Are Children Citizens or Slaves and Superpets?

"Free the Children; They Need Room to Grown" by John Holt appeared in Psychology Today when the original edition of Escape From Childhood was first published. It is a great summary of the context for Holt's later proposals in the book to grant children the same rights as ordinary citizens. As I continue to reread Escape From Childhood I'm struck by the practicality of the philosophical ideas he presents, as well as by the incremental approach he advocates for implementing them.

A friend sent  this quote by John F. Kennedy that really sums up for me the challenges Holt presents to readers of Escape From Childhood:

For the great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.—John F. Kennedy