The poet Philip Larkin put his finger on it years ago with: They f*** you up your mom and dad. He could have also added ‘teachers’ and adults in general (and of course we in turn f*** up our children, but that need not detain us here).
Among the many bad habits we had as children that were beaten or scared or threatened out of us was the manner in which we ate our food: chewing with the mouth open. Now we are told that the adults were wrong, and all those threats and warnings we received as children were misplaced. We were told then that if we persisted in eating with our mouths open, we would grow tusks like elephants.
Far from discouraging open-mouthed chewing, it actually encouraged us to eat that way – after all, which child could resist the idea of growing tusks? It would have been the same if we were told we would grow a tail or an extra ear on our foreheads – children love that stuff, something Marvel comics monetised long ago.
