

The End of the Best Friend. - schleyfox
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/17/fashion/17BFF.html?pagewanted=1&ref=homepage&src=me

======
iamdave
This has got to stop. And by this, I mean psychoanalyzing every single aspect
of childhood to the point of saying that having a best friend is "bad".

Seriously.

Stop it.

~~~
mechanical_fish
I would be alarmed by this if I thought it represented anything but one
journalist's effort to manufacture a trend.

Here's the only piece of data in this article:

 _Most children naturally seek close friends. In a survey of nearly 3,000
Americans ages 8 to 24 conducted last year by Harris Interactive, 94 percent
said they had at least one close friend._

Hm. Looks like that might indicate the exact opposite of this article's
thesis. Fortunately, the journalist has found some really powerful individual
anecdotes!

 _“I just really don’t have one person I like more than others,” Margaret
said. “Most people have lots of friends.”_

I'm no sociologist, but the problem with this datum is kind of obvious. Nobody
but a social idiot would, using their _real name_ , tell a _newspaper
reporter_ that "I have twelve friends, but only one of them is a really close
friend". That's a good way to lose eleven friends.

------
biggitybones
This article is infuriating. They're effectively trying to social engineer
these kids to prevent a few side effects that are crucial in their
development.

Why is it that we think that kids are somehow meaner now than they were at any
other point?

~~~
avani
To play devil's advocate for a moment, only addressing the point of bullying:

While you and yours may have the support structure and innate tendency to
become stronger as a result of early-childhood bullying, I think the schools'
argument is that the potential harm in a student being bullied to the point
they hurt their future educations/careers is greater than the potential good
of bullying for those who can withstand it.

Social fortitude is like any other aspect of development in that some children
will obtain it sooner than others. Those that get there first become the
popular kids and the kids that simply don't care. Those that don't arrange
themselves into ``safe'' cliques or take what the other children say to heart
and believe that they are stupid/ugly/weak and will never be able to change.
If the parents are not available, the school would need to be able to provide
individual support to nurture these kids to the point where they can stand up
for themselves. This is difficult in public schools, so the alternative they
are using is to encourage all the children to spend time together.

Now, devil's advocate aside, since I believe I can provide the type of
supporting atmosphere that will help a kid toughen up, I would likely not send
my child to a school like this. However, faced with the problem of unreliable
parental involvement, I can somewhat understand the school position.

------
jim_dot
Yeah these kids had better learn to be friends with everyone, or else it's
detention all year!

------
bmj
Interesting take on the NYT article here:

[http://inmedias.blogspot.com/2010/06/if-any-friendship-
coach...](http://inmedias.blogspot.com/2010/06/if-any-friendship-coach-tries-
to-mess.html)

------
tcskeptic
When I read this quote: _"I don’t think it’s particularly healthy for a child
to rely on one friend," said Jay Jacobs, the camp’s director. "If something
goes awry, it can be devastating. It also limits a child’s ability to explore
other options in the world."_ My unfounded but immediate assumption was that
nobody really like him when he was a kid.

But more seriously, there is an approach implicit in the article that I have
seen quite often in schools and large businesses. Because leaders are
unwilling to do the hard work of examining problems on a case by case basis
and creating solutions (Often because they are unwilling to suffer the
criticism that indiviual decisions create) problems are approached from
rediculous and overly broad perspectives. (See for example Zero Tolerance
policies in schools, airport security, etc.) Being unwilling to confront
bullies in this case is leading to the deliberate elimination of best
friendships. By making it a policy, it eliminates having to make hard
decisions, one can now simply say, "Policy says...." and punt.

------
pge
Using twins as the anecdotal sample for whether children have best friends is
another point against the thoughtfulness of the author. As a twin myself, I
would argue that twins have a built-in best friend and thus rarely have
another "best friend" like a singleton would, so they are a particularly poor
choice to illustrate anecdotal evidence that kids don't have single best
friends.

------
surlyadopter
Hey, I wasn't a weird loner. I was a trend setter!

------
thecircusb0y
Looking at this from a networking scenario, will this create a mesh network of
relationships, where a balanced trust is generated through each node, sharing
information through the network replicating over each node... Okay now picture
1984, where everybody is equal, people can't have relationships, the
government regulates everything... I don't know, something about this disturbs
me. I have 3 friends I'd trust my life with, who'm I was best buds with in the
respective areas/schools I went to (I went to different districts moving
around alot). I haven't been diagnosed with anything other then to lose my
college beer gut.

~~~
nostrademons
I think we should just replace humans with computers. Then you can program
exactly who they talk to. And ban firewalls!

------
starkfist
It's the Brave New World, SWPL version.

------
Tichy
"increasingly, some educators and other professionals who work with children
are asking a question that might surprise their parents: Should..."

This kind of meddling makes me sick. Dear educators, stay the hell away from
my kids.

------
sliverstorm
I'm getting tired of all this trumpeting of the end of this, the end of that,
the end of everything.

