Is it wrong to tell kids that their future is limitless?

So many of us tell our kids “you can be anything you want to be when you grow up”.  But can they?

The first time I told my daughter she had limits was during the naming of Catholic Pope Francis in 2013.  She was 8 and asked if she could be Pope one day.  I told her females are not allowed to be head of the Catholic Church.  I answered her “why” with my own bias; “because some people think tradition is more important than equality”. 

I’ve watched businesses, young parents, grandparents all decide what toys are for girls and which for boys.  I guess girls don’t grow up to drive cars or build buildings.  Perhaps men don’t become Fathers or caregivers.  If that is true, it is a waste of time for girls to play with cars or blocks or for boys to like dolls.  We tell them they can be ANYTHING when they grow up, yet we limit their play as children.  

If their future is limitless, why don’t we limit our children less?

We teach our kids to be kind to all people.  Not to be a bully and to stand up for others being bullied.  And then we have a passionate exchange as adults, like a political election, and tolerate candidates spewing hate, bigotry and publicly bullying other candidates.  We don’t want our kids to support mean behavior or bullies and yet we vote for a candidate anyway, because a portion of their campaign serves our own self-interest.  In that decision we tell our kids that there ARE things that are more important than being a good human.

We have a rise of youth mental illness and suicide in North America.  I wonder how much of the responsibility for this crisis falls on the adults for setting unrealistic expectations and sending mixed messages.

Is society too broken to fulfill the dreams of our children?

What’s your view?