We are also overloading the word “Child” here, which we may need to disambiguate at this point.
What you are saying applies broadly to a 7 year old, and less to a 16 year old. For the 16 year old, there’s no longer 2 possible outcomes “succeed as a Salafi” or “fail as a Salafi.” There is often the very real option to “Make your way towards something else.” And the seeds of that could easily start (probably did!) in the 13 or 14 year old.
It’s also neat that humans are kind of wired where the great questioning/rebellion tends to happen more in the 13-to-16-year-old than the 7-year-old. Thus the common phenomenon where the person graduates high school and church at the same time, or leaves the cult, emigrates, etc.
I think you’re onto something. I think, for this purpose, “child” means anyone who doesn’t know enough about the topic to have any realistic chance at successful innovation. A talented 16 year old might successfully innovate in a field like music or cooking, having had enough time to learn the basics. When I was that age kids occasionally came up with useful new ideas in computer programming, but modern coding seems much more sophisticated. In a very developed field, one might not be ready to innovate until several years into graduate school.
A 16-year-old Salafi will be strongly influenced by his Salafi upbringing. Even if he* rebels, he’ll be rebelling against that specific strain of Islam. It would take a very long and very specific journey to take him toward California-style liberalism; given the opportunity to explore he’d likely end up somewhere very different.
*My understanding of this particular Islamic school is hazy, but I doubt our student is female.
We are also overloading the word “Child” here, which we may need to disambiguate at this point.
What you are saying applies broadly to a 7 year old, and less to a 16 year old. For the 16 year old, there’s no longer 2 possible outcomes “succeed as a Salafi” or “fail as a Salafi.” There is often the very real option to “Make your way towards something else.” And the seeds of that could easily start (probably did!) in the 13 or 14 year old.
It’s also neat that humans are kind of wired where the great questioning/rebellion tends to happen more in the 13-to-16-year-old than the 7-year-old. Thus the common phenomenon where the person graduates high school and church at the same time, or leaves the cult, emigrates, etc.
I think you’re onto something. I think, for this purpose, “child” means anyone who doesn’t know enough about the topic to have any realistic chance at successful innovation. A talented 16 year old might successfully innovate in a field like music or cooking, having had enough time to learn the basics. When I was that age kids occasionally came up with useful new ideas in computer programming, but modern coding seems much more sophisticated. In a very developed field, one might not be ready to innovate until several years into graduate school.
A 16-year-old Salafi will be strongly influenced by his Salafi upbringing. Even if he* rebels, he’ll be rebelling against that specific strain of Islam. It would take a very long and very specific journey to take him toward California-style liberalism; given the opportunity to explore he’d likely end up somewhere very different.
*My understanding of this particular Islamic school is hazy, but I doubt our student is female.