Seriously…as a parent I feel like I’m constantly stressed out on finding the right words and approaches to reinforce the right things but sometimes articles from “the experts”:
Just make me seethe with contempt for how out of touch and frankly awful some parenting gurus are.
Its not all bad to be fair. I agree with number 2 and teaching kids how to recognize their own emotions and think empathetically but then there’s shit like number 3:
Furthermore, complaining about your job around your kids teaches them that work isn’t fun. As a result, they may grow up believing that adulthood is about spending half of your waking hours in complete misery.
Oh, well we can’t have that can we? Oh no junior, I swear daddy definitely loves clocking in at 6am and answering emails and crunching numbers rather then going outside to play basketball with you or build that new lego set. What, you’re grown up now and you hate your job and the way it makes you feel incredibly alienated in a way you never could have imagined? You just need to work on your attitude! Fuck that noise!
Even number 4, which I agree is good in practice, is arrived at for the wrong reasons. Its not about teaching kids some nonsense about being the sole arbiter and decision maker in charge of your life. Its about reinforcing the responsibilities and obligations you have to one another, whether that’s doing work or going to help grandma get some things down from the attic, or getting groceries for the week at the store.
In a few years I genuinely hope we evolve to the point of realizing that teaching our children neoliberal mindset is its own form of abuse.
Whenever you say that you have to do something, whether it’s running an errand or going to dinner at Grandma’s house, you imply that you’re being forced to do things you don’t want to do. Instead, show your kids that you’re in control of your own time: It’s up to you to decide what you’re going to do, as well as when and how you’re going to do it.
I swear bro, capitalism totally isn’t coercive bro, trust me bro.
Instead, lie to your kids and pretend you’re in control of your own time: Make it seem as if it’s up to you to decide what you’re going to do, as well as when and how you’re going to do it.
Class oppression is just a negative mindset, sweaty. Don’t think of it as being exploited, think of it as being insploited, makes all the difference
I looked up some other stuff this contributor has written (because I apparently hate read articles to wake up in the morning) and this bit was just fucking gold:
Saying things like “we can’t afford new shoes like the other kids because we come from a poor background” reinforces to your child that most of life’s circumstances are out of their control. Kids who recognize their choices in life feel more confident in their ability to create a better future for themselves. Rather than allowing your kids to host pity parties or exaggerate their misfortunes, encourage them to take positive action (e.g., setting up a lemonade stand so they can save up to buy things they want or need). Kids who recognize their choices in life feel more confident in their ability to create a better future for themselves.
But like for real, that’s exactly what it is. Its one thing to teach your children to take out the trash, and another to teach them that they should actually really enjoy taking out the trash and brainwashing them into thinking they’re doing it because they’re choosing to do it and not because its on their list of chores and there are consequences if the work isn’t done. Its fucking gross.
Fellow parent here. This makes me want to write an article called “How To Brainwash Your Kids Into Little Communists.”
I remember back when I was more of a lib, I was definitely worried that my kids weren’t going to “make it” because as a petite bourgeois I could sense quite easily that the world ten or twenty years from now is going to be a lot worse than it is today. These lib parenting articles are one result of that anxiety, I think. If we aren’t part of the 1% in the Global North, we have to do absolutely everything perfectly in order to make sure that our kids have a shot of living decent lives…as the running dogs of the capitalists.
I remember being into the growth mindset. Don’t say: “you’re good at this,” say: “you practiced really hard,” etc., etc. Show that you can change yourself if you work hard enough. This kind of stuff was even posted around my kids’ elementary school and is probably still there. It’s not really that different from the liberal mentality floating around in the air when I was a kid, it’s just kind of more codified, I guess. I actually don’t totally disagree with it, I just think it’s absurd to expect people who are being crushed by capitalism to do anything except survive (and even them, so many people don’t make it no matter what they do). People who are into the growth mindset or similar meritocratic ideas seem to believe that everyone is just a monad floating in a vacuum, and that our connections to one another are mediated exclusively by the free market. There is no history, there are no material circumstances. Everyone everywhere starts life in exactly the same place, and if you can’t make it, then it’s because you’re lazy, or you just haven’t been given the right opportunity. Liberalism / fascism being exactly the same exhibit one zillion and three.
c/parenting when.
I definitely feel this, but I think abandoning the growth mindset completely is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. A lot of those think pieces took legitimate science and turned it into catch phrases. Having your kid see themselves as malleable and to challenge frustration with mor effort isn’t a bad thing. That said, I know it’s hard to teach that without playing into all this Protestant work ethic bullshit
So much this. I know for a fact my son is going to have hardships I didn’t and less opportunities then I did when he comes of age. Urgh…I don’t know how active c/parenting would be but I find myself often threading the needle between making sure he has the best opportunities within this system while also trying to remind myself its all fucking bullshit anyway and I don’t want him to think life is all competition and hustling for success, and I’d love to get views from fellow travelers trying to navigate hellworld also.
Jesus Christ.
OK. So normally, while I agree with most people’s take on the lib media bullshit, I find most HexBaron’s reactions to be hyperbolic.
