Posted by Ronan on Feb 19, 2007 in Uncategorized | 1 comment
From Wiki – “A feral organism is one that has escaped from domestication and returned, partly or wholly, to its wild state”
Did anyone see the MindShock documentary on Channel 4 on Feral children last night? It showed the story of several children but focused on one; Oxana Malaya. She was brought up by dogs until she was 9. The documentary visited her when she in late 20s. Experts diagnosed she has the mental capacity of about 5 or 6. She lives in the confine of a community for mentally challenged adults and milks cows. In the Channel 4 documentary, doctors stated that it is unlikely that she will ever be properly rehabilitated into ‘normal’ society.
so the question posed at the start of the documentary – What makes us a normal human? Are we humans because we are born by humans and brought up by humans in a human manner? If we completely remove the upbringing of humans does it make us non-human?? The documentary was slightly leaning towards this. It’s the age old problem of Nature vs Nurture.
Other things highlighted in the documentary is parts of our brain (including language, feelings etc) shrink if not stimulated in early childhood (0-3). If this continues beyond the age of 5 we can never ‘learn’ to speak fully or empathise with other people. Scary.
A bigger question which was wasn’t addressed in documentary – why was this allowed to happen? What kind of parents would do this to their own child? Was there nobody to help??
I didn’t see the documentary as I am in terrestrial TV land. However, it does sound quite horrific that a situation can arise where children are abandoned to fend for themselves.
The shrinking of the brain without stimulation is scary. If we put this on a local context of children with autism, it suggests that the Irish government need to provide more resources to help parents develop their children’s full capabilities.
As for what is a normal human, I think that everyone is normal regardless of their nature and nurture circumstances.
Children born in a feral environment are normal regardless that they are raised in a environment where survival is the only aspect of life.
Children born with autism or other disabilities are normal regardless of their neurological and physical make up.
If we start applying different values of normal then does this equate to discrimination or is that being over sensitive?