Is there anything that can be learned from cases like Buttigeg and Harris where at least one of their parents was ostensibly a proponent of Marx? Have any of you known or had communist parents?
I’m trying to avoid my own kids becoming reactionary and the only thing I know to do to avoid that is show them internal consistency with my own views(valuing consent, consistency, openness, compassion, reason, creativity, and an unbreakable will), educate them on class conflict and historical materialism, and give them opportunities to reinforce the innate kindness within them while also introducing them to various other groups so that they grow up to feel a human connection to anyone regardless of differences in age, gender, nationality, etc.
I’ll be closely involved in their school work to help counter imperialist propaganda in their public school education.
I’ll be involving them in programs like 4H so they don’t become alienated from the means of production and their environment.
I’ll be insisting they get part time service industry jobs when they’re old enough to help radicalize them against the inhumanities of capitalist exploitation
Additionally, the only communities I can think to raise them as a part of are SRA, and UU. If y’all have any suggestions I would love to hear them.
PMCs produce hellspawn because material conditions matter more than stated ideological conviction!!!
One thing I’m considering is getting my kids involved in our local theologically liberal Methodist church. This is actually pretty difficult for me because I still have leftover trauma I’m dealing with from my fundamentalist evangelical upbringing (long story short, the doctrine of eternal torment nearly broke my brain) and I’m very much an atheist now. However, this church is pretty good at community involvement and definitely doesn’t share the views of my evangelical upbringing. I think my kids could really learn good things about accepting others and empathy towards everyone.
Also, I want to add that I had very good, loving parents that I still have a good relationship with today, as do my siblings for the most part. They are politically conservative evangelicals, and yet their kids range from commie (me) to mostly good intentioned radlibs (my siblings); and we’re all atheist or agnostic. My siblings and I have discussed this at length before, and the best we can determine is that despite their theological and political views, our parents were kind and loving and taught us to be kind and empathetic towards others. They also never pushed their views on us and they generally valued learning (we were told we had to go to college despite my parents not really going themselves). And weirdly, we also listened to a ton of non-political news radio in the car. All of us do attribute some of our knowledge and concern about the broader world from that.
I think it’s important to note with the Harris and Buttigeg examples that both dads were incredibly successful, high level academics. This might be a bit of a generalization but you don’t get to that level of academic accomplishment without making tremendous personal sacrifices i.e. you probably won’t spend much time with your kids. No different from your high-level investment bankers or marketing managers. I know a fair number of successful academics and all but one, quite frankly, is a shit parent. Because at that level, pursuit of knowledge and/or success is an almost obsessive drive. I’m guessing Harris and Buttigeg’s dad probably spent very little time actually parenting them, which would explain a lot.
increddibly successful, high level academics
what are the class interests of the PMC? https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2019/11/the-characterless-opportunism-of-the-managerial-class/
