I can't help but think that something would get sacrificed in that process - no, you shouldn't basically throw the kid out in there like a sort of rejected Spartan baby left to die on a mountain, but at least for my part my parents coddled the fuck out of me in some ways and I've had to make up for it when I realized that it had a negative impact on me. So I guess in this case it's a good idea to intervene if your kid is coming home with a persistent serious problem, but there's some kind of teachable moment in your kid dealing with it to a lesser extent. It's never too early to get a little practice dealing with assholes (although with preparation). I'm also fairly sure parents want to minimize the amount of self-parenting their child has to do. How would you respond if your son grew up and asked, 'Dad, what the heck was the deal with being all weird about dolls and shit? I liked those.'But the temptation is to instead shield him/her from as many sources of external criticism as possible.