The Ethics of Letting Your 13-Year Old Climb Everest

This post pretty much states my own misgivings about public admiration for this feat. If I told you I let my 13 year old kid do something that had a 10% death rate, what kind of father would I be? His parents will no doubt reply that their kid was special, and the 10% chance of death didn't apply to him. No doubt that's exactly what everybody in that 10% since 1954 has thought, and the fact that he happened to have made it up and down in one piece doesn't change the morality of the decision.