Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The unusual ways Western parents raise children

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 684 posts

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#181

Post by meowster »

xyzzyz wrote: post #163
meowster wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if salaries were more competitive because there were less workers? If the cultural norm was to only have one parent work, then it seems like the supply of workers essentially doubles* if both parents work, leading to less competitive wages. *not exactly, but essentially. Yes, not everyone is married etc.

The salaries were not more competitive than they are now. Families who raised children on one income back then quite simply expected and did with much less than single income families do today, not to mention with how much two income families make today.

I'm on my phone and I'm having a hard time finding a single source that shows this, and it's possible that I can't find it because it doesn't exist, but I have found that housing prices have outpaced wages, car prices have outpaced wages, and tuition prices have outpaced wages (though tuition prices is a whole different issue). Real Wages, which accounts for inflation, have barely budged.

It seems like both parents work to pay for child costs that exist because both parents work.

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#182

Post by rayiner »

silicon2401 wrote: post #175
lqet wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She already introduced him to Starbucks and McDonalds. Now I have to ensure that she stays way way down on the list of people we would consider babysitting. Relax. I occasionally ate fast food when I was 4, and I was definitely aware of the existence of McDonalds. I never had a weight problem in my life, and today I eat fast food maybe once every 3 months or so.

That's a condescending and unfounded response. Some people can take heroin and not have issues, but that doesn't make heroin safe by any means. You're in a small minority of Americans and not representative of the average person. > The organization estimates that 3/4 of the American population will likely be overweight or obese by 2020.[13] According to research done by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health,…

Americans aren't fat because of Starbucks and McDonalds. Those things are just food. Americans are fat because they eat too many calories and don't get enough exercise: https://www.businessinsider.com/daily-calories-americans-eat...

At age 2-3, my parents fed me traditional Bangladeshi meals of chicken or beef curry stewed in heavy amounts of canola oil. My 2 year old, meanwhile, lives on McDonald's chicken nuggets. There's no way the former is better for you than the latter.

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#183

Post by stevekemp »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #61
AndrewUnmuted wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny, human mothers have a unique trait through which they can identify the cries of their particular child, even at a playground where a lot of kids are making noise. Somehow, mothers are able to cut through all the din and identify the voice of their young child, at the exclusion of all others. Nature does so much to bring mothers closer to their young, yet fathers do not possess this "talent." In fact, we se…

As a man who put his career on hold to be the stay at home parent, this seems extremely out of touch. In my house I’m the one with the “talent”; it has nothing to do with gender. It had everything to do with being in tune with another human being.

Agreed, I did the same thing.

Towards the end I could tell, from the sounds of his crying, whether he was hungry, tired, or hurt too. (Towards the end in the sense that he was able to answer questions, or use words to explain a little what was going on. Raising him bilingually, and it took a while for him to start speaking.)

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#184

Post by kube-system »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #177
lqet wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She already introduced him to Starbucks and McDonalds. Now I have to ensure that she stays way way down on the list of people we would consider babysitting. Relax. I occasionally ate fast food when I was 4, and I was definitely aware of the existence of McDonalds. I never had a weight problem in my life, and today I eat fast food maybe once every 3 months or so.

I accept I may be over-reacting a little, but in that particular case occasionally means a weekly happy meal. The kid in question is already yelling "Happy Meal day" on Friday.

Is that supposed to be egregious? I liked McDonalds as a kid too. You get a toy, after all.

This is hardly going to harm a child:

https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/meal/4-piece-chicken-mcnu...

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#185

Post by [deleted] »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #132
PebblesRox wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree and I really dislike the undercurrent of fear that's present in a lot of parenting advice. The message (implicitly or explicitly) tends to be "do it this way or you'll damage your kids." But the truth is we're never going to be perfect parents, we have no guarantees over how our kids turn out, and there are a wide range of approaches that will lead to good outcomes. I like to do research to discover options I…

There is damage and there is damage. Some can really change kids trajectory. Some become a funny anecdote for the future. I am a newly minted parent and we had a visitation from a parent, who now has a 4 year old. She already introduced him to Starbucks and McDonalds. Now I have to ensure that she stays way way down on the list of people we would consider babysitting. There may not be wrong way to parent exactly and…

[deleted]

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#186

Post by alistairSH »

derivagral wrote: post #172
ajmadesc wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Queue the Doctor / Lawyer married couple with 2.5 kids who vacation twice a year, lease German cars, and have positive net worth crying about 'only being middle class'.

Technically, aren't they right? Middle class typically means you still have to work, strictly speaking. I'm going off of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_class#Three-level_econo...

Depends who you ask, or the context. Anecdotally, software developers, being more math-minded than average, tend to think of middle-class literally - the middle third or middle quintile of income distribution.

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#187

Post by [deleted] »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #177
lqet wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She already introduced him to Starbucks and McDonalds. Now I have to ensure that she stays way way down on the list of people we would consider babysitting. Relax. I occasionally ate fast food when I was 4, and I was definitely aware of the existence of McDonalds. I never had a weight problem in my life, and today I eat fast food maybe once every 3 months or so.

I accept I may be over-reacting a little, but in that particular case occasionally means a weekly happy meal. The kid in question is already yelling "Happy Meal day" on Friday.

[deleted]

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#188

Post by lqet »

silicon2401 wrote: post #175
lqet wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She already introduced him to Starbucks and McDonalds. Now I have to ensure that she stays way way down on the list of people we would consider babysitting. Relax. I occasionally ate fast food when I was 4, and I was definitely aware of the existence of McDonalds. I never had a weight problem in my life, and today I eat fast food maybe once every 3 months or so.

That's a condescending and unfounded response. Some people can take heroin and not have issues, but that doesn't make heroin safe by any means. You're in a small minority of Americans and not representative of the average person. > The organization estimates that 3/4 of the American population will likely be overweight or obese by 2020.[13] According to research done by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health,…

I agree that there is an obesity problem (although I am not an American), but I am not so sure that demonizing french fries, Chicken McNuggets and hot chocolate from age 4 will have the desired effect.

E, to answer the question below: because my personal experience from being a child and caring for a child is that anything that is demonized by the parents becomes extremely attractive.

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#189

Post by seszett »

meowster wrote: post #83
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in Canada it’s sometimes discouraged and criticized to co-sleep, too. I was born here and had never even heard of co-sleeping until I was in my mid twenties. I found it pretty intuitive too, but got some flack from people over it. After 3 kids I don’t really care about the criticisms anymore. They stop co-sleeping when they’re ready, and it was as simple as that. I mostly enjoyed it. Sometimes you miss having a…

> but got some flack from people How do they even know you're co-sleeping in the first place?

Other parents usually ask questions on what how you are doing, what you are doing, etc, and unless you flat out refuse to answer the questions (which seems rude) or outright lie, then they will eventually learn that your kids are sleeping in your bed.

Re: The unusual ways Western parents raise children

#190

Post by teddyh »

Clewza313 wrote: post #153
mpalmer wrote: post #133

> Kuroda [...] didn’t find any correlation between the amount of time babies were carried and the amount they cried. "I couldn’t agree with that," she says. > Her research found that carrying a baby reduced [...] how much they cried. ...what?

Existing research said there was no correlation. Her research says there is a correlation. Gotta say common sense is on Kuroda's side here, it's super common for babies to cry in strollers and then quiet down the moment they're picked up and held/plopped into a baby carrier.

Commonly observed: https://bonkersworld.net/baby-care
Post reply on HN