Taking sides: Children vs. (non-human) animals

Or similarly overgrown babies

we have a friend whose son has ADHD and perhaps other issues not yet diagnosed and sometimes he acts out. at our school, her son was acting out one morning and she had to overhear another couple parents talking loudly, saying things like "What is WRONG with that kid?" and the like. i think she often feels pretty helpless in the face of it, just both dealing w/her son as a single mom and dealing w/judgmental strangers.

tonight i was looking through some of our family photos over the past year. my sons are very young, ages 4 and almost 2, so they have changed physically and developmentally a substantial amount in one year. it occurred to me that one of the reasons i felt so emotionally invested in responding in this thread is that, ultimately, to me, children are innately fascinating. by observing and spending time with them, i gain understandings about the ways in which we learn, develop, and form fundamental assumptions about basically anything - relationships, ourselves, the physical world, cause and effect, trust, pain, love, anger, whatever, anything. this is kind of related to what local garda was saying about kids displaying adults' best or worst traits but it is more about just being curious about and interested in how we develop those traits, form those values, build those assumptions. when i talk to my son about something - whether about why it gets cold in the winter, what death and dying are, what it means when we cook with salt instead of sugar, or why his brother gets angry and cries when he hits him, we are discussing fundamental concepts and he is forming those assumptions and developing knowledge for the first time in his life. at a basic human level i cannot understand how someone could be so uncurious about or disinterested in talking with or spending time with children when that awareness and appreciation comes so easily from doing so. i know that sounds harsh - i realize i was/am taking some perhaps very strident moral positions in response to a hyperbolic message board post. i don't want this to be a moral argument. i'm also a little baked right now. but, like, is the birth, growth and aging process of humans, their emotional, cognitive, physical, and personal development, not fundamentally interesting to you in some kind of way?

i understand not feeling comfortable spending a lot of time with them and maybe being irritated by them in certain social situations, i definitely am. when my kids finally fall asleep at the end of the day it is honestly something i feel relieved about daily, without exception. it is a lot of work to be around them. i relish moments when i can talk to another adult or enjoy a meal at a restaurant without interruption. but, like, spending time with kids helps me reflect on and be aware of fundamental aspects of being human, that are as meaningful and important as, say, talking with and offering support to a friend whose mother is dying from breast cancer, to cite the example mentioned earlier in which a toddler interrupts the conversation.

they are also really cute in the same way that puppies are ffs

That's a great post, marcos.

^^

its a nice post but its a bit omg the wonder of being a parent which yknow fair enough.

it doesnt really address THE ISSUES

I'm 47 and my wife and I never had kids, and certainly I find *infants* exasperating to be around at times, but many of my friends have raised kids who are now graduating from high school, or are in high school now, and it's been really interesting to see them discover the world as they've grown up. And we have other friends who have all recently had their first children so the whole thing starts again.

One of the most amazing child-related things I saw recently: I play guitar in a cover band, and our singer Josh has a little girl about 2 years old. Josh's wife brought her to one of our recent shows. They sat at a table right up front, and Jordan was amazingly well behaved. But not just that, she sat there and watched her dad sing like he was God Himself. She was in absolute awe of her father, like maybe he had *invented* music. It was fascinating to play while watching her watch him.

by observing and spending time with them, i gain understandings about the ways in which we learn, develop, and form fundamental assumptions about basically anything - relationships, ourselves, the physical world, cause and effect, trust, pain, love, anger, whatever, anything.

i gain understanding about these things from observing and spending time with (and talking to) adults, which...p much goes for the rest of your post too? fully-grown humans are really fascinating to learn about. what i'm saying is i don't get why there's any more ~wonderment in engaging with children than with people who have been and are still being shaped by the world, and who can actually articulate that

I feel the opposite of lex, dogs seem like such a pain compared to children, and they're guaranteed to die within like what 15 years?

and such small portions etc

at this point i'm not 100% certain lex knows where adults come from

Lex, I think you are drastically overestimating the malleability of adults.

which is a source of some wonderment itt, you have to admit

at this point i'm not 100% certain lex knows where adults come from

i don't see what relevance it has? i am interested in food, i am interested to know from a distance where it comes from, i have no interest in actually physically being on a farm.

Lex, I think you are drastically overestimating the malleability of adults.

malleability isn't what necessarily interests me about adults tho. i'm not especially invested in shaping them.

Good recent posts, I feel better now than I did before, sometimes anxiety can be overwhelming! I have limited reserves!

i am all for lex hating kids. sheesh, let the guy hate kids.

this thread got long! don't know if i can read it all.

i think we can all agree that people who REALLY love dogs want to have sex with dogs though, right?

