Cry Cry Cry

The admittedly whiny Neal Pollack whines some more, this time about how mean people wrote him nasty letters in the wake of his Salon article documenting the horrible prospect of having to care for his own cannibal child for an additional 2.5 hours per day. Again, it's all about him. Still no mention of why other children (and child care workers) should have to put up with daily injury from his kid. I continue to be unsympathetic.

UPDATE: Apparently Salon has edited the article post-publication without notice. A quote by the child's mother calling her biting son a "little shit" has been excised.

There's a fair amount of criticism for Pollack in that Table Talk thread, although the site with the really incensed commentary is here. Some of it's a little over the top, but many fair points are made.

UPDATE II: Salon's Letters to the Editor offer many constructive suggestions, but also do not let the Pollacks off the hook. There's one really angry letter which sounds like it might be from Sophie's dad.

Ted Frank seems to think that the objections can be deflected by the fact that the piece was intended to be satire. I would buy this, except the piece does not effectively satirize any particular experience. Even if some of the dialogue is exaggerated in an attempt at satire, that doesn't change the facts which can be discerned from Pollack's website and the focus of the piece, which are 1) Elijah hurt other kids and terrorized one kid in particular for weeks, resulting in his expulsion, and 2) this is supposed to make us have sympathy for his parents. I save my sympathy for the children who were unnecessarily subjected to injury and fear on a daily basis because the Pollacks put their inadequately socialized and poorly disciplined child in preschool so they could get back to their chosen careers.