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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

#671

Post by ianai »

dm319 wrote: post #513
inlikealamb wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I came here to say this. My step-sister's family sticks to the concept of family despite all the women being raped and beaten by their father. They will not address the problem, their mother will not address the problem, and the only way to live in reality is to leave them. They violently attacked her for trying to discuss it on multiple occasions. Their mother continues this even after the death of their father. The…

This is a great comment. My story isn't nearly as bad as this. I just happened to be born the son of an asshole. I really don't take responsibility for this or his behaviour - but I was brought up being made to believe it was my fault. I recently received a torrent of abuse via WhatsApp from him after a relatively minor disagreement on a news story I wasn't interested in (Harry and Meghan). It happened just as I star…

Definitely not worth it to let it affect your life now.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#672

Post by Ensorceled »

sudosysgen wrote: post #612
nsxwolf wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering that I'm circumcised and every male I know is, and none of us even give it a second thought or feel that our genitals have been "mutilated", I would say it requires a bit of sucking. There has to be some existing dissatisfaction or disorder for someone to get so up in arms about that. Anyway, it was an example I saw, I had intended to remain neutral on the subject.

The fact that other people went through it too is a horrible, horrible metric for something being okay, and I think buying into that is its own form of sucking.

Agreed, add to that because something didn't bother me or bothers me less than something else means it's okay is also a horrible metric.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#673

Post by jakubp »

Wolfenstein98k wrote: post #458
jakubp wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people cry, shout or even try to manipulate you when you tell them their behavior (based on excessive attachment or dependency of some kind) is an issue for you. Many of the same people's loved ones realize that and are in a clinch: do I distance myself, hurting them? do I not distance myself, hurting self? It's not something you can just ask about: "I'm not as attached to you as you are to me, what do we do?"

There was no attempt to manipulate here - as the author stated, they didn't find out about the mother's crying for a long time. It was never made known.

I wasn't suggesting OP's mother wanted to manipulate. I wanted to express that it's a very common situation in relationships of all kinds that there's assymetry in desired closeness and it's difficult / non obvious what to do there (i.e. no easy solution).

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#674

Post by loudtieblahblah »

trashface wrote: post #616
loudtieblahblah wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My parents...are a mixed bag. They weren't or aren't abusive. At least, not physically or sexually or anything like that. Emotionally...that depends on how you want to interpret events and what your perspective is. But.... there's a gigantic cultural (rural vs suburban), generational (Xenial/Milennial vs Boomer), political (die hard Republicans vs Greenwald-esque progressives) and religious (baptist vs atheist) divid…

The aversion to mental health care in the older generations is really tiresome. My mom has pathological anxiety and probably depression, but has never gotten any sort of treatment for it. It radiates out and affects everyone around her. And of course, since she didn't recognize mental illness in herself, she also couldn't see in her children. So we never got care that we needed and are various degrees of fucked up no…

side topic: the funny part about going through anxiety myself, as an atheist, is it really made me appreciate certain aspects of religion - from the comfort and wisdom people get from faith in something bigger than themselves, to even appreciating services from organized religion itself, therapy services for those who can't afford therapy otherwise, to the mental benefits of social/communal gatherings and belonging.

i'm no less an atheist than i was before anxiety,but i'm certainly less of an asshole about it.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#675

Post by voisin »

trashface wrote: post #616
loudtieblahblah wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My parents...are a mixed bag. They weren't or aren't abusive. At least, not physically or sexually or anything like that. Emotionally...that depends on how you want to interpret events and what your perspective is. But.... there's a gigantic cultural (rural vs suburban), generational (Xenial/Milennial vs Boomer), political (die hard Republicans vs Greenwald-esque progressives) and religious (baptist vs atheist) divid…

The aversion to mental health care in the older generations is really tiresome. My mom has pathological anxiety and probably depression, but has never gotten any sort of treatment for it. It radiates out and affects everyone around her. And of course, since she didn't recognize mental illness in herself, she also couldn't see in her children. So we never got care that we needed and are various degrees of fucked up no…

> I'll never forgive my parents for putting us through that.

Maybe worth keeping in mind that they were probably doing what they were force fed to believe was the right thing to do. Everyone is just trying their best (usually, and even if they aren’t, it is generally better for your own mental health to go through life assuming they are).