But holy shit, fuck this article. As a dad, with kids, I’m totally outraged someone had the nerve to publish this. My dad never took me to Disney World for a vacation. Fuck no. We were beyond poor. And that’s this capitalistic system the world over. Like, most families cannot afford to ever go to Disney World; no amount of budgeting can fix that. Most families who do go to DW only ever go once (maybe twice tops) while the kids are living in the house. The baseline for a 4 person family to go to Disney is 5k. That’s the starting point.
This article only gets worse from there. Lie to your kid about your job! lol you fuckinkiddingme? If work was fun rich people would steal that from us too. Even if you like your job, there is way more shit you’d rather be doing unless you hate your kids.
I find most HexBaron’s reactions to be hyperbolic
Listen jack, teach your kids whatever dumb shit hexbear says
Good rule of thumb: teach your child to recognize what is and isn’t in their control. They will learn and apply coping techniques accordingly. If you can’t control something, you temper your emotions to make it bearable. If you can control something, you temper your emotions to make it possible to exert that control.
And then you have them participate in collective action. Show the that most of the things that are out of our control as individuals are in our control as a group. Fuck all this shit about “working together” being good for morale or whatever. No, working together is the means by which we control our lives when we otherwise couldn’t.
I feel like… We should just talk to kids like they’re normal human beings? With age appropriate language and yada yada, but still, you don’t need to use psychological Jedi mind tricks to help them become good people.
Try to explain to them how the world works the best you can, provide them as much attention and a stable healthy environment as you can, and the rest is out of our hands
In my experience that’s definitely the approach I keep going back to. Like…I’m not one of those people who wants to be a wet blanket on all the magic and I still support santa clause and the tooth fairy but honestly you can be pretty real when you’re connecting with your kids and explaining things to them. They’re actually really logical…but they usually lack the language to put everything in context. I guess a big part of the problem though is how many fucking adults in the western world especially are in outright denial about their own feelings/emotions and sense of obligations.
Believing in Santa is dope as a kid. But yeah, if a parent is able to be self-honest , it’s gonna be almost impossible to connect with with their children.
That said I’m not a parent. Maybe the best approach is putting on the wiggles all day idk
I guess a big part of the problem though is how many fucking adults in the western world especially are in outright denial about their own feelings/emotions and sense of obligations.
Yes yes yes. Parents use their kids as a crutch to avoid dealing with their own trauma and that’s where so much intergenerational trauma comes from
You have to thread the needle though. I tried treating my kids like I would treat anyone else (obviously, anyone that I liked and with age appropriate language like you said). It wasn’t until I went to counseling that I realized that a lot of the shit that I thought was condescending to do to children, they actually really got a lot out of. My issue was that my parents we’re terrified of me growing up so they treated me like a little kid for way too long, but despite that they were really stingy on praise because they were just super busy and by the time they got home they were exhausted and wanted to veg out in front of the tv for a while.
So I was repeating that with my kids and now I have to manually relearn basic skills for making my kid feel like they’re getting enough attention and that the good things they do are actually good. I was explaining when they were bad because that’s what you do with an adult who fucked up. But kids thrive on attention and will start to play dumb and act out more to get you to waste more time explaining so that you forget about following through on consequences. The ADHD brain is real.
Also, I initially was very candid with my kid about problems in my life. And eventually I ran into them being constantly stressed out to the point of not being able to function. Kids just can’t handle the amount of stress hat we do.
To an extent, it is indeed the job of parents to shield their kids from their own trauma and to let them get used to the world in small steps. And it’s also part of that job to cater to them (what I would have called manipulation before this). I understand a lot of people here have struggled with narcissistic parents and have put a lot of effort into not replicating those behaviors, so I wanna say I’m not encouraging abuse. Just doing my best to point out that it’s possible for the pendulum to swing in the other direction and for it to become neglect
But kids thrive on attention and will start to play dumb and act out more to get you to waste more time explaining so that you forget about following through on consequences.
This is incredibly true. To highlight: my son played dumb in kindergarten for the longest time and the teacher was getting a bit concerned at his reading progress. I thought we were doing fine but he did one 1 on 1 session and the teacher called me to tell that he actually needed to get moved to the advanced reading group and, she suspected, was playing dumb to get more attention from her. I noticed the same thing where he will often ‘forget’ words/letters during bed time reading because he wants me to read in the voices. Eventually I started just reading the stories to him at bed time again and having him practice reading in other times.
This is the constant issue and stressor with parenting though. Its not only ok indulge and cater/shelter to your children…its necessary
Like as a teacher I generally won’t get negative in front of my students, but that’s not because I’m trying to manipulate them into some bourgeoisie mindset of “Positive thinking will let me achieve anything!”, it’s because that’s a weird thing for a teachers to do and doesn’t fit the environment.
Also, indoctrinating students with Marxism always makes me feel positive.
But if I had a kid, I’d think it’s fine for them to see that I’m not always a positive go-getter, and sometimes I get negative as well. I wouldn’t put my burdons onto them, of course, but showing them how I deal with life seems like a good idea.
