You "fixed" my post by substituting "kill people with your bare hands" for "parenting?"

Hmmm.

If I write "in the equation 2x = 6, x = 3,"
you respond by saying "yeah, but if x= -5 then your equation fails, ha ha ha!!!"

Brilliant.

But one of the benefits to having raised children is learning to anticipate how childish minds work. So, I anticipate that you're next intellectual step is to say, "No, no, 'kill people with your bare hands' DOES work in your post, don't you see, it does, it does!!!"

No, child, it doesn't. Killing people with your bare hands won't help you understand your parents, unless maybe they were bare hand killers.

What people can learn from parenting dwarfs other experiences. Parenting is one of the most fundamental of human activities.

Going to China might give you a fuller life. Fighting in Iraq might. Almost any new and challenging experiences might. We all have the vagaries of our individual existences which make us unique. We each do a lot of different things, and necessarily fail to do most things.

But because parenting is so fundamental to human existence, it is overwhelmingly necessary if you are to understand what human existence is about, and your own most important relationships, your own history.

If beings from another dimension came here and wanted to experience what it is to be human, they'd surely say "let us first be children, then parents, because these humans are creatures which, most fundamentally, are first children to parents, then parents to children. That's certainly how they exist. As far as we can observe, that's also why."

But if you want, stick to giggling at such brilliance as "substituting 'killing' for 'parenting' makes his post fail!"

That you think such drivel is humourous tells us all you certainly haven't undergone the maturation parenting sometimes brings about.

Hopefully it's not too late to delete that.

Rational thought.

Are you talking about those who don't parent? You certainly could be, don't you think? And if it isn't clear from your writing which side your on or what point your making ... it's worthless writing.

Does "too often" mean they can sometimes do this and it's okay? And you say 'parents.' Non-parents never grant themselves ... You never do? I mean, besides in your post?


I never said it took kids to drag me kicking and screaming into sympathy with the world. What I said was, kids put life in your life. And they do. If you ever have any, you'll understand. Until then, you'll be ignorant.

Your inability to have sympathy for that part of the world which has moved past childless adulthood exposes your ignorance. I do have sympathy for those who don't parent, and that sympathy and understanding is clear from my post. No such sympathy and understanding is to be found from you, however.

Which is my point. I can understand and appreciate childless adulthood because I've lived it. You can't understand or appreciate parenting because you haven't lived it.

Uh, that's what I said. Glad you agree. Wish you would read better, instead of merely emotionalistically reacting.

Again, please, if you're going to respond to a post, read the post. Show me where I said parenting gives me the most satisfaction in life, and I'll never post here again. Fail to show that, and you never post here again. Deal?

What are you talking about? Are you trying to point out that everything in life is a gamble? That crossing the road, or not, is a gamble? That buying a lottery ticket, or not, is a gamble?

Explain, please, how parenting is more of a gamble than not-parenting?

"You're gambling the life of a baby too."

As opposed to, what, not even giving the baby a life?

But let's not go off on an abortion tangent. The topic is raising kids, not making them. You can do one without the other.

I only read a few sentences of your rant against me, and right after your rant against AirshipOhio, that was enough for me. I decline to participate in that sort of exchange.

Generally we don't do that sort of thing in the Lounge, but have at it if you like. I just don't think it's productive or has an adult tone.

Of course you don't. Until you've parented, you don't know what you don't know about it. That's true of many things. But it isn't true of not parenting. Almost all parents have been childless adults.

No. Those activities you've quoted, first of all, aren't excluded by parenting, and secondly, aren't any where near so fundamental to the human experience as parenting.

We can only be three things in life. Children, childless adults, parenting adults. Having only been two of those three can not possibly lead to as full a life as having been all of those three. Indeed, until you've been all three, you can't even understand the other two. You won't have perspective.

There's an old saying I'm going to butcher here, something to the effect, "he who only knows England, doesn't England know."

Of course you don't feel you're not a whole human being. How could you know you aren't one, until you become one? No matter how often I point out that experiences [childhood, childless adulthood, parenthood] are greater than just [childhood, childless adulthood] alone, if you want, you can deny it. You don't have to admit that 3>2.