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#676

Post by bostik »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #316
bostik wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An apology?

You might be confusing the question. A child does not have to apologize to a parent that left before they were born.

Sadly, I wasn't confusing it. The world is cruel, and a non-zero fraction of absentee parents became so because of the child in question.

Meaning: for a number of children with an absentee parent, they were the reason for one of their parents to abandon the other.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#677

Post by mensetmanusman »

moate wrote: post #617
mensetmanusman wrote: post #604

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me it is illuminating to meditate on some underlying assumptions here. E.g. “I did not consent” This type of statement assumes you have a will. If one decides that they have a free will to make decisions, it is useful to note that this is a supernatural belief (because the laws of physics have no room for free will in a stochastic universe). If there is no free will, and nothing matters, not only did you not cons…

Obviously Nihilism is the ultimate freedom to do whatever the fuck you want. Now, do you have any thoughts on the actual point of the morality of having a child without their consent since you do believe in free will?

The morality of gift giving is a good starting point.

Intention matters.

Is it good to give a gift for selfish reasons? no.

Is it good to give a gift to make others jealous? no.

Is it good to give a gift to help force your will on others? no. (this is the one closest to your consent question)

Is it good to give a gift out of a genuine desire to share the joy you received from said gift? yes.

E.g. the decision to have a child is not a trivial moral decision. It is not necessarily a good to decide to bring a child into the world. We see this clearly play out in the data of NYC for example, where less than half of conceived children in some communities make it to term.

Self examination is required to see where the true motivation comes from. If one feels that their life was more a burden than a gift, that person is probably not in a great state to decide to morally have a child.

Unfortunately, many people think that having a child will fix their issues.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#678

Post by mensetmanusman »

bostik wrote: post #676
mensetmanusman wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might be confusing the question. A child does not have to apologize to a parent that left before they were born.

Sadly, I wasn't confusing it. The world is cruel, and a non-zero fraction of absentee parents became so because of the child in question. Meaning: for a number of children with an absentee parent, they were the reason for one of their parents to abandon the other.

Isn’t this ignoring consent? The child had no choice in whether to be conceived; at least one of the parents did :)

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#679

Post by tharkun__ »

themacguffinman wrote: post #627
tharkun__ wrote: post #619

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough. I'm intrigued by the "non-believers to demonize God" though. As a thought experiment, replace God by any deity of any religion, such that you would also be a non-believer (I assume you are a believer in the Christian god), which should help with the objective distance. How about human sacrifices, say Vikings or Aztecs. What are your thoughts on human sacrifice? Would you go as far as to demonize the Azte…

(I'm not the person you're replying to) A bit of a tangent: I don't know that much about the Aztec gods but AFAICT, the Vikings didn't really deny that their gods can be pretty terrible. There are a lot of Norse myths that basically describe a really dysfunctional and bitter family, but with superpowers. Betrayal, infidelity, pettiness, arrogance, and stupid mistakes are all reflected in stories about their gods. The…

Also fair enough :) and to add to your tangent AFAICT though Viking human sacrifices are described it seems like they weren't the common place standard type of sacrifice.

I don't necessarily think that it matters much for the question though. I'm not sure I can find a different benevolent omnipotent (or close enough) deity to make a straight comparison to that doesn't have a current (large) following that would drag the discussion into geopolitical/georeligious territory. If you do know one I'm all up for a substitution.

I don't know with the parent I was replying to, he seems reasonable, but usually religious discussions "never end well" because of the belief involved. Bringing the discussion to a different non-current religion levels the playing field to both sides discussing something they don't believe in. The "fun part" is where the believer in a current deity knows that "obviously Odin doesn't actually exist, there are no Norse gods". Well that's how I feel about their deity, sorry. But I don't mind that they believe in it as long as they leave me be and don't try to convert me or negatively affect me because of their beliefs.

Re: A shift in American family values is fueling estrangement

#680

Post by Thiez »

slacktide wrote: post #451
ceilingcorner wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of those things would result in the complete extinction of human beings. The Black Death was pretty horrible and yet European society still exists.

European society exists today, but experienced societal collapse at the time, which extended for hundreds of years. Y'know, the Dark Ages?

The Dark Ages were before the Black Death...
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