Vad innebär det för ett barn att identifiera sig med ett system?
Rule 31 – Avoid the Stockholm Syndrome
It is not unusual for parents to see the traditional public school in their neighborhood as their only choice. Most recently I experienced this as I was speaking to a man in the airport when our flight was delayed two hours. After discussing my work as an educator, he shared with me that his daughter has become extremely depressed due to school and the doctors now want to medicate her saying she is bi-polar. He shared how she is smart, gifted, and creative, and wanted to know how he could get her to be okay and just finish school. When I explained to him there were options outside of school, he just couldn’t wrap his mind around it…even though school did not lead him to the career he has today. He kept bringing the conversation back to how to make her better with school rather than consider giving her the freedom to learn outside of school. This is not unusual. I have run up against this before when parents can clearly see school is hurting their children, but come up with a million excuses to defend the school rather than consider alternatives. This is reminiscent of the Stockholm Syndrome when victims, who are under total control of a few all-powerful people, develop sympathy toward their captors.