Parents 'ignoring eye sun danger'

Sun exposure at a young age doesn't just increase skin damage and cancer. Eye structures can also be damaged if not protected.

cute novelty instead of real protection.

and the poor kids have to suffer for it

How do we know that the glasses we purchase really do keep the UV rays out. Dark glasses that let the eyes dilate and do not keep the UV out are more dangerous than no glasses IMO.

We:

• Had toys made of lead;
  
• teethed on cot rails painted with lead paint;
  
• Played with sticks;
  
• Carried knives and never once thought of using them on each other;
  
• Had mercury compounds dabbed on our skinned knees and elbows;
  
• Fell out of trees and broke limbs (the tree's and ours);
  
• Counted it a win if a random stranger or the local copper kicked our arses all the way home and DIDN'T tell our parents;
  
• Played doctor and didn't develop a lifetime of complexes and neuroses;
  
• Disassembled bullets and shotgun cartridges with pliers, knives and vice, using the components to make fishing sinkers, and explosive devices;
  
• Blew up anthills with those explosive devices;
  
• Played cowboys and indians with pellet guns and real bows and arrows (blunted);
  
• Built yoni guns powered by bicycle innertubes capable of lobbing a 1/2 lb stone 2 or 3 blocks;
  
• Explored mineshafts and storm drains;
  
• Disappeared from dawn to dusk secure in the knowledge that our parents couldn't find us. Whilst they were secure in the knowledge that we would find them when we got hungry.
  AND
  
• Spent every daylight hour for six solid weeks out in the sun every summer with no more protection than a dab of zinc cream on our noses;
  
  And yet somehow we survived to breed the current generation of mollycoddled, fragile, antisocial little bastards that are the children of today.
  
  

Those who *didn't* survive aren't exactly around to put in their 2 cents worth, are they? The world is by many accounts a different place than it was 30, 40, 50 years ago too. UV rays are much stronger today due to ozone depletion, for instance.

...took care. Proably inadequate, but still likely sufficient to spell the difference between injury and death.

We looked at the sky before venturing into holes in the ground. chose only the softest punkiest wood when using our yoni guns to repel little brothers. Looked both ways before venturing into the street.

We knew that the most dangerous person in our life was ourself.


Kids of today (and far too bloody many adults) do things without even a moment's thought. All dangers are external, and that is how they are taught. An entire legal proffesion has grown up around making the results of an individual's stupidity someone else's fault. And then they text/phone while driving and plough into a sidewalk cafe.


I concede you are correct on the ozone UV thing.

to clear out the ethereal channels. I tend to take her advice, especially when demonizing the Sun has proven so very wrong. I recently read a recommendation for parents to allow their kids about 30 min. of Sun a day because there is such a widespread deficiency of Vitamin D in kids! And this after the breathless warnings to slather on SBF 1200!:rofl: :rofl: