Stereotyping for the next generation.

A while back we were doing some house chores when I noticed something interesting.  The Boy was outside washing his car..................................

.............................While Wheatsie was vacuuming her room. 

Just struck me as interesting.

Mother Saves Baby that Doctors Left for Dead

Full Story with Video

HT Catholic Parents Online

More on Pornography

The more people I speak with, the more it seems that light needs to be brought to this subject.  I can understand why it is kept so quite - it is a very difficulty sin and addiction to overcome, there are many feelings of guilt, shame, and weakness tied to it.  Most often though, I don't think people actually recognize the damage that viewing pornography actually does to both sexes - or for that matter the way in which they view each other in general.  So, to that end, I will be posting more frequently on this topic.  I encourage any reader who struggles with this to not lose hope.  There are ways to free yourself from this addiction.  There are ways to heal your marriage.  There are ways to feel pride as a man, husband, and father again.  There are ways you can protect others from falling into the trap.  Don't hide, find someone you can trust to hold you accountable, get to Confession and Mass, seek the healing the Church provides. 

Some thoughts found on a Google search.

MSNBC article
A curvy body's like a drug to men

An hourglass figure activates the reward center in his brain
By Charles Q. Choi
updated 2/23/2010 1:23:02 PM ET

Watching a curvaceous woman can feel like a reward in the brain of men, much as drinking alcohol or taking drugs might, research now reveals.

These new findings might help explain the preoccupation men can have toward pornography, scientists added. Shapely hips in women are linked with fertility and overall health. As such, it makes sense evolutionarily speaking that studies across cultures have shown men typically find hourglass figures sexy.

To explore the roots of this behavior, researchers had 14 men, average age 25, rate how attractive they found pictures of the naked derrieres of seven women before and after cosmetic surgery that gave them more shapely hips. These operations did not reduce weight but just redistributed it, by implanting fat harvested from the waists into the buttocks.

Brain scans of the men revealed that seeing post-surgery women activated parts of the brain linked with rewards, including regions associated with responses to drugs and alcohol.

It might not be especially surprising that evolution wired the male brain to find attractive bodies rewarding.

"Hugh Hefner could have told us that by showing us how many zeroes are in his bank account," said researcher Steven Platek, an evolutionary cognitive neuroscientist at Georgia Gwinnett College in Lawrenceville, Georgia. "But there's more to it than buying Playboy, Maxim, or FHM."

For instance, "these findings could help further our understanding pornography addiction and related disorders, such as erectile dysfunction in the absence of pornography," he explained. "These findings could also lend to the scientific inquiry about sexual infidelity."

The scientists also found that changes in a woman's body-mass index or BMI — a common measure of body fat — only really affected brain areas linked to simple visual evaluations of size and shape. This may be evidence that body fat influences judgments of female beauty due more to societal norms than brain wiring.

"The media portrays women as wholly too skinny," Platek said. "It's not just about body fat, or body mass index."

What do women think?

Future research could also investigate the effects that attractive figures have on the female brain.

"It turns out women find similar optimally attractive female bodies as attention-grabbing, albeit for different reasons," Platek said. "Women size up other women in an effort to determine their own relative attractiveness and to maintain mate guarding — or, in other words, keep their mate away from optimally designed females."

These findings should not be construed as saying that men are solely programmed by their biology, nor that "women without optimal design should just hang up their mating towel," Platek added.

Platek and his colleague Devendra Singh detailed their findings online Feb. 5 in the journal PLoS ONE.

More to follow

It's Official: TV Linked to Attention Deficit

Babies and toddlers parked in front of the TV have a much higher risk of developing ADHD by age 7, a new study shows
by Jean Lotus

A study from the American Academy of Pediatrics shows that watching videos as a toddler may lead to Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD, also called ADD in UK) in later life.

TV watching "rewires" an infant’s brain, says Dr. Dimitri A. Christakis lead researcher and director of the Child Health Institute at Children’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center, Seattle, Wash. The damage shows up at age 7 when children have difficulty paying attention in school.

"In contrast to the way real life unfolds and is experienced by young children, the pace of TV is greatly sped up." says Christakis. His research appears in the April 2004 issue of Pediatrics. Quick scene shifts of video images become "normal," to a baby "when in fact, it’s decidedly not normal or natural." Christakis says. Exposing a baby’s developing brain to videos may overstimulate it, causing permanent changes in developing neural pathways.

"Also in question is whether the insistent noise of television in the home may interfere with the development of ‘inner speech’ by which a child learns to think through problems and plans and restrain impulsive responding," wrote Jane Healy, psychologist and child brain expert in the magazine’s commentary.

Babies brains grow rapidly

Even a child playing with its own fingers has the neural patterning that comes from bending, flexing, stretching and grasping. Scientists tell us that the brain develops in completely unique ways between birth and three years. As a kiddie viddie baby sits "mesmerized", neural paths are not being created. This is crucial brain development that stops by age three.

"You don’t want to think that something as innocent as half-an-hour’s peace and quiet could reduce your kid’s chances later in life," says Claire Eaton, 27-year-old mother from Lewisham, Australia.

Setting up baby for failure in school

Are parents who use infant videos such as "Baby Einstein" and "Teletubbies" putting their child at risk for a lifetime of Special Ed classes, school "behavioral therapy" and Ritalin?

In the study of more than 2,000 children, Christakis found that for every hour watched at age one and age three, the children had almost a ten percent higher chance of developing attention problems that could be diagnosed as ADHD by age 7. A toddler watching three hours of infant television daily had nearly a 30 percent higher chance of having attention problems in school.

Infant videos: They wouldn’t sell them if they were dangerous --Would they?

An explosion of kidvids for the bouncy chair set has hit the market. These include Baby Einstein, Baby Mozart, So Smart etc. TV shows, such as Teletubbies, aim at 18-month-old toddlers. These videos are peddled as "educational tools" to "give your baby a head start." The truth is, they are a video-tether that keeps baby out from underfoot.

"Max is learning German right now from a video"

Parents take away crucial life experiences from their child every time they pop in Baby Einstein. But they do love how it takes the baby out of their hair for awhile Listen to what parents say in testimonials about infant videos:

"I love spending time with my boy but let's face it, there are times when you just have to have 10 minutes or so to yourself so that you can wash the dishes or do laundry; that's when you pop this video in. It's 25 minutes of entertainment that holds the attention of even very young children. ," (son 10 months) Chris Hudson from San Antonio, TX.

There are times I rewind it and play it again and again until I get the dishes done and order restored. My son is captivated (and hopefully learning something). Mom I n Connecticut

The only thing I wish is that the videos were longer than 30min. Melissa Perruzi, Clinton Mississippi

(From Baby Eisntein reviews on Amazon.com).

Big problem for little people

Twenty-six percent of US children younger than age two have TV in their bedrooms - often watched from the crib, and 36 percent of families leave the TV on almost all of the time, even when no one is watching, according to a 2000 Kaiser Family Foundation study.

Don’t put your child at risk!

The good news is, infants and toddlers don’t need television to distract them. Humans raised children for 50,000 years before television sets and you can do it too. Your children can learn to entertain themselves or play with your supervision.

"When one-year olds are playing with a toy, they can explore it, poke at it, drop it," says Yale University Television Researcher Dorothy Singer. "They’re learning about space, about sound, and they’re developing sense of competence. Watching a TV show just doesn’t provide the same sensory experience."

Leaving a child alone with the TV is never a good idea.

"Would you entrust you toddler into the care of a baby sitter, even for a few minutes, who cannot hear or see your child?" writes Nancy Hall of Yale University’s Bush Center in Child Development and Social Policy. "Would you leave your child in an environment that encourages passivity, limits creativity and results in increased aggressive behavior? Many 1-year-olds are spending time regularly with just such a baby sitter: the television set."

What is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder?

ADHD affects 12 percent of US school children and has increased dramatically over the past 50 years. Studies show ADHD increased with the introduction of children’s television in the 1950s and then spiked higher in the mid 1980s when VCRs and home video became commonplace. Although the condition is known to be genetic, scientists have noted its rapid spread throughout every social class of children, and guessed that there could be an environmental cause. TV watching is a cause, this study shows.

How much TV should I let my baby watch?

No child under age two should watch television at all, the Academy of American Pediatrics advised in 1998. Doctors blame TV for increasing aggression and obesity in children, now they add ADHD risk to early TV use.

