ear piercing for young children

[fumanchu]

I was disturbed to overhear in Claire's Accessories yesterday a mum trying to persaude her obviously distressed child to have her ear(s) pierced, saying it wouldn't hurt. The child was about 6 I think. I wasn't sure if the child had had one done and refused the next, she was crying. The shop staff just stood by. I was tempted to say something but didn't. What do you think? and shouldn't shops have some kind of age policy? personally I think its fine for say 13 yr olds and up and I know Italians for example often have babies' ears pierced but i was very unhappy about the coercion.

I don't see that respecting someone's culture/faith has to include the blanket respect of things that are pretty awful. I don't agree with the tribeswomen who send their crying child at the first sign of puberty to have sex with men in a nearby village who they've never met, I don't agree with FGM, I don't agree with circumcision, I don't agree with filing teeth into a point, I don't agree with ensuring a hymen has split, I don't agree with little girls covering their heads, or forced marriages.....there's loads of stuff that are human issues disguised as cultural practices and therefore deemed acceptable.

samoa I don't think ear piercing is confined to any ethnic group or culture so to claim that everyone who finds piercing infants ears objectionable is racist or ethnocentric is perhaps slightly myopic

Alkinkum, Have you ever been into a Claire's? I'm not sure you could rely on a sixteen shop assistant to stand up to a parent who insists her child should have her ears pierced.

giveitago.....what a stupid post.

Is there a club for people who like to misinterpret conversations to suit their martyrdom status?

And I mean it looks tacky on all children, without exception

Oh thus spake PP who still doesn't get the fact that calling us names and telling us how to feel about it is really clever.

FFS - they way a few of you talk is as though you'd actually notice earrings on kids and think that family was abusive and chavvy? You'd therefore have nothing in common with the parents and possibly not be 100% about a friendship.

I find that very disturbing.

My ds makes friends with people who cross his path - I've never bothered to notice whether a little girl has earring or not and if she did I would think nothing about it. It would never once cross my mind that this girl is a victim of anything.

You are the guys who are one the one hand martyring these girls and then also calling them chavs.

Calling you names? I think not.

Another nonsensical post then.

I do think I'm right.

"nothing in common with the parents and possibly not be 100% about a friendship"

Don't most people make judgements like that all the time though. It's fair enough that you'll have more in common with some people than others. I think I do see those pierced children as victims. I'd obviously be more tolerant if it seemed a cultural choice, but as far as the fashion victims go I would feel the parents had very different priorities to me. There's a lad at preschool with a mohican; it seems rotten, like his parents have set him up.

awwwwww, nothing wrong with a mohawk, i'm waiting in keen anticipation for the day i can do my ds's although doubt his school will allow it when he gets there.

I'm no victim.

I don't like hair gel in my boy's hair and I see lots of his friends with Beckham looks - I think it's naff but certinaly not chavvy as they are not better or worse than my kid - they are kids plain and simple. I'd view a mohican the same way. I personally cannot stand little girls with long hair and bows and clips and anything pink. But they or their parents are not chavvy to me - just don't have good taste in my view.

Yes of course I judge - I'd worry alot less about ds befriending a little girl with earrings than I would a friend with blinkered and judgy parents as kids are impressionable and I wouldn't want my little boy to lose his innocence under their influence. I want my boy to have a big life.

Can't stand little girls with long hair and who like pink....erm isn't that nearly all little girls?

The pink thing is usually a choice they've made for themselves too (like liking fifi flowertot or my little ponies)). And it's a phase they can move on from simply.

No Posie - I don't think it is. But again, their and their parent's choice. But that's my OPINION. So not worth much and it makes no difference to me if ds wants to befriend a pink clad girl. Why would it.

But it's your (generic, not your's in particular) comments about abuse and chavviness that makes me honestly feel that kids of parents with your views would not make suitable friends for my child. I want to keep his innocence as long as possible and that, to me, means him befriending people he just gets on with regardless what they look like or their cultural background. It's done him fine so far. That IS innocence. The laden views that some posters have disturb me only in relation to my ds.

Befriending and spending time with kids who have parents with mindsets so set means it would mean (to me) that his outlook would be influenced by people who (I feel) are blinkered and limiting. Again, I want him to have a big life in an increasingly small world.

