Live online chat with Frank Furedi - Tuesday April 10th 9-10.15pm

[Carriel]

Frank Furedi is a sociologist, father of a 5 year old boy and author of the controversial new book "PARANOID PARENTING (Abandon Your Anxieties and be a Good Parent)" (Penguin) - which argues that children are actually physically safer than they have ever been before and perhaps more in danger from the conflicting advice handed out to parents by different generations of "childcare experts". You can post questions in advance for Frank here, or drop in on the live discussion on Tuesday. The first six contributors to the live chat will each receive a copy of Frank's book.

Dear Frank,

I heard you on the radio and told a friend about what good sense you seemed to be talking and she seemed horrified and told me that you'd been involved in Living Marxism, the magazine that tried to prove the Bosnian concentration camps didn't exist and how could I take you seriously? Is that true and, if so, how do you expect to be taken seriously as a parenting expert?

Dear Fairynuff

Probably, yes. Kids need good food. And I give my son a weekly lecture on the virtue of vegetables. (which he promptly ignores) But I am worried about the way that eating has become complicated by professionals who turn every bite of a cheeseburger into a major health issues

Hi Jraven

I agree that instincts are not naturally perfect. However, as mothers and fathers learn and interact with their child they gain important insights about parenting. They develop almost a new sense of what the kids needs. Unfortunately, often experts step in and tell parents that the professional knows best. As a result parents stop cultivating, developing - and most important of all - believing in their instincts. Learning to cultivate and to trust your instincts in the most important key to effective parenting.

Dear Ra

It very much depends on your son, his school, and general circumstances - such as whether he is isolated or has a group of friends. The most important first step is to always bring it out into the open

Dear Alex2

There is plenty of objective information around. Even experts who promote a paranoid style of parenting agree about most of the basic facts. The real problem is not information but the pressure that parents face to treat even an insignificant risk as a routine problem to their child. The 'what if' question means that even if only a handfull of children are abducted by strangers - we are forced to reorganise our life around a risk that is statistically insignificant

Dear Nancy

Other countries are 'safer' because parents believe them to be safe. If you walk around Madrid at night - you will see massive traffic and yet the kids are playing out on the streets. Many British parents would not allow a 14 year old out under such circumstances. And yet there are 7-8 years old Spanish children having a great time in circumstances that would be denounced as dangerous by British safety experts. There is also one other big difference. In Spain adults intervene to prevent children from getting into trouble - in Britain adults are too embarassed to get involved.

Dear Robbie

I am not actually a parenting expert. I don't think that anyone can know more about your kids than you do. So I am not worried about whether I am taken seriously as a parenting expert. I hope that my analysis of the parenting crisis will be taken seriously. My views on child rearing are based on my work as a sociologist and through my experience as a father. They have little to do with with any of my alleged views on Bosnia, the theory of relativity or the British monarchy. You will have to judge me on what I say about child rearing rather than on any issues extraneous to child-rearing

Well that's all for tonight folks.

Frank - Thanks so much for all your replies and for taking the time to come and enter into a live discussion. Thanks too to everyone else who took part.

Carrie and Justine

Dear Frank Do you think paranoid parenting has grown out of an excess of guilt? Parents are made to feel everything that happens to their child is their fault or influenced by them. there is no concept of the child having the right to his or her own problems. So parents have increasingly become overprotective rendering children less able to show initiative or develop coping skills. This then makes the child less capable and the parent more anxious. Is it some sort of vicious circle? Perhaps it is also to do with adults not seeing children as active agents but only viewing adults as omnipotent. What happens when they become teens and want to break away?

Dear Frank,I live in the centre of Rome, and its not excatly true that the parents abroad are less paranoid that the English, In Italy they are far more worried about everything, they worry about food (that their children don't eat enough!!!)If there is a slight breeze, jumpers are slapped on immediatly,there are very few children running around the centre of Rome, everybody is taken around by cars or babysitters(I'm talking about 14yr olds ,but funnily enough they seem to send their children to summer camps and organised summer activities without checking who their children are with all day!! They let their children have scooters at the age of 14 without even knowing how to drive , there are so many accidents in the city involving kids of 15 yrs old !!I have a 10 yr old and they think its because I'm English that I have a cold mentatity, when I leave him in the park playing football, and I don't worry too much what he is eating or how warmly he is dressed , but he will never have a scooter at the age of 14, and I always am a bit worried about sending him to organized summer camps !! So its true there are a lot of contraditions in bringing up children, I think that English mothers on the whole are pretty relaxed about the unimportant matters, here, children stay with their parents until the age of 30, God forgive !!!!!!!!!