BEFORE you commit to spending one or possibly even two minutes reading this column, I need you to answer a very important question.
Haven't you got anything better to do?
What about poor little Tiffanae-Mae, your sweet and adorable three-year-old?
She's desperate to make that dream castle from those new Lego blocks Auntie Gloria gave her for Christmas. You've been promising to sit down with her and put it all together for yonks now.
You really should be spending quality time with her – instead of doing something as frivolous and inconsequential as reading a newspaper. You ought to be ashamed of yourself.
Well, if I haven't embarrassed you into putting down the Post and getting on with something more "useful" instead by now – congratulations.
You've just passed the level one membership test of my brand new club.
It's called the Guilt Trip Rebels (GTRs for short). It's for a new breed of modern men and women who refuse to be shamed into feeling bad about the way they bring up their own children.
I got the idea the other day, after reading the latest in a long line of "despairing" articles designed to have a nice little dig at perfectly decent parents everywhere.
This one was alarmed and outraged at how many mums were choosing NOT to spend 24 hours a day playing, chatting, doing arts and crafts, learning a foreign language or generally interacting in a meaningful way with their kids – but were instead doing something utterly disgraceful.
They were sometimes going on Twitter or Facebook.
Indeed many did something even more appalling. They were texting friends.
Have you ever heard anything so shocking?
OK, reading the paper wasn't actually mentioned as one of these deadly modern sins. But the inference was there for anyone daring to take five minutes out of their day to engage in this debased activity, rather than sitting gazing adoringly at their offspring: You are evil.
Next thing you know parents will be wanting to have a bath or go to the loo without dragging their children with them.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. As founder of the GTRs, I'm amazed at how many things I ought to be feeling guilty about.
Let me see, if I let my kids eat any type of junk food, they will have a low IQ. If I let them watch television before three, they will not learn to talk. If I bottle feed my babies, they could be at risk of a deadly disease. If I breast feed beyond six months, they could suffer digestive problems. If I leave my 14-year-old home alone, I could get a police caution. If I leave my newborn alone for one second, she might be at risk of cot death.
Either that, or the strange woman from down the road will come and steal her.
Oh hang on, I think that last one is a soap storyline, but still.
That's why the GTRs say enough is enough.
If you want to send a text or go on Twitter, you go ahead and do it. If you want to give Tiffanae-Mae the odd sausage roll, she'll survive. And if Iggle Piggle, Makka Pakka and the Pontipines can give you five minutes' peace while you put your feet up and read the paper at 6.20pm, there is no shame in this whatsoever.
Indeed, here's a bit of advice that might well make you the best parent in the world.
The next time you glimpse even the first part of a shock, horror headline decrying modern parenting, stop reading.
And go and play with your kids instead.
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