Kids should be seen and heard

I vow to spend the year disputing how great it used to be, to dispute how people were such better parents back in the day because they made their children fear them and excluded them from the family by putting them at children's tables and sending   them to play outside until the street lights came home.  We were seen and not heard.  Which is not a good thing. It is important for children to feel empowered and heard by their parents. I am tired of this idealized version of the old days when children respected adults...we did not respect them, we feared them. Women were role models for slavery.  Children were abused and had no one and no where to turn.  The only people with a voice back then were white male Christians who had a good job. 
So,  the old days are just that old!  There is a reason that people who were raised back then did NOT raise their children that way. 
The good NEW days are what we should be focused on.  If your children are disrespectful it is probably because you do not respect them, you probably do not model respect of others to them and YOU, their parent, need to research ways to change that. 
If you are looking for the good old days there was no such thing.
It's a myth perpetrated by people who don't want to change for the better.
So start sharing positive parenting tips that support creative,  politically aware , vocal,  respectful children. 
Change is good and for a reason. Embrace it.
These are the good new days.