Should young children who display left-handedness be forced by their parents and teachers to use their right hand, as was done in the past?

I don't believe in bullying kids about things that are NOT important. I don't want to be a control freak or micro-manage them.

I believe in picking battles, and "letting kids be kids" when it doesn't hurt anything. There are enough rules that must be imposed upon them (and enforced) for the good of their soul, the good of society, and the good of the family.

If I can't charge a given behavior (e.g., "fidgeting") with a violation of one of these Goods, I let them be.

Kids can't be, and shouldn't be, robots. They should also have their individuality respected -- God made each person different.

We accuse the modern SSPX of creating "cookie cutter" phlegmatic priests in Winona, among other things. Why should we be guilty of squashing the same innocent individuality in our own children?

I don't think individuality is an effect of Original Sin. I think it's something God intended for there to be from the beginning.

What virtue do you see, OP, in writing righthandedly?

The nuns when I was a kid sure saw something wrong with it. My brother was whacked on the knuckles with a ruler every time he was caught writing with his left hand. That was multiple times daily. Nowadays that would be child abuse. He is now ambidextrous, but no longer a practicing Catholic. Go figure.

(I think I might have been a lefty as well, but a serious accident involving a wall socket and a bobby pin probably changed that before I was old enough for school. I am still Catholic, but approach sockets and switches with caution!)
1MT

Quote from: Guest

Should young children who display left-handedness be forced by their parents and teachers to use their right hand, as was done in the past?

Is this kind of ignorance and superstitious nonsense still alive and well in 2014?

I see why you chose to post it Anonymously -- I'd be a bit ashamed to ask such a question myself.

WHY would you influence a child to use his right hand, when his brain obviously favors his left?

Perhaps because left handed children are "sinister" (from the Latin sinister, meaning "left") or from the devil?

There's only ONE solution -- burn them at the stake!

 :heretic:

...or maybe not.

 :rolleyes:

Or maybe their brain is just wired differently. It's a completely material consideration, with no spiritual ramifications.

Let's not give Catholics, or Traditional Catholics, a bad name.

This is one area where our modern, politically correct society has it right where previous generations got it wrong. There's bound to be some reactionary trad somewhere who thinks left-handedness should be resisted because, after all, our modern liberal PC sensibilities became the new orthodoxy at about the same time we stopped forcing left-handed children to use their right hands!

Why was there ever a stigma behind left-handedness? I don't get it. Being southpaw is probably really bad for driving a manual transmission car in a right-side driving country, but that might be it, IMO.

This is one area where our modern, politically correct society has it right where previous generations got it wrong. There's bound to be some reactionary trad somewhere who thinks left-handedness should be resisted because, after all, our modern liberal PC sensibilities became the new orthodoxy at about the same time we stopped forcing left-handed children to use their right hands!

Well-said.

I feel an uncontrollable urge to criticize and/or mock the "dark ages" when I hear stuff like this.

Sure, the dark ages weren't as "dark" as the anti-Catholic propaganda would have us believe.

But we WERE in the darkness of ignorance about some things back then -- and left-handedness was one of those things.

Good docuмentary about Catholic Europe during the Black Death.