Woofbert Woofbert

Somebody up the road from me actually got convicted for getting Hot under the Collie :p

Man's best friend with benefits

bad parenting -vs- people who want to control and dominate and yell at their captive dogs every day

i mean people legally get to walk around in public with a living creature on a leash and they are constantly yelling at and choking these innocent creatures. closet nazis, if you ask me. or maybe not even so closeted.

but those fuzzy little guys are cute. don't get me wrong. BAD DOG!

i gain understanding about these things from observing and spending time with (and talking to) adults, which...p much goes for the rest of your post too? fully-grown humans are really fascinating to learn about. what i'm saying is i don't get why there's any more ~wonderment in engaging with children than with people who have been and are still being shaped by the world, and who can actually articulate that

― lex pretend, Thursday, December 15, 2016 8:42 AM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i agree with that! the wonderment specific to children though is that formation is in its nascent stage and it is way more dramatic because those basic assumptions that adults often take for granted are still being questioned and developed. adult humans obviously can do that too. but to brush off that development happening in kids bc you can just say "oh that's true for adults too" i think is missing something very important about childhood.

also kids CAN articulate that!!! my 4-year-old (and just about any other verbal kid that i know, really) ) asks remarkably sophisticated questions about the world and shares insights that most adults might take for granted. talking to him about stuff is obviously different than talking to an adult but imo is not any less interesting. children are incredibly articulate about things if you meet them where they're at.

Parents vs. animal owners would be a funny poll.

I suspect lex got caught in a negative feedback loop in his interactions with and thoughts about kids and has not been yet forced into a position of intimacy with a child sufficient to break that negative cycle. He expects the worst and finds it.

Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe vs. Old Macdonald

also kids CAN articulate that!!! my 4-year-old (and just about any other verbal kid that i know, really) ) asks remarkably sophisticated questions about the world and shares insights that most adults might take for granted. talking to him about stuff is obviously different than talking to an adult but imo is not any less interesting. children are incredibly articulate about things if you meet them where they're at.

― marcos, Thursday, 15 December 2016 18:36 (forty-five minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

again this is nice but imma say right now that no yr four year old does not converse at the level of a sophisticated adult

that is not what he said

and i mean caveat im sure you have a bright kid and good conversations with same etc

xp its not what he was asked either tho!

nb im nkt v invested here but its a strange thread for parents to double down on the wonderment of parenthood iycwim

takes the ile hivemind off trump for a few hours

xp its not what he was asked either tho!

he was not asked a question, do keep up

to sum up my position (for those who care); parenting is a trip, non-parents will never really understand it, lex is a clown the end

has not been yet forced into a position of intimacy with a child

please rephrase this

not all intimacy is sexual, dan

children ask very basic questions for sure

i mean parents seem to get something more out of them because of context -- the parent-child relationship

so they read into these simple questions extravagant metaphors and philosophical inquiries

but a kid basically just worries when he will eat, when he will poop, and what game s/he's playing next, but for a brief second asks why little jimmy can't play with a kid, parent says some half-truth, and thinks deeply about race relationships and injustices in the world, then drives away in their hybrid/gas-guzzling car

but a kid basically just worries when he will eat, when he will poop, and what game s/he's playing next

this is not accurate ime

i love basic questions so much

the best is hearing what answers dads give on the street

theyre not capable of thinking in complex ways due to their lack of real life experience

you can talk to them about social justice, the environment, equality, but it ends there. their reactions cannot be compared to an adult and are scientifically primitive

children are megalomaniacs and thinking contrary to that sounds pretty silly

^ Yeah, but plenty of adults don't know what the fuck they're talking about. I side with Laurie Anderson on that one

I don't get why you are equating complex thinking with political issues

xp

but an adult surely has more potential of life experience than someone who has been alive, say, 5 years

xp

their frame of reference is more limited, but there is a lot of complex thinking that goes on within that

xp

i never really thought about kids until i had kids. i didn't know many kids. none of my friends had kids. the first time i ever held a baby was when we had a baby. didn't come from a family with lots of kids. i know more kids now obviously. they're okay. most of them are pretty boring. i like my kids because that's how it works. i am definitely more sympathetic towards parents and more tolerant when i see/hear kids acting up or screaming or babies crying or whatever. they don't bother me. because i've been there.

children are emotionally underdeveloped

you want them to talk deep about what it feels that they can't eat an extra cookie? or that they accidentally peed/pooped their pants?

there is no complex thinking a child can produce because of limited and less varied experiences. their world is too highly controlled

put a baby on a rooftop and s/he will kill her/himself

Things kids are often v interested in exploring/talking about that def involve complex thinking: the natural environment, mechanical processes, basic physics, animals, the list is p long. Limiting complexity to the vagaries of human social constructs is p arbitrary.

put a baby on a rooftop and s/he will kill her/himself

but teach a baby to fish

what age are these pooping kids anyway? two?

i realize the FA symbol person is being silly, but is he/she talking about toddlers? i guess he/she must be. since he/she is talking about babies on rooftops.

yeah idk