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A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

theatlantic.com

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Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#181

Post by samatman »

hackeraccount wrote: post #139

We're all living that Asian family joke. Parents spend their whole lives waiting for their kids to thank you. Kids spend their whole lives waiting for their parent to say "I'm sorry." That said I've never felt that way about my Mom and Dad. I've faults and problems a plenty but I wouldn't ascribe any of that on them; indeed the best things about me seem to clearly come from them and the worst are just as clearly thin…

Yes, but for many of us in the West, without the tradition common to East and South Asians of reciprocal obligation.

This used to be nigh unto a human universal: your parents raise you up from a helpless infant to adulthood, and this obliges you to love and care for them for the rest of their lives.

I'm as deracinated Westerner as it comes, and yet I'm fairly traditional in this regard. I can think of three acceptable reasons to estrange from parents: sexual abuse, severe physical abuse, and the parents disowning the child. Even the second one leaves a lot of room for reconciliation, since they can't hurt you anymore.

I mean, easy for me to say, my parents easily earned a B+ and I was able to work out my teen angst with my father by my mid twenties. Still: casually abandoning "honor thy father and thy mother" doesn't seem to be working out very well for us.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#182

Post by jrumbut »

tablespoon wrote: post #121
nsxwolf wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few years back there was a movement on Facebook with groups called "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" and similar that encouraged people to cut off their parents. It seemed wildly popular and had tons of engagement. People would diagnose their parents with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, discuss how every problem in their lives could be traced to their parents, and that was that. I've also saw more than one per…

> A few years back there was a movement on Facebook with groups called "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" and similar that encouraged people to cut off their parents.... > I've also saw more than one person disown their parents after being sucked in to the anticircumcision movement - men who had until that moment seemingly normal lives but were then convinced their sex lives would never reach their potential because…

What's weird is some of these communities aren't even wrong, a lot of people do have parents with personality problems or whatever, it's just their nature to go off the rails and have unpleasant real world effects.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#183

Post by weregiraffe »

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.

    They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had

    And add some extra, just for you.
But they were fucked up in their turn

    By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern

    And half at one another’s throats.
Man hands on misery to man.

    It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,

    And don’t have any kids yourself.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#184

Post by ellyagg »

GavinMcG wrote: post #146
wonderwonder wrote: post #36

Wonder how much of this is driven by social media and the internet today. The word 'Toxic' is just thrown around now and everything is 'Toxic'. Its a word that has ceased to have any real meaning but virtually every behavior that used to just be normal every day activity is Toxic. Everyone has flaws and no one has all the answers. Parents are just people doing the best they can and for the most part making what they…

"Toxic" is just a catchier-sounding synonym for "harmful." It doesn't imply intent — in fact, that's one of its strengths, and one of the major components in the shift in the way we collectively talk about things over the past couple decades. Part of the conversation around race, for example, has been an awareness by more and more people that unintentional harms are far more prevalent than intentional ones, and in to…

It's not "just" anything and it's definitely not just catchier. Toxic is a far more forceful word that is often used to convey more force than is deserved for the situation. It steals discussion territory without justifying its claims. It's a bit like a clickbaity headline.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#186

Post by nate_meurer »

iammisc wrote: post #64
michaelscott wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the article is talking about estrangement proper, where children and parents do not talk to each other at all, not that they engage but sometimes don't understand one another. The former is more serious, the latter is expected.

I don't think I understand that either. My view of family is definitely one of obligation not understanding.

It sounds like you had a decent family, but are you able to see that your experience isn't universal? Can you imagine that many other people have vastly worse families, with a wide range of abusive and predatory behaviors?

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#187

Post by vkou »

dktoao wrote: post #163
pseudalopex wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

4. Abuse. Did you mean they aren't actually new?

I think they meant that their examples are things that would have been "shoved under the rug" or hidden in the past and are no longer taboo. If you were gay in 1900 you hid it, if you are gay in 2020 you are out (usually). Abuse may consist of a lot of things, but using physical abuse as an example. If you beat your kids (more than just spanking) in 1900 it was still taboo (but maybe less so)

I think your view of the past is colored by 21-st century social norms.

In 1900, a husband beating his wife wasn't even illegal in most of the world. [1] Beating children and other animals would barely even register as unusual.

[1] It wasn't practically illegal in most of the US, both on the state & federal level until the late 20th century - https://www.cji.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/domestic_abus...

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#188

Post by birdyrooster »

tablespoon wrote: post #121
nsxwolf wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few years back there was a movement on Facebook with groups called "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" and similar that encouraged people to cut off their parents. It seemed wildly popular and had tons of engagement. People would diagnose their parents with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, discuss how every problem in their lives could be traced to their parents, and that was that. I've also saw more than one per…

> A few years back there was a movement on Facebook with groups called "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" and similar that encouraged people to cut off their parents.... > I've also saw more than one person disown their parents after being sucked in to the anticircumcision movement - men who had until that moment seemingly normal lives but were then convinced their sex lives would never reach their potential because…

Also their congregation creates the conditions for other similar types of thinking and cross pollination of other niche ideas which explains Q-like, super-conspiracy groups that are like a rotating prix fixe menu of paranoid nativist memes and fit neatly adjacent to neo-nazi, sovereign citizen, and even incel movements.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#189

Post by vineyardmike »

shagie wrote: post #143
wonderwonder wrote: post #36

Wonder how much of this is driven by social media and the internet today. The word 'Toxic' is just thrown around now and everything is 'Toxic'. Its a word that has ceased to have any real meaning but virtually every behavior that used to just be normal every day activity is Toxic. Everyone has flaws and no one has all the answers. Parents are just people doing the best they can and for the most part making what they…

> The word 'Toxic' is just thrown around now and everything is 'Toxic'. Its a word that has ceased to have any real meaning but virtually every behavior that used to just be normal every day activity is Toxic. I've been tempted to write a blog post "Toxic Considered Harmful" One of the biggest problems with the toxic label is there isn't anything that can be said in response. Its an attempt to get sympathy and/or end…

> It is often incredibly difficult to refute someone making a claim that something is toxic

Perhaps a lot of the "toxic things" are subjective based on someones experience, so there is not much to refute.

If someone says the way they were treated by another was toxic, who are you to refute its toxicity? People tend to be able to understand how some thing affects them and if it is good for them.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#190

Post by antattack »

nsxwolf wrote: post #62
wonderwonder wrote: post #36

Wonder how much of this is driven by social media and the internet today. The word 'Toxic' is just thrown around now and everything is 'Toxic'. Its a word that has ceased to have any real meaning but virtually every behavior that used to just be normal every day activity is Toxic. Everyone has flaws and no one has all the answers. Parents are just people doing the best they can and for the most part making what they…

A few years back there was a movement on Facebook with groups called "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" and similar that encouraged people to cut off their parents. It seemed wildly popular and had tons of engagement. People would diagnose their parents with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, discuss how every problem in their lives could be traced to their parents, and that was that. I've also saw more than one per…

As the saying goes:

The apple never falls far from the tree.

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