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A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

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Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#641

Post by gls2ro »

jkhdigital wrote: post #559
avidiax wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's definitely not a coincidence, but it is certainly complicated. Damaged kids become damaged adults, and if they realize it, they may decide that they wouldn't be good parents and rightly opt-out of it. Children that didn't have the right opportunities, whether that's their parent's fault or not may not have enough achievement as an adult to take on the burden of being a parent. One can argue whether it is harder…

> Damaged kids become damaged adults I strongly disagree with this overbroad generalization. > you can't argue that being a parent requires lots of resources in both time and money, and if you don't have both, it's the right choice to not be a parent. I would be happy to argue this. Raising children is the most essentially human experience one can have. A society with fewer parents is a society well on its way to nih…

Damaged kids become damaged adults which will raise damaged kids. Of course we can add a word to express that this should not be applied to individual but only to a group: like "Majority of damaged kids become ..." and of course it really depends what people mean when they say "damaged".

If that means trauma, then there is this concept of "Transgeneration transmission of trauma" not in terms of epigenetics (as this has not been proven yet), but in terms of behaviour of adults transmits trauma verbally and non-verbally to the child. I think this also applied to a whole range of responses/believes about how we approach life in general which is transmitted from parents to child. Yes, also the child has their own personality and might not be influenced that much, but nurture is pretty powerful especially in the forming years.

Not sure this is a 100% proven mechanisms in psychology (replicated and understood) but I can easily identify in my kid things that I wish I fix for myself and I see this in other parents with kids too.

I also think a child is a very powerful chance to change myself as kids can really be (specially when they are young and copy their parents) mirrors of their parents thus making identifying these mechanisms easily.

I am thankful that I think there are a lot of things that I caught early on, did a lot of work to fix them and managed not to transmit to the child.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#643

Post by bwilli123 »

jgilias wrote: post #285

When I was around twenty my Mom used to call me every other day or so just to have a chat. One day, after she asked me how my day was, I shot back something along the lines of: "I don't have anything to tell you, really. You're calling so often that nothing new manages to happen in between the calls." So, she stopped calling. I would go home every other week as usual and everything seemed fine. It was only much later…

...I've long since retired, my son's moved away I called him up just the other day I said, I'd like to see you if you don't mind He said, I'd love to, dad, if I can find the time You see, my new job's a hassle, and the kids have the flu But it's sure nice talking to you, dad It's been sure nice talking to you And as I hung up the phone, it occurred to me He'd grown up just like me My boy was just like me...

The Cat's In The Cradle Harry Chapin 1974

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#644

Post by _game_of_life »

pkghost wrote: post #382
bseidensticker wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think "toxic" means "irredeemably harmful". It just means harmful and makes no judgement on intent.

It's more than harmful—prior to the latest common usage, toxic usually meant potentially lethal for sufficient dosage. So, while it is indeed free of connotations of intent, it evokes disgust and, in fact, invites ostracism. If something is so dangerous that it can kill you, there's rarely much wisdom in attempting to talk it out of being lethal. Better to just remove it from your environment. In any case, I agree th…

So what you're saying is... Toxic is being toxically overused?

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#645

Post by AtlasBarfed »

jgilias wrote: post #285

When I was around twenty my Mom used to call me every other day or so just to have a chat. One day, after she asked me how my day was, I shot back something along the lines of: "I don't have anything to tell you, really. You're calling so often that nothing new manages to happen in between the calls." So, she stopped calling. I would go home every other week as usual and everything seemed fine. It was only much later…

Yea, how much of the article is basically that people are putting off having kids MUCH longer than they used to? I had one in my 40s.

Having your own kid puts into perspective all the failings you thought your parents had.

So when people were having kids at 20 (or earlier), yeah, you don't have two decades of delayed adulthood/extended teenagedom to complain about your parents.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#646

Post by jchallis »

hi41 wrote: post #519

I got estranged from my parents because my wife and they did not get along well. Towards the end, I would call my mother once a week. I could never make my wife get along with my mom. One day , my mother said something that annoyed my wife. I called my mother and had an angry conversation and hung up the phone. She had high fever but did not call for about 10 days. She died of stomach cancer two weeks later. To this…

Speaking from someone who knows - your mom wouldn’t want this choice to haunt you and would want you to find peace.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#647

Post by ikr678 »

pkghost wrote: post #382
bseidensticker wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think "toxic" means "irredeemably harmful". It just means harmful and makes no judgement on intent.

It's more than harmful—prior to the latest common usage, toxic usually meant potentially lethal for sufficient dosage. So, while it is indeed free of connotations of intent, it evokes disgust and, in fact, invites ostracism. If something is so dangerous that it can kill you, there's rarely much wisdom in attempting to talk it out of being lethal. Better to just remove it from your environment. In any case, I agree th…

I understand it to be harmful, but in a way that contaminates the environment around it. A bad colleague can be a dick, in isolation, whereas a toxic colleague would be someone whose behaviours poisons their surrounds and brings out bad behavior in other people in their team.

I am non-contact with a toxic parent because I know it brings out worse behaviour in myself, and I want to stop that cycle of passive-aggressiveness and judgement towards people I do care about.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#648

Post by didericis »

crazygringo wrote: post #309
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Lots of people are massively fucked up and still have kids anyway, either accidentally or otherwise. And then their kids are put at a massive disadvantage in life and in human relationships." This is an interesting one, and in direct contradiction to the adage: "Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times.” My life experience agrees, tough…

I mean, that adage about hard times, while entertaining, has zero truth to it. It's not something supported by history. It just sounds cool to say is all.

I disagree. I think the reason combat veterans often feel like their squad is a second family and rich country club members often feel like the other members are competitors is the difference in the adversity of each situation.

However, I think the type of “bad times” conducive to building strength is fairly particular; it only creates strong people if the problems being faced are external and require cooperation to solve, and the people facing adversity are capable of overcoming their own problems when adversity forces them to face them.

If interpersonal problems are the main source of adversity, and there is nothing external to force cooperation, that’s often demoralizing and more conducive to antagonistic forms of competition rather than camaraderie and self improvement.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#649

Post by asdff »

agensaequivocum wrote: post #553
minikites wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Many millennials are the tipping point Millennials are way worse off than previous generations by many metrics, that's why so many of them are angry. The tipping point already happened.

This is ridiculous. If you look at the totality of the situation, the average person is living an easier more comfortable life than the top 1% 120 years ago.

What, before electricity? How about comparing middle class american with a middle class american from 30 years ago. That's where you see some stratification.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#650

Post by asdff »

MattGaiser wrote: post #248
zwieback wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good point. Unless you were the first-born and inherited the family farm you were probably forced to find your luck elsewhere and even 20 or 30 miles would mean effectively being separated from your parents for all but special occasions.

I would be curious to know when the median human in each century saw their parents for the last time in Western society. As there were so many events where soldiers went off to war and settled where they conquered or colonists sailed off around the world never to return or conquistadors decided to just stop somewhere and marry a local woman.

I bet for the median human over history that they typically lived with their parents until they passed. You still see that in a lot of families.
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