Monday 12 July 2010

A little bit on prejudice and crawly creatures

Prejudice - "A preconceived belief, opinion or judgement made without recourse to reason...most commonly used to refer to a preconceived judgement towards a people or a person because of race, social class, gender, ethnicity, age, disability, political beliefs, sexual orientation or other personal characteristics..." Wikipedia.

We all know that prejudices have existed since, well, rather a long way back. I mean, who knew that the Good Samaritan would have been, so, erm, 'good'? He sent shockwaves right through the New Testament, so much so that five-year-old children are still making plays about him now.

What concerns me though is that 2000 years later, we are no nearer to a lack of judgement, tolerance or grace in our everyday lives.

Do let me give you a little example.

On Saturday my husband and I took the two children to a birthday party. It was in a soft-play area where children not associated with the party were also allowed to play.

As we watched Renée and Edie frolicking with an older girl, my husband, who, it should be known, is the world's biggest snob (when asked whether he would have been attracted to me had I been christened Sharon or Tracey* rather than Emily, he simply smiled and said "well it would have been a lot harder"), turned to me and whispered,

"Ew, look at that girl. She's all dirty. And I bet she's got nits as well."

It has to be said, I may have laughed. But I may also have said something along the lines of,

"You can't say that. Don't be such a bloody snob. She's no more likely to have nits in her hair than any other child here."

And that, I thought, was that.

Except, of course, it wasn't.

Cut to the very next morning and Renée just so happens to scratch her head...

Rather too many times for me not to go a foraging in her hair. And what do I find? A whole host of tiny little blood-sucking parasites.

I think my husband was rather too smug for my liking.

You see, the problem with bloody prejudice is that on occasion our original assumption turns out to be correct, thus reinforcing whatever prejudices we may have had.

I give up. At least on the bit where I try to persuade my husband to stop being such a snob.

But having spent all day yesterday picking the little suckers out of both my children's hair, I may just give up on the Mothering front too.

*Absolutely no offence meant if your name just so happens to be Sharon or Tracey. But don't expect my husband ever to fancy you.

19 comments:

  1. we all know it's bollocks 'that lice prefer clean hair' they latch on to any hair they can!! but the cleaner you are, the more likely you are to discover and treat the blighters (and I don't mean treat them to tea and cake, I mean treat them to a trip down the plughole) for the first few years of school I washed DDs hair every 3 days and combed with nit comb and conditioner, her hair is 2ft long, I am a martyr, she got nits but they never lasted more than a few days!

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  2. Your kids may have had headlice already and you just hadn't noticed. But posh ones of course.

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  3. the ONLY way to is to religously wash, shampoo and comb once a week if your kids are in school. if you homeschool then DO NOT asume you won't get them - we did! - but you probably only need to comb once a month.

    also, if you are atall under the weather and/ornot well, you are more likely to get infested, and infested badly.

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  4. I tried to be a better person last year when a dodgy looking woman turned up to watch a teen baseketball game at our school. Unkempt and not really like the other visiting parents, I gave her the benefit of my doubt, even when she sat right next to me. A little too close for comfort to be honest.
    It was about two hours later that I discovered she stolen about $200 from my bag - on the floor in front of me!

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  5. erm, sorry to be a bore, but nits go for clean shiny hair - so pass that onto your husband! can i now be a snob? I HATE those soft play centres! x

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  6. Please, don't start me on nits! With 4 kids I spent the best part of 10 years dealing with those nasties. Conditioner & comb every 2 days, the only way. And tell JP I'm a 'Karen' so probably come within the remit of 'Sharon and Tracey'..But no worries, I shall just playfully slap him when I next see him..LOL xXx

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  7. Sometimes you really need to trust your instincts — political correctness be damned!

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  8. Have you done the drowning the little blighters (the lice, not your children, obviously) with conditioner trick, before combing them out with a nitty gritty comb or similar? I'm sure you have, but just in case not I thought I would mention it...

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  9. Good luck with the lice - I hate them with a vengeance as well.

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  10. Don't you hate when the men are right!? My man is like that too sometimes, and I try to keep my mind open and be nice...!

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  11. Your husband sounds like he would get along very well with mine!

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  12. My all time favourite cure for nits - I say was, not is - wash, comb through conditioner, dry hair on high heat, then blast with ghds. It works and keep on with the combing. When we lived in Hackney and my daughter was the only white kid at school she never go them because the Asian kids had oils in their hair. Move to Chiswick and we were best with 2 years of poshington nits and no one would admit where they came from!!! We have not been bothered for a while xx

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  13. No soft play centres for little L. I know why. Now, who's the snob...

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  14. I have tagged you over at mine. A meme for an Em...
    http://tinyurl.com/389gm7h

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  15. well - sometimes the unexpected can happen when we expect it the least and nits are something anyone can get - dont worry

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  16. Yep, been there. The lice I mean (soft play too, sadly all too often). Mind you, hate to say, if both kids were crawling with them, maybe more likely they already had them?! Unless they spent a long time head to head so the whole population could all crawl over? Anyway, we have a fantastic metal comb called Nit Free, which I recommend. The comby bits have spirals which removes the nits as well. Good luck!

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  17. ewww, nits. I think my head itches now :-(

    I'm sure I had more to say, but never fails that when I start typing, in comes a child or four... See you when summer holiday is over ;-)

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  18. yuk. Hate those little blighters. Els caught nits last term off a very nice, clean girl from a 'good background' - I don't think nits prefer Sharons/Tracys over Aramintas/Cordelias. Any head will do...

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  19. Lice like clean hair, so actually, it should be a status symbol to have them. It says "my children have well-kept heads" like nothing else.

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