New Study:
Two-Year Olds Branded
by TV Advertising

Cornell Research: Children's TV Triggers Autism
Uh-Oh! Pediatricians

Ban TV for Toddlers

HT http://www.whitedot.org/issue/iss_story.asp?slug=ADHD+Toddlers and Jen from the Servants of Our Lady of Guadalupe

Support Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted’s Defense of Catholic Teaching on Abortion and Personhood

In late 2009, Sr. Margaret McBride, an administrator at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix, Arizona, authorized the abortion of a member of the Diocese of Phoenix thereby incurring automatic excommunication ( Latae sententiae) from the Catholic Church by virtue of Canon Law 1398.

Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted, in responding to this grave situation and obeying the Canon Law to which every Catholic is bound, publicly affirmed the excommunication — unleashing unabated anti-Catholic sentiment and the vitriol of the secular news media and dissident Catholic groups.

The individuals signing this letter pledge their support for Bishop Olmsted’s faithful defense of Church teaching to accomplish his primary task — the salvation of souls in his diocese — which includes the souls of Sr. Margaret McBride, the preborn child whose death Sr. McBride authorized, the child’s parents, and any other individuals involved.

Bishop Olmsted reminds us that a unique and unrepeatable preborn baby is at the center of this tragic case and his or her murder strikes at the very core of the Gospel of life and the call of Jesus to see His face in those less fortunate.

Please stand with us and support Bishop Olmsted by adding your signature to our open letter to Bishop Olmsted.

H/T - American Life League

Wikipedia article

E 5 Men this Wednesday

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.
Ephesians 5:25
E5 MEN


HUSBANDS FASTING FOR THEIR WIVES


The e5 Man fasts for his bride to imitate Jesus as described by Saint Paul in his letter to the Ephesians, chapter 5 (for which e5 is named). Fasting is eating only bread and water.
Jesus made a bodily sacrifice on the cross for His Bride the Church to present her to God the Father "without spot or wrinkle." (Eph 5:27) By fasting for our earthly bride and joining our sufferings to Christ's we intercede for grace for our brides. At the same time our act of bodily love in union with Christ accelerates our own conversion.

By making this sacrifice for the women in our lives we live out the essence of the gospel through a very particular act of self denial. To lay down one's body out of love for another is the central message of the gospel.

Register as an e5 Man.  Click here to watch the e5 video.

NOT ONLY FOR MARRIED MEN
Membership is not limited to married men. For single men, their fast may be dedicated to their future bride. For widowers or those unlikely to get married, the beneficiary of their fasts may be for a deceased wife, a daughter, a sister, or a granddaughter, or any other women in great need. For the consecrated celibate man the benefit of their fast can be for the benefit of the community they serve or for consecrated celibate women.

REQUIREMENTS
Except for medical reasons, the minimum requirements to be an e5 Man are that you:
1. Be a baptized Christian man.
2. Register with e5. Register as an e5 Man. Click here.
3. Fast on plain bread and water at least one day a month for your bride for her spiritual growth and healing - preferably on the first Wednesday of the month.

ADDITIONAL INTENTIONS OF THE E5 MAN
The intentions of the e5 also include:
1. All the other e5 Men's brides or primary intention.
2. For all the e5 Women registered with us.
3. For all women sinned against by men.
4. For the petitions sent to us by women for women.
5. And in general for all women.
Many e5 Men choose to fast more than once a month and often choose other beneficiaries for those days such as sisters, mothers, or friends.  See e5 Special Forces.

Prayer request

Please keep a friend in prayer - she is having difficulties in her pregnancy.

Quote on Womanhood

I was hitting the next blog button off the Badger Catholic when I came across this blog - great quotes on womanhood, here is a sample.

"Godly womanhood ... the very phrase sounds strange in our ears. We never hear it now. We hear about every other type of women: beautiful women, smart women, sophisticated women, career women, talented women, divorced women. But so seldom do we hear of a godly woman - or of a godly man either, for that matter.We believe women come nearer to fulfilling their God-given function in the home than anywhere else. It is a much nobler thing to be a good wife, than to be Miss America. It is a greater achievement to establish a Christian home than it is to produce a second-rate novel filled with filth. It is a far, far better thing in the realms of morals to be old-fashioned, than to be ultra-modern. The world has enough women who know how to be smart. It needs women who are willing to be simple. The world has enough women who know how to be brilliant. It needs some who will be brave. The world has enough women who are popular. It needs more who are pure. We need women, and men, too, who would rather be morally right than socially correct."— Peter Marshall

"If you women continue to demand your choice to work, you will so upset the economy of this country that the time will come when you will not have a choice. You will have to work."— Helen Andelin

H/T - Clothed with Scarlet