Is childhood fundamentally a different state than adulthood, a different kind of animal, so to speak? If so, is there that moment of transition, a discontinuity, where childhood switches to off and adulthood switches to on. Few will argue that puberty is such a discontinuity in the physical sense; the capacity to bear children goes from no to yes, from off to on. Are there psychological and social discontinuities too? The answer is yes, everything, absolutely everything is different ever after the light of innocence leaves the child’s eyes.

Every early elementary school classroom is full of embryonic criminals. It’s as natural for little kids to lie and steal as it is for them to breathe. They cheat, fight, show disrespect, and harass each other sexually as free of guilt as if they had just eaten a hot dog.    Eliot Wigginton

And afterward, our Darwinian imperative to breed now matched with the capacity to do so, innocence has been strangled by shame.

The basis of shame is not some personal mistake of ours, but the ignominy, the humiliation we feel that we must be what we are without any choice in the matter, and that this humiliation is seen by everyone.   Milan Kundewra

George's selection of 66 Phlogs is available in print from People's Press.

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