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American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

qz.com

141–150 of 172 posts

Re: American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

#141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So no, and you will just continue with the condescending assumption that anyone questioning you doesn't know anything?

I'm not sure how you would like me to answer false assertions? Especially since my post is clearly about people with a mortgage (as is the book I recommended). The best I can do is point you in the right direction to properly educate yourself.

Personal finance books are often a lot of garbage with a little bit of wisdom thrown in that requires effort to extract.

http://badmoneyadvice.com/2009/03/whats-wrong-with-the-milli...

Re: American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

#142
post #3

While I think his insights on how we treat our children is amazingly insightful, and I love how it's described as a religion (the point that children are our sacred cows is very good in particular) his attempt to relate it to marriages seems shoehorned at best. There's a lot of problems with the way we treat children, but I think it's relation to marriage is the least of our issues. But seriously, the whole "children…

I don't think he's being insightful at all. All his observations seem to be shallow and his conclusions are weak. > parenthood became a religion in America...Nothing in life is allowed to be more important than our children...a human achieves its peak value at birth and declines thereafter Most Americans tend to believe their children come first. This isn't a religion, it's an evolutionary instinct. A species can't c…

> I don't think he's being insightful at all. All his observations seem to be shallow and his conclusions are weak.

Thank you; you put it better than I could.

A small example that demolishes his crackpot theory: we just had a kid a few weeks ago. We have a cat, who has never been around children, and who has never had children. And yet, when the child cries, the cat comes running; and if the cries do not subside soon enough, she'll start howling. And then there's this example: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30893297

Is the cat following some religion too? Hogwash.

Re: American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

#143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Ultimately, I lump all these social and parental problems down to Political Correctness. For the nay sayers, you can treat people with respect and not be PC. PC is a set of perverted rules that bully people into what to think. I have been told, "You can't say that, we have to be open minded here" when expressing the belief that political correctness does more to damage discourse than almost any other idea in weste…

Isn't the perverse fairness of giving equal time to clearly unequal opinions (/science/facts/etc) worse discourse than political correctness? Of course PC can and does wade into over sensitivity but it also includes the idea that you should err on the side of safety when using words that can be terribly hurtful to some people. It's not our place to decide that it's not in fact hurtful.

Yes, the idea that we must be fair to all opinions, no matter how silly, is also a bad one.

Re: American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

#144

I agreed with pretty much everything until the following: "Mothers are also holy in a way that fathers are not expected to be. Mothers live in a clean, cheerful world filled with primary colors and children’s songs, and they don’t think about sex. A father could admit to desiring his wife without seeming like a distracted parent, but society is not as willing to cut Ms. Waldman that same slack. It is unseemly for a m…

I'm not sure your observation is at odds with the assertion made here. We could sexualize mothers while keeping the taboo on mothers themselves being sexual i.e. desiring sex. In fact, the sexualization could even feed off that very taboo.

Re: American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

#148
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thought the sample of college graduates vs. all 22 year olds are a little different. All babies will turn into all 22 year olds. Only some babies will turn into college graduates. Therefore some of a population, if selected artificially (i.e. college graduates) will always be better than the whole population (i.e. all babies.)

Hate to be that person, but it is true that most babies will turn into all 22 year olds.

[deleted]

Re: American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

#149
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thought the sample of college graduates vs. all 22 year olds are a little different. All babies will turn into all 22 year olds. Only some babies will turn into college graduates. Therefore some of a population, if selected artificially (i.e. college graduates) will always be better than the whole population (i.e. all babies.)

Hate to be that person, but it is true that most babies will turn into all 22 year olds.

You are correct.

Re: American parenting is killing the American marriage (2014)

#150
post #46
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thought the sample of college graduates vs. all 22 year olds are a little different. All babies will turn into all 22 year olds. Only some babies will turn into college graduates. Therefore some of a population, if selected artificially (i.e. college graduates) will always be better than the whole population (i.e. all babies.)

College graduates are "better" than the whole population? Wow. I completely disagree and as a college graduate I would never say something like that.

Are you objecting on the grounds that this speech is offensive to non-graduates or that it's generally not the case given the context?

A test statement may be: A certain population is at the top of the IQ bell curve therefore they are smarter.

The IQ bell curve being the context.

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