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The window for great-grandmothers is closing

memoirsandrambles.substack.com

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Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#401

Post by havblue »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #324
tuatoru wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The (lack of) social prestige for pregnancy and motherhood among UMC women is a bigger factor. Women have been indoctrinated to place career first and only. Try saying "soccer mom" with an admiring tone instead of a sneer if you want to understand this.

Is it possible women could want financial independence without being indoctrinated? Or are they incapable of desiring power over their own lives, perhaps unlike men?

You can simply ask whether women really are financially independent today: You have student debt, mortgage costs, credit cards etc on one hand and the necessity of keeping that job once you're "independent" of your family and significant other on the other hand. How independent are you if you're paycheck to paycheck?

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#402

Post by bitcoin_anon »

makeitdouble wrote: post #384
hateful wrote: post #373

I've always had this weird thought - that doesn't really pass the ethics test, but here it is anyway. I was raised by my grandmother - let's just say my parents were not ready. And I know a lot of parents that want their kids to have kids but the kids aren't ready. What if it would become the norm for Grandparents to raise the children? That way the second generation can focus on their careers, etc and the first gene…

IMHO the part about the kids not being ready is crucial. If they're just not well off financially I'd see your idea happen (but then, we already see grand parents giving a hand financially in these kind of circumstances) But if they're not ready mentally, there would be mountains of issues with their relationship with their child. For instance, do they even fully understand it's their child under their responsibility…

My life was a mess until we unexpectedly had our first child. I don’t think I ever would have considered myself mentally ready. The child came first, then I started growing into a suitable person.

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#403

Post by everforward »

IG_Semmelweiss wrote: post #332
em-bee wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the component that is getting lost in our culture, which in other cultures is still more present is that grandparents play an active role in helping the young parents to raise their children. in chinese culture for example the young couple moves in with the husbands parents, and so grandparents are always around to give advice and help. when our first was born we moved to live a few km from the grandparents, and ther…

I thought you were going to say it for a minute there - the cultural component that you speak of that I feel is missing in our US culture during the younger years is 'duty' I was also a mess in my 20s and i had a lot of growing up to do to prepare for kids. Yet. Even after kids, I didnt really grow up quickly enough until kids forced the issue. Having kids and being responsible for someone else who is solely deoenden…

> Maybe its bad leaders (bill Clinton affair etc

I would add to this the increasing speed and volume of news. I don't know whether today's leaders are truly worse so much as that were all just much more aware of their failings than we were in the past.

There are no secrets these days.

I also think there's an aspect of societal propaganda breaking down in the face of the internet. "Duty" is a clearly artificial term, people are only bound to it so far as they believe in it. Society has gotten less good at convincing people to believe they have a duty.

We also have a lot of infighting between political and cultural factions that ruins the sense of shared obligation underpinning duty. It's hard to feel a duty to someone Fox News or Reddit has been telling you to hate your whole life.

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#404

Post by lotsofpulp »

havblue wrote: post #401
lotsofpulp wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible women could want financial independence without being indoctrinated? Or are they incapable of desiring power over their own lives, perhaps unlike men?

You can simply ask whether women really are financially independent today: You have student debt, mortgage costs, credit cards etc on one hand and the necessity of keeping that job once you're "independent" of your family and significant other on the other hand. How independent are you if you're paycheck to paycheck?

> How independent are you if you're paycheck to paycheck?

This is a useless measure of independence in the context of this discussion since it applies to men and women. When discussing differences in genders, obviously we are discussing one gender being able to achieve more financial independence than the other due to laws/customs/discrimination.

> You can simply ask whether women really are financially independent today: You have student debt, mortgage costs, credit cards etc on one hand and the necessity of keeping that job once you're "independent" of your family and significant other on the other hand.

Student debt is optional and highly variable, mortgage is irrelevant in this discussion since it applies to men and women, credit cards are also highly variable, and the job thing was also irrelevant as pointed out above.

Also, note that 99% of women (and men) in 99% of the world for 99% of history have never had or been in families with enough wealth such that they did not have to work. They simply worked for their own family, with no explicit pay, and hoped they would get a sufficient spot at the decision making table.