"I think ear-piercing should still be done in pharmacies etc, not high street stores where the training in hygiene etc is likely to be minimal."

totally agree with this

'Not wanting to permanently alter children without their consent...'

And you don't do this, Posie? You really don't permanently alter your children without their consent?

Every. Decision. YOU. Make. Permanently alters your children. Vaccination? Discipline methods? Food? School? Television?

DD's ears were pierced in a pharmacy when she was 13 months old.
I thought then it looked good, and still do now that she's 9, though she rarely wears earrings, she doesn't want to often.

I really don't see the big deal.
It didn't hurt her (and given that she was 13 months, I;d have known), and nothing bad has ever happened because of the holes in her ears.

I honestly fail to get the big hoo ha over it.

I may have a few so called chav qualities, in fact I know I do, I watch soaps and shop at Asda, but at the same time I eat olives, and we're having homemade Baba Ganoush as part of our meal tonight. (Lamb Kofta, sweetcorn fritters, Tzatziki and a green salad. Thank you Sam Stern)

Why such judging, really why?

Do people honestly believe that all children who have their ears pierced when young come from horrible families, with parents who are just desperate to mutilate them?

I come from a culture where piercing babies ears is the norm. I was given earrings as christening presents. My mum refused point blank to have ours done until we were old enough to make that decision ourselves. I was 13 and I have had lots of problems with them because I can only wear gold, even the greek earrings I had as a baby can cause them to swell up.
My daughter had hers done first for her 10th birthday ended up in a&e with the whole earring stuck inside her ear when it caught in a towel and was pulled backwards through the earlobe, that was within a week of them being pierced.

She had them done again when she was 12 and we have no problems.
Piercing may be done culturally for babies but it is totally unnecessary. It inflicts pain on a child just for appearances sake. The a&e department statistics are quite scary as it is on average they see a piercing related problem about once a week in just one hospital. Why inflict something on a baby that can so easily go wrong.

Ans bless her my Mother decided to finally have her ears pierced when she was in her late 60s and my MIL in her late 70s, they persueded each other, so why the rush to do it within weeks of babies being born, I don't know

@ egypt

Every. Decision. YOU. Make. Permanently alters your children. Vaccination? Discipline methods? Food? School? Television?

what a load of bollocks - weakest argument ever.

has it occurred to you that you HAVE to FEED your children? you HAVE to discipline them, you have to educate them.you have to make a decision about vaccination and what media they are exposed to because the issues are more salient.

You do NOT HAVE to make decisions about punching holes in them (or for that matter dying their hair or threading their eyebrows) while they are children - those decisions are for them to make when they can make them in a balanced and proper way.

I winder if you are also planning to choose your DCs HE course, subsequent career path and life partner while it is still a child?

No? so why are you making decisions they will be able to make for themselves, for them?

MM - I do see your point that some choices are more necessary to make for children than others. But it's not 'bollocks' that we all project our views and values onto our children whether intentionally or not. And I'd say that in the scheme of life ear piercing is a minor, mainstream thing. So really don't understand the anger and vitriol about it. I knew that this thread would end up this way though because I've seen people's reactions in RL about it.

Bruffin - noone is saying it's necessary, but what some of us are saying is that's it's no big deal. Some of us are saying it's gross, chavvy and abusive.

But it's not 'bollocks' that we all project our views and values onto our children whether intentionally or not.

No, but what is a load of bollocks is the attempt to draw a direct comparison between the need to feed ones' children and the need to punch holes in their ears

And I'd say that in the scheme of life ear piercing is a minor, mainstream thing

and there is that "mainstream" argument again!

"just because many people do it, it must be ok"

Why do so many of us enter adulthood and leave our brains at the doorstep?

I remember Corporal punishment (by almost anybody) being mainstream - must have been ok?

Capital punishment is mainstream in many countries - must be ok?

Sex and arranged marriage involving 11 year olds is still mainstream in some countries - must be fine.

Recreational drug use is mainstream in loads of places - spiffing

Follow the status quo - baby, you cant go wrong.

Get a grip

Blimey calm down ....wait till they want their belly buttons piercing, or snakebites