That you don't see a benefit in parenting doesn't mean there isn't one. I had trouble convincing my kids there was a benefit to math.

And I didn't "decide" to have kids, btw. Not the first one, anyway.

I'm running out of steam here.

You're all so hurt by what I now understand is a monumental insult (or is interpreted as such): my statement that you need to parent to have lived a full life.

Because of this hurt, your emotionalism leads to defensive justification of your choice to skip parenting. And, because you're ignorant (by definition) of what parenting is, you (ignorantly) equate it to such relative trivialities as travel. How could you not?

Anyone's life is fuller for the greater experiences in it (although depth of experience is just as key as breadth; "touristing" around the world isn't necessarily much more of an experience than watching Travel Channel).

The question is one of weight. Is it possible to weight experiences?

Is it fair to say that being a child is such an important stage of human life, that if a person suddenly appeared fully grown, we'd all say that this person has had less than the full human experience, less than a full life, no matter how many jobs or adventures or whatever he later has?

And can you then see that second only to being a child to those parenting, in the pantheon of common and key human experiences, is parenting a child?

Most of those who parent, tell you this. None of those who haven't parented, can know of this.

You haven't parented. How can you know what it entails? How can you know its benefits?

I was a happy childless single, for many years. I know of what it entails. I know its benefits.

And, having lived both ways, I'm telling you: Being a human who has been a childless adult AS WELL AS a human who has parented GREATLY outweighs, in life experience and education, the life of someone who has only had the former experience, and not also the latter.

It isn't any more complicated than that. It's so simple, in fact, that I'm going to let this thread go.

YOU ranted. I responded. Nothing in my OP was directed at you personally. Everything in your response was directed at me personally.

And, "that sort of thing" that you accuse me of doing, you were in fact doing yourself. Which is incredibly childish of you. Please stop.

For starters, I didn't tourist around the world. I lived all over the place. I also own my own business, and have been self-employed for many years. I can use your bizzare gradation on anything. For self-employment: haven't had a job yet; had a job; don't deal with a job. I guess I couldn't understand employment until I left? Or that an employee is less whole than me? LOL, I deserve to get slapped for that attitude.

This thread has become so unlounge-like...do we really need a "Dont want to deal with dids but still want to argue" sub-forum?

A more apt analogy would be that you said "x + y = 6; therefore x = 2." You offered an opinion about something. It is not a question that is subject to a scientific analysis; it can only be an opinion. And yet, you claimed to have the correct answer.

So on what authority do you make your claims? Why is your assertion that x = 2 any more or less legitimate than x = 3, or my (mock) assertion that you can never truly know life unless you kill people with your bare hands?


This comes across as an attack, because I for one don't see any overt emotionalism in my incredibly brilliant and apt original message itt.

See my line of reasoning above, re: I could claim that you only feel that parenthood is of ultimate import or meaning because you feel inadequate and are desperate to justify your existence in some way, or any other thing I feel like making up. And barring the presentation of any data or facts, how can you dismiss my opinion-claims, and at the same time, declare that your own opinion-claims are facts (and anyone who doesn't agree is emotionally entangled in the question, defensive, ignorant, immature, etc.).

Above all, let's keep it civil, and if you really want to go into the nitty gritty then start a thread in SMP. But in SMP, you will probably run into more than just 2 people jumping on you about passing off these kinds of bad arguments as incontrovertible facts.

Finally, and this is really the most crucial issue, my first message itt is hilarious! If it wasn't just so repetitive, I'd go back and read it for a 3rd time right now.

I never endorsed that sentiment. I agree with the idea that it is an individual good, and the reaction to having a child (and the ramifications of it) are definitely not universal. However, I understand what MrMore is saying. I never wanted kids until I had them; the fact is, with most people, they do drastically alter your perspective and enrich your life, even if you think, as you do now, that you will find more trouble than joy in them. I have known many who have had children after saying for years they didn't want any (my wife is one of those people, as well as myself), and none have regretted it. And that is a perspective that a non-parent cannot say they possess, no matter how one wishes to intellectualize the idea. Taking that as "high-horse" condescension, or as some back-slapping self delusion, as some here have done, is some pretty slippery accusation. Certainly, some parents claim a moral or intellectual superiority, but that's true of non-parents, as well.

