Rosemond’s advice

As a mother, public school and Sunday School teacher, and most recently, election worker, I have often seen the results of parents who have not heeded John Rosemond’s advice to raise children in a way that is socially acceptable.

If I may quote Rosemond (from possibly the column that inspired the writer of the recent letter “Find somebody else”): “It is an act of love for one’s neighbors for parents to teach children that their feelings do not rule other people’s behavior (beginning with theirs).”

I was reminded of this when I worked at one of the election polling places in Fayetteville. Almost 100 percent of the parents who brought children in with them—admirably in many cases to show them the process—told their children to quietly stand here or sit there, and the children obeyed. In only one case during the entire 12-hour day did a child come in screaming, “I want to go!” and left screaming the same thing.

This little 3-year-old had his parents outnumbered one to two, and set the other 100 or so people in the room completely on edge. I know when they left the child actually thought they did so because he wanted them to. Sadly, he was right.

Those are the parents who desperately need Rosemond’s advice. The fact that the letter-writer apparently does not is no reason to stop publishing the column. If you don’t like his ideas, don’t read the column. To repeat John Rosemond, “[Your] feelings do not rule other people’s behavior.” EVELYN BROWN Fayetteville