• Contramuffin@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Parents’ jobs aren’t to protect their kids. It’s to make sure that their kids are sufficiently prepared for the world when the kids grow up.

    There seems to be this rising trend of parents being overprotective of their children, even to the point of having parental controls enabled for children even as old as the late teens. My impression has always been that these children are too sheltered for their age.

    I grew up in the “age of internet anarchism,” where goatse was just considered a harmless prank to share with your friends and liveleaks was openly shared. Probably not the best way of growing up, to be fair, but I think we’ve swung so hard into the opposite direction that a lot of these children, I feel, are living in their own little bubbles.

    To some degree, it honestly makes sense to me why the younger generation nowadays is so willing to post their lives on the internet. When that’s the only thing you can do on the internet, that’s what you’ll do

    • RozhkiNozhki@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      I have recently learned that the new helicopter parent type is the snowplow parent - these are the ones that not only shield their kids from the world, but also fully manage their lives for them. I work for the University of California and seeing how absolutely helpless these kids are is scary.

      • Contramuffin@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        I’m in the UC system as well. It’s both concerning and amusing how much college students nowadays go to their parents for permission on minor things. I get it, to some degree. Respect for your parents and all that. But some degree of autonomy would be helpful at that age

    • breadsmasher@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Parents jobs arent to protect their kids

      I get you don’t mean this so broadly but you lose all nuance with this statement.

      Protect them from every minor mistake or risk that could ever possibly happen, and smothering them? Sure.

      Someone about to stab your kid? Protect them from predators? Protect them from various risks and hazards in life which every parent should be teaching them?

      • dont get into strangers cars
      • dont let strangers into the house
      • look both ways when crossing the road
      • intensely_human@lemm.ee
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        5 months ago

        It wasn’t the comment that lacked nuance; just your reading.

        All the stuff you added went without saying.

        • breadsmasher@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          Parents jobs arent to protect their kids.

          What the fuck else does that mean? If you want to believe you can read minds and assume what a person is talking about, whatever.

          But if someone makes a statement, maybe take it at face value rather than “ah yes they must mean something else”

          fucking idiot

          • intensely_human@lemm.ee
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            5 months ago

            I’m pretty autistic, so you’re not allowed to write this off as “people using magic communication I can’t understand because I’m smart” or whatever your model of the current situation is.

            When a person says it is not a parent’s job to protect their kids, you already know what it means. It’s right there in your three bullet point.

            • dont get into strangers cars
            • dont let strangers into