Not pain pals

It’s true that most mother-daughter relations are fraught with tensions (Close fight, December 19). These tensions are aggravated by an ‘overbearing’ mother suspecting her daughter’s every move or an ‘independent’ daughter who faults her mother’s every question regarding her well being. This, however, doesn’t mean that they can’t be the best of friends. A mutual respect and empathy for each other’s value systems can really make a mother and daughter to come close and share all their secrets as only best friends can.

Kumar Sourav Das
Burdwan

Tabs on porn

Pornography on the Internet is all set to get legal teeth once the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) launches exclusive domains for porn sites (Reserved for XXX, December 12). It’s scary that now even children can access these sites easily by just clicking on the mouse. Therefore it’s important that ICANN must do more to protect children and persons at an impressionable age from browsing these sites with strict password-protected access. This will help in preserving the moral integrity of our young ones.

Ahtesham Ahmad
Andal

No preachers please

It’s evident that there is need for ‘good’ science teachers today (Lure of ideas, December 12). A good teacher should evoke an eagerness in the student to learn about science rather than scare them with drab lectures. And this can be achieved by interspersing the lessons with illustrative examples. Mr Simon Singh of the UK demonstrated this amply during his lecture on the history of the Universe and emergence of the idea of humanity at the Indian Institute of Chemical Biology, Jadavpur. We wish his book Origin of Cosmos will teach science teachers to be more ‘inspiring’.

B.N.Bose
Dum Dum Park