But all of that is irrelevant anyway. The question is does my daughter have the same opportunities available to her as my son? Or would she have to hope for having nice in laws while my son could aim for the stars and secure a high paying job?

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#405

Post by bitcoin_anon »

jzb wrote: post #381
CalRobert wrote: post #8

If you haven't read the article, it's about how people having kids later means you won't meet your great grandparents. My mom had me when she was 23, and her mom had her at 22. I'm in my forties and still have two living grandparents, and am very grateful for them. I remember a lot of days where my grandmother watched me and my sister, and she was able to do that because she was only in her late 40's herself and plen…

It weirds me out a lot when people talk about parenting and family planning like this. Like, having kids should be planned around strategically based on factors like "are my parents young enough to be supplemental child care" over "do I have the mental and financial readiness to be responsible for raising a human being? And do I even want to do that?" If people want earlier parenting, then create a society that suppo…

Creating a society that supports it is an intractable problem. Instead, the problem that we are faced with (as organisms) is how can we raise as many successful children as possible? This problem is workable, and hopefully involves support from ones grandparents.

I’m curious how many children you have.

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#406

Post by JamesBarney »

r00fus wrote: post #227
bradlys wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of this assumes so many things that I think people who were born and raised in stable UMC (like most on HN) take for granted. Even if I lived close to the family I was born into, I would never let them get near my children. The years of neglect and child abuse are reason enough that they should never see them - let alone be caregivers. Similarly, you’re assuming that your marriage would have gone smoothly still…

I'm not denying your experiences - I was reasoning using my own. I did not have a typical upbringing - I'm felt like an outsider and went to a different school for like 7 years in a row. Clearly your circumstances dictated your options. Nowadays, in this truly oligarchic economy, most young people simply don't feel they'll ever be able to afford a home or family either (which is a massive regression). Perhaps the fut…

Housing affordability has little to do with an oligarchic economy and everything to do with policy decisions we made to make housing expensive.

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#407

Post by JamesBarney »

program_whiz wrote: post #349
rayiner wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Sorry to nitpick this, but there is a subtle flaw in this thinking. The main argument of the article is that our experiences in the world (e.g. having a good teacher, getting bullied, parenting, etc) don't account for much difference in our personalities and genetically determined proclivities in the long term. Although the article says only half of personality / psych traits are genetically determined, which is stil…

Have you found any studies that show that shared environment makes a "huge difference" on broadly how a kid turns out? I haven't seen any.

And that cdc site isn't evidence. If you look through any of those studies it's all correlational. So they have literally 0 power to differentiate outcomes driven by genetics vs shared environment.

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#408

Post by digging »

ein0p wrote: post #230
jwells89 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a parent, but I feel the same about myself. Having a kid at 22 would’ve been a mess to say the least. Looking back at that age halfway through my 30s, at that point I wasn’t much more than an overgrown 16 year old that could legally walk into a bar who wouldn’t get his head screwed on quite right for another 6 years or so at minimum.

As someone who had his first kid at 23, you grow up real quick once you become a parent. Moreover I doubt it’s even possible for a person to fully mature if they don’t have kids. Or to really understand their own parents for that matter.

> Moreover I doubt it’s even possible for a person to fully mature if they don’t have kids.

This is my favorite of the lies parents tell, it's so obviously nonsensical

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#409

Post by wil421 »

munificent wrote: post #115

If you ever sit down and really think about it, it is absolutely wild how profoundly the invention of the birth control pill has changed the course of human history, our cultures, and human society. It's gotta be up there with, like, writing and fire, in terms of shaping the destiny of our species.

Farming machines changed it more so than birth control. Also farming practices like using fertilizer.

Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing

#410

Post by dochtman »

hateful wrote: post #373

I've always had this weird thought - that doesn't really pass the ethics test, but here it is anyway. I was raised by my grandmother - let's just say my parents were not ready. And I know a lot of parents that want their kids to have kids but the kids aren't ready. What if it would become the norm for Grandparents to raise the children? That way the second generation can focus on their careers, etc and the first gene…

Here in NL it is quite common for grandparents to help parents out with day care on their workdays. School pickup is rife with grandparents…
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