, the cerebral cortex is not all there yet so the ability to foresee consequences of action isn't well developed at all... almost like being able to plan only one move ahead in checkers... not 10 like an adult can.)

Teens and early 20's are certifiably insane years. These years are filled with ME ME ME with enough intelligence to get into trouble. Teens can be great liars and not-so-good planners. They know right from wrong... but anything goes to get their way.

My advice.. keep teens on a tight leash. Satisfy their urge to pro-create by promoting art, hobbies, something productive AND make sure the "GROUP" is the family... i.e. We're Smith's, Smith's don't do that.

So how does Stalin get involved in this? Stalin knew young adults were insane, gullible, couldn't see consequences of action very well, and could be convinced easily into doing almost anything. Hitler used this on his Hitler Youth. Our own armed forces use young soldiers because they make the best fighters... i.e. they think they're immortal and will be more easily ordered to face enemy fire and take a hill.

There are all kinds of psychological and medical studies published on the internet that will re-enforce what I'm saying here. See if you can find Harvard Medical School's sugar metabolism brain scans of brain development with age... really cool. (I'm not giving you a link here because I want you to see for yourself and (ugh) think.