Arguing with my brother-in-law yesterday that we ought to give our children more freedom and more responsibility. "Yes, that's all well and good but what happens when something unexpected happens?" he asked, constantly fearful of his own children's safety. "Well that's when we see what they're made of," was my answer. And as I gave his question more thought I realised that the whole raison d'être of the bourgeois life was the minimization, containment and domestication of the unexpected, of spirit.