That said, I don't really feel sorry for people who don't have kids. There are other experiences in life that have a richness that parenting does not provide. There are many who have a full life without them, and many parents whose lives lack fulfillment despite the presence of children. .

Nor does that mean that those who choose not to have kids are "wrong" or "unnatural", somehow denying a primal urge that they would do better to acquiesce to. Or that every human is incapable of regretting to have kids. Some, I would guess, feel that way.

All of which are selfish acts, no matter what their utility. Not one of those things is geared toward the best interests of the prospective child. "Historically, and all around the world today", children are conceived to assuage a selfish impulse.

Like I said, parenting is a whole 'nother thing. Parenting is the result of transcending that selfish conceptual urge. Or, rather, "good parenting" is the result.

Now I gotta look up airship's response and see if it really was all that insightful and funny.

I don't really think that. I think that I am not in a position in life to care for them responsibly. If anything, I think I would find more joy in them than they would in me, at least in the long run, if my financial situation doesn't improve.

It can also be a predictable process of denial that would never be necessary.

I recall most if not all remarks to that effect being qualified rather than absolute.

I haven't seen it done regarding their status of non-parents, myself. I've heard it, and expect to hear it in the future, from parents by virtue of their mere parenthood, too many times to count.

Sounds fair.


But none of them are what you claimed they were -- acts born out of some sort of primal joy in it or whatever. Having kids, like getting married, has had and always will have many motivations. Yours acknowledged the more romantic ones alone.

Sometimes.

Sometimes. It's certainly lovely to think of it as something transcending ... something. Sometimes it's just a practical matter. Often it's done by rote. Sometimes it is handed off to the help. Sometimes it is handed off to the wife and fathers barely know their kids. That latter doesn't strike me as terribly rare in western society. My own half-brother told my stepfather he thought of him as an absentee father. I told him he didn't know how lucky he had it because in my case he was all too present, but that's another story.

Tell me you read the part about murdering people with your bare hands and teenagers being difficult and didn't at least get a little tickle or smirk out of the juxtaposition and appropriateness of the FYP there.

tylerg's post about the "overwhelming majority of parents" may be qualified, but it aspires to the same effect as an absolute.

Virtually every post in this thread, those on both sides of the coin, is written in absolutes, with some kind of assumed universality.

Maybe we're hearing what we want. I hear that obnoxious "it just wouldn't be fair for me to have children" line, with the requisite condescension and judgment, quite a bit, and not simply in response to queries about why one has no children, but as tacit accusation.

For the record, I see your point about parents. I love kids, but, as a rule, find parents insufferable. But, had they no children, I would find them equally insufferable about some other selfish garbage, their pet or their fantasy football team or whatever. I love kids because they haven't reached that "age of insufferabilty", yet. But I don't find parenthood to be the trigger, at least not as readily as non-parents seem to.

We may be getting into semantic nit land, here, but at the very basest level, all were selfish act aimed at that acquisition of some primal relief (I don't think "joy" is the right word).

And all of those motivations are selfish acts. Selfless acts are only required and acted upon to maintain the selfish satisfaction attained by those acts. Again, semantic nit land, so I'll shut up about it.

No, sir, I laughed out loud.

I dunno, I'm not responsible for any posts but mine, but my impression of that wasn't so strong. The "maybe you should wait for kids" side is less absolute pretty much by definition, isn't it?

I don't follow you here. How can someone talking about their personal decisions and saying that dismissing them as ignorant or foolish is misguided be something that comes with requisite condescension and judgment? Isn't it the other way around? Isn't someone who takes his experience and ideas as universally applicable and inherently superior the one who is striking a pose and copping an attitude?

I don't see what you're talking about happening here. I've never seen it happen in real life, either. But I do see the opposite. Both in this thread and in real life.

