Think you guys are worrying too much. If someone has the aptitude or interest, they can develop the skills needed, especially in this day and age of internet connectivity, and being able to pick the brains of other like minded enthusiasts for literally anything.

For example, I had a problem with my tv and was able to find some kids youtube video where he took it apart and replaced internal components, and its fixed. 10 minutes of research and mine was fixed too. 30 years ago I would have never been able to access that store of knowledge

Being involved with old vws as another hobby, I'm always amazed at just how many 16 year old kids have taken their car completely apart and put it back together to paint some inconsequential widget.

There are plenty of kids who have those skills, and can connect with other people to learn more and better stuff through avenues like forums. But everyone is different, I'm sure my grandfather the engineer had this exact same concern when he watched my dad unable to turn a wrench or help him effectively with around the house projects, and my dad the lawyer was I'm sure concerned that my powers of writing and reasoned argument were nothing compared to his, and so on. I wouldn't be surprised if any kid that I may have has completely different interests, the trick seems to be making sure your kid has the opportunities and exposure to these potential interests, and is able to hone them.

Then again, if a kid really likes videogames, they can pursue it. I have a childhood friend where all she would do was watch bad horror movies and play video games, to the intense concern of her active duty navy father, and now she's made an extremely lucrative career out of video game character design and artwork. To piss off her father, when he bought a shelby gt mustang and wouldn't let her drive it, she bought a top of the line camaro SS, and won't let him drive that.

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