Table of Contents
Not all statements and background articles are (still)
translated
Essays
or Statements Weblogs
Essays
or Statements
#1: Counter Balance ... Why?
Counter Balance is a
registered foundation with the aim to share discussion in society, particularly
about human relationships, so say the articles of the foundation.
The foundation will give some counter balance to some tendencies in the
discussion about human relations.
#3: Littleton:
North American Rumble - and How to Avoid It
On 20 April 1999 two Unites States teenagers, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris,
shot thirteen fellow students and then themselves at their high school in Littleton,
Colorado. It was their aim to kill more people, but that did not happen. There have
been more school shootings, a sad list - North American rumble.
Counter Balance has gathered views on this subject.
We pose the questions: [....]
Our main source is not what many school principals, police
officers or politicians have said about it, but what youngsters
themselves have said about this issue.
It's not a dangerous subculture, but the suppression of deviant subcultures,
which is the problem.
# 4:
Sexual Intolerance
For centuries, the Netherlands has been regarded as a tolerant
country.
Dutch and Turkish children are playing together and churches and mosques are
peacefully located next to each other. In the city you can see a Chinese,
Mexican and Turkish restaurant. Apparently and logically, no taste is the same
and anybody should be allowed to follow his predilection. Except ...
... when we are talking about sexuality.
"Faggot" is about the worst example of name calling at the
schoolyard. Well, "Pedophile" or "Dutroux" is even a bit
worse. We really can't consider this sexual tolerance.
What are the motives behind this intolerance?
# 5: What's Wrong With Our
Children? ... Or With Us?
One has to wonder: what has
gone wrong with our children?
Counter Balance likes to rephrase it: what's wrong with the way we deal with our
children? What kind of counterweight would be appropriate?
Counter Balance has collected ideas and articles about this.
#6: Time
for Boys
It seems to be wrong with the boys in our society. Girls achieve better at
school. Boys have far more behavior and learning problems. Boys seem to be in a
permanent crisis. [...]
What's happening? What's wrong? What can we do?
Last years, there is written a lot about this subject. Counter Balance
gives its own opinion in this statement and offers a selection from literature.
#
7: The Right to Intimacy ... Also for Children?
Children are in need of intimacy in order to grow in a
balanced way - also intimacy with adults, intergenerational intimacy.
Regrettably, nowadays almost nobody dares to offer intimacy, it has become
suspect.
Particularly in education and child care, the new rule is better to keep a
distance than to be viewed as a pedophile. Children and adults meet each other
merely in a functional role, quite seldom as a person. The children miss
intimacy.
This is a pity for the children - and bad for society.
#
10: American
Ruble … Do We Want Them?
“American
ruble” is a Dutch expression for situations which should be avoided. We used
this expression in Statement # 3
about the shooting teenagers in Littleton. Surely situations to avoid.
Such
situations do not appear out of the blue. In the background is a culture that
more and more also appears in The Netherlands. Do we want this?
We
might learn from the North-Americans in some respects, we might avoid other
aspects. Concerning things like winning battles and technical performance, they
are good. In the area of meaning and human relationships, Europeans are better.
Three
subjects are a great problem for North-Americans: sexuality, children, and the
combination of both.
Statement # 11: Intimacy: danger or opportunity to grow?
We’ve repeatedly pointed at the importance of intimacy,
including intimacy between the young and adult people. The less intimacy, the
greater the chance of violence later in life. So we need to have room for
intimacy. However, there is a problem.
Nowadays, such intimacy is soon identified with what is called
incest or pedophilia. These concepts are directly linked to sexual
intimacy, which in turn is usually known as sexual abuse and evokes the
notion of permanent damage.
This is a subject for research. We will limit ourselves here
to voluntary intimate contact outside the family.
# 13: The
research of the Rind et al. Team
Intimacy between children and adults is important. The more
intimacy for the child, the less is the chance for violence later on.
Nevertheless, there is a problem.
People name intergenerational intimacy quickly as ‘incest’ or
‘pedopilia’ and think immediately of sexual intimacy. Then, it’s
called child sexual abuse and the first notion is that there will always
be life long harm.
Research has told that permanent harm is factually quite seldom. Still there is
resistance against the very idea of intergenerational intimacy.
In this section, we present the research of Dr Rind and his team. We also will
tell about the resistance against his report and the replies to this resistance.
In this introducing statement, we give also a frame of reference: the ideas of
Habermas about the discourse.
Read the Rind et al. Files: Index
RBT Files
# 15: Gay
Teenage Boys; They don't fit into a feminist's model
Gay teenage boys definitely exist. Sexual orientation awakens quite early.
Boys usually have their first sexual experiences in their young teenage years. How should
we think about this? [...]
Nowadays, people usually think about such experiences using a feminist
model. [...]
This model is nearly always used when referring to the sexual experiences of
youth, including those of gay identified teenage boys who sought their first sexual
experiences themselves, in keeping with their sexual orientation.
This model does not mach the facts. [...] research has been done, at
least among boys.
# 17: A Loser Shoots
At the end of April 2002, a 19-year-old male youth in Erfurt,
Germany, shot 17 people and himself. In the US such things happen more frequently.
The murdered people urge us to ask: is this an incident,
or are there trends we should recognize?
We have to speak about the contact between parents, teachers and youths - or the
lack of this contact, about large schools and alienation, about violence on TV
or in computer games, and about the handling of emotions - or learning how to
handle them -
especially for boys.
OK - and can we do something meaningful?
#19: Listen to the Children
- But Bush stumbles over sexual openness
A slogan often to be heard in the USA: "Listen
to the children!".
Do they do that, there? No. Unless a child might speak, after hours-long interrogation, about sexual abuse.
Politicians use the slogan, but do not listen to children.
Politicians stumble over sexual openness.
At the UN's Children's top, 400 children from all over the
world could speak.
# 22: “… Hold fast that which is good"
- On the new conservatism in the Netherlands
After the pull to the right in the Netherlands, and already before, people with conservative opinions saw their chance to step forward. Whereas before ‘conservative’ was equal to ‘not good’, now ‘the new conservatism’, or also known as ‘neo-conservatism’, was launched with great enthusiasm.
What are then the ideas of this new conservatism?
Do they demand any kind of Counter Weight, and if yes, what kind?
# 23: Fundamentalism
"By grimly campaigning against abortion, the US president
Bush has endangered the health of millions of women, babies and children world-wide. "
(Dutch media, 3 December 2002.)
Besides neo-conservatism we must differentiate between a number of ideologies, their proponents, and the implications thereof. When one is talking about Islam, this does not always happen.
In the countryside of an Arabic state, there are influences of Islam that take the place of religion, an ancient culture of herder-tribes, and politics of a dictatorial regime which blend naturally with one another. For an analysis one really must differentiate between them.
The West must look at itself.
#25:
Overprotection and distrust,
a vicious circle
Before and after school hours, it is very busy around the
schools: a traffic jam of cars.