I like kids too, quite a lot. They're often worth a lot more than their parents (while being much easier to kidnap) and far better company. I sometimes find myself hoping their parents won't limit them or mold them too much in their likeness.

Parents can try to mold kids but it doesn't usually work. I'm having a hard time thinking of anyone I know who grew up to be like their parents.

I can think of many. I think home schooling increases the chances dramatically, because you have fewer conflicting points of view brought into a child's life, and fewer chances for her to see that many people with opinions she may have never expected or had been told were wrong or terrible are actually quite confoundingly nice and reasonable people. I knew a lot of born agains growing up, and let's just say a very solid number of them grew up quite uptight. I knew a gigantic number of racists growing up and they got that way because their parents taught that to them too. I've known plenty of people who have swallowed their parents' political beliefs hook, line, and sinker. I've known plenty of Asian girl children who must have learned to be incredibly, seemingly quite unnaturally shy and quiet, from somewhere, because none of the kids of other races was anything like that. I've known weird or awkward parents who have had weird or awkward kids. I've known lowlife parents who raised lowlife kids. I've known bright and happy parents with all the possibilities of the world open before them who have raised bright and happy kids with all the possibilities of the world open before them.

Also, if you don't think a kid is like his parents, come back in 20 years and you might see a much-increased resemblance. They say the acorn rarely falls far from the tree. It might for a while, though, and on the surface.

This is amazingly funny.

Jeez I hope smug self-righteousness isn't genetically transmitted.

amen.

I´m pretty sure by now that MrMore is leveling.

I doubt this. Every generation bemoans the behavior of the next generation. I think this has more to do with getting older, poor memories and romanticizing the past than it does to actual changes in behavior.

That's not to say that certain behavior might be more endemic now than before; but I would characterize it more as a variation of bad behavior, rather than a downward spiral to worst behavior.

By the way, this thread reminds me of a great "All in the Family" episode, where Mike and Gloria debate the morality of having a kid in a world rife with problems, including over-population. (In the 70s, we used to hear more about over-population than we seem to now.)

I think the matter was resolved with one character saying something to the effect of, "what if your kid grows up to be the one to SOLVE some of those terrible problems?"

It was a glib way of ending the debate, but not bad for a 30 minute sitcom.

Every generation is right, too. We have become a much less formal society, with looser boundaries and slacker manners every generation. It would take an ignorance of history to think otherwise. Before Dr. Spock's baby book came out, people didn't twice about swatting kids, or yelling at them either, unless it was done unfairly or got carried away. It wasn't an essential evil in and of itself; that thought would have been considered more or less an absurdity to the average parent. Compare to today. Kids were also vastly better behaved in public and toward their elders. And when they weren't, you could expect a swat from a stranger as much as from your parents, and no one would blink an eye. Parents took personal responsibility for and were shamed by the behavior of their children in public. Times have inarguably and significantly changed.

I wonder how the notion could come about that such clear differences could be spoken of as a false memory. Is it possible that could only be done by those too young to be the holders of those memories themselves?

Personally, I don't find discipline romantic. It's often uncaring, blinkered, and overbearing. It is never pleasant to enact. My stepfather used to say, "Children should be seen and not heard," which I find a disgusting notion. Discipline is certainly practical when done with care, though, and as necessary as good manners to a civil public sphere.

Well, call me ignorant as much as you like, but I do not think your conclusions are so obvious. It's true that in the US, over the last 50 years, corporal punishment has decreased. But it is a leap to assume that kids are now worse behaved or that parents take less responsibility for such behavior now.

Besides, it might be useful to specify what time periods we're talking about. Are you only looking at the behavior and conduct of Americans this century, or contemplating a broader context, as I was?

I'm no spring chicken here. Age is not the reason I beg to disagree.

I'm tempted to disagree with your definition of "romantic," but I don't think it would further our discussion. My point is simply that every generation has a tendency to believe that things were "better" in their day. So, when I hear the common refrain that "kids behave worse" nowadays, I don't necessarily believe it, notwithstanding that it may be a common perception.