Good grief. My five year-old regularly uses a very sharp ceramic paring knife to slice cheese and cucumbers for snacks. She was taught how to properly handle a blade, shown how sharp it was, and carefully guided and supervised until she got the hang of watching her fingers and immediately placing the knife in the sink and out of her younger sisters' reach after use. If my five year-old can successfully and safely wield a knife sharp enough to glide through raw meat, that ten year-old can certainly handle one of those flimsy pieces of garbage.

Also, it irritates me to no end when parents fail to teach their children age-appropriate life skills and then expect society at large to protect them from their own inexperience. It isn't the grocery store's fault this ten year-old is too helpless to handle a completely harmless tool; it's the mother's. She, not the store, should bear the consequences of that failure.

Yes, agree with Jess.

I see this all the time. Parents don't dole out increasing privileges - with the commensurate responsibilities - as their kids get older and able to handle them.

My perspective is that the parents are afraid to see their kids fail. One of the friends doesn't know how to ride a bike, because the parents were afraid the kid'd fall and scrape a knee. It is stunning. And what really peeves me, is that mine picks up on *their* fears, and asks me things like "is it ok to climb a tree?" (My answer is invariably, "well, do you think you can?", and the answer is nearly always well-thought-out.)

Wow - that is awful about the bike.

And about how there's some social spreading of the fear.

At ten years old we would ride our bikes downtown to the Army Navy Surplus store and buy machetes and then spend our days exploring the woods.

We've focused a lot on giving our daughter responsibilities she can handle. She's only 20 months old, so no knives yet, but she has been going up and down the stairs by herself since she was about 13 months old. She helps put her toys away, too (poorly, but we gotta start somewhere). I certainly hope she can manage a small knife by the time she's 10.

It's England. They've for the most part successfully removed firearms from the people. Now they're worried about knives.

I've carved with these before with my kids... they are actually not sharp, cuz with a pumpkin you don't need sharp as much, just stout...

but look at the thing, it even has a guard on it's hilt to protect your fingers. Oh, I'm sorry, did I use the violent images of swords and knives? OK, how about we call it a "Safety Finger Guard" Didja notice the rounded tip?

so what this parental unit is teaching little Jonny is that everything in the world can hurt him, or that his mother is as smart as a box of rocks, and he should just ignore her. Oi.

Interestingly the ones sold in the US ARE aged for 12 and up, more as a limit to liability for the company.

When I was his age, I was sharpening all my mom's kitchen knives for her, and I used the big chef's knife for pumpkins, because you could get that amazing straight sharp cut for the spooky eyes...

Surprised she let's him carve it at all... when the kids were really small, they got to decorate their own pumpkins with markers, and then I made a big one cut out.

eventually they took over for me as they got older.

"stupid is as stupid does."

SwissArmyD, my dad did that too. When we were little we drew on them with marker and he wielded the knife. By the time we were 7 or 8, we were on our own - he'd sit at the table and do his own.

Turning her son into an emotional-eunuch. By age 10, I owned a rifle (a .22), a Bowie knife, a sleeping bag and a tent -- as did all my friends, and we'd spend nights in the woods. I'd learned how to set up a camp, cook a meal, basic first aid, how to hunt small game, which plants were edible and how to find clean water. I'd also learned not to shoot at a skunk (especially when dared by my older brother), and that quite a few of the girls who lived in the area were much better shots than I was. I went to an Ivy League university and Tier 1 grad programs (graduating with honors), and married a country girl (who also has graduate degrees, and who is a much better shot than I am). Our sons have professional degrees and can take care of themselves (and also are better shots than I am). In all professions, having learned to be self-reliant is a great advantage over those who wait for someone else to make a decision.

Dr. Rosemond talks about that a lot - over-protecting and micro-management, that is.

This week's column:

"Why are today’s children so filled with fear? Ask their moms"

http://www.gastongazette.com/lifestyles/family/column-why-are-today-s-children-so-filled-with-fear-ask-their-moms-1.389356

(It's just over one page long - you have to click on the second page.)

Previously, he's also pointed out the vicious circle of micromanaging parents who refuse to believe THEIR precious kids would ever do something forbidden - or horrible - when the parent isn't there, and this belief is aggravated in part by hotheaded outsiders who believe that if a kid misbehaves, it's ALWAYS the result of bad upbringing. Not true. Kids have free will too.

When I was 9 I cut myself opening a can of pillsbury dough. We should ban dough. I still have the scar...

Yes, in today's society/institution the kids will have to learn to fashion their own shanks.

At ten I think I was in cub scouts where we played with our Swiss Army knives by standing face to face and throwing the knife out to the side into the ground to make the other person stretch his one leg out to match the reach. He would throw his knife in the other direction. (Think of a game of twister played with knives - tons of fun!)

Of course, as the game went on the knives got closer and closer to the feet - not on purpose, it was just the way we threw them. The idea was to make the other guy fall over; but the knife throw had to be a realistic reach. No fair throwing something out 3 feet away.

No one died, or even lost a toe.