Jackie,
thanks so much for the long and fascinating post.
there is so much here.
i've seen some shows on genetics and identical twins, genetics and super intelligent people, on the tv. what always puzzles me is how genetics can be responsible for people being both the same and different! i guess i don't really follow it.
i don't agree that scientists know what birds think. we can only understand in terms of tests we give them. being a bird and thinking bird thoughts would be an experience no scientist could predict or understand. what kind of success rate do psychiatrists have? do they really understand our minds?
your stories of neglected children are kind of gut wrenching. as you put it so well, the parents are often suffering just as badly. when families go wrong it must be so difficult to have any positive influence. and of course it's not just families that go wrong.
when i was a teenager (and still optimistic about the world) i had a realisation that jails don't help anybody. if we really want to help criminals (and society), we should provide programs that actually rehabilitate them. now i think about it, the same goes for a lot of our institutions: schools, companies, government. these are things we can do something about. children who have terrible experiences at home, as you said, go on to look for love in other places. i don't know about other schools, but you couldn't have squeezed a drop of love out of most the teachers at my school if you ran 'em individually through a wringer.
i guess we could all start by following your example, jackie. your comments ring like bells across the internet, kind and full of hope.
