LETTERS IN VIEW : Don’t Pass Childhood; Go Straight to Adult

Well, since I read it in The Times it must be official--we have now decided to do away with childhood altogether (at least for the rich). I see in the “Haute Tots” feature (Oct. 19) that children as young as 3 or 4 are being dressed in $300-and-up designer evening wear so they can look just like their parents. We are told that this is now a requirement for being “socially correct.”

I guess the old-fashioned idea that childhood was a time for exploring, imagining, playing, laughing and enjoying a few brief years of freedom before taking on the burdens of adult responsibility is now just for us unfashionably poor and socially incorrect people. If you’ve got enough money, you can completely skip all the mess and inconvenience of having kids and simply turn them into miniature adults.

As for me, I guess I’ll just have to struggle along with my old-model children. Well, at least here in backward San Bernardino, I won’t have to worry about running into those women who turn up their noses at kids who don’t have “the look.” Ah, what a world, what a world.

KIM FOREMAN

San Bernardino