It's becoming pretty clear that you have a very specific view of children/adolescents based, I guess, on your own experience. My problem is with the extent to which you are willing to generalize that experience. For example, you wrote:
>Let's see. The mommy gets daily beatings from her hubby, so finally she
>divorces the asshole and raises the kid by herself. The kid reaches
>teenage years and starts behaving like the daddy: calling her mommy a
>bitch, screaming and punching her when he gets upset with her over her not
>doing what he wants. When asked by a counselor/therapist/social worker
>about his behavior he explains he does so out of his anger because his
>mommy "abused" him by depriving him of his daddy (who BTW does not give a
>shit about the brat he sired), dating other men, or generally not letting
>him do what he wants. I bet that the majority of self- or state-appointed
>"child advocates" would agree or at least be sympathetic toward that kid
>and see his mother "unfit."
Huh? Are you saying that the majority of child advocates are morons?
Next, you write:
"Now, enter the ageing new-agers who still psycho-analyze their own childhood, hate the mainstream society, and long for "alternative" lifestyles. Violence in general, and much less so violent children, are not a part of their upper-middle class background. "
What makes you think violence is a monopoly of the "lower" classes? The most violent families I know about ARE upper middle class: A friend, raped by his step father from age 11 to age 17. No one in that family is still the wiser. Another friend who witnessed the father beating the mother to death...and then his getting custody of the children. Another friend whose sister was raped by her father when her sister was five. The only difference between upper class and lower class domestic abuse, so far as I can see, is that if you're in the upper middle class, you don't get punished for it.
As for the rest of it: medicate em, kick em out of the house, etc., what can I say?
Joanna Bujes