Genetic

To put Thursday's incident with my teenager into perspective, I just heard that a young man in her year at school, who we have known since he was three years old, attempted suicide on the same day. Fortunately he didn't succeed. He was being bullied. Why? Because he is short for his age, as is my daughter. He is creative, unconventional and a little different. At secondary school, these are bad things.

To be popular you have to be tall states my daughter.

Obviously it's harder for boys.
So... do we really want everybody to look the same in this world? A certain height, a certain weight, a certain shape... I used to loathe it when I heard mothers boasting about their kid's height. As if it were an achievement rather than an accident of DNA.
Speaking of which, more thoughts also on my daughter's arrest. It seems that many young people, including several of her friends, are being arrested for minor misdemeanors. Is this just because the police want to get the new generation's DNA on file? Although there has now been a ruling on this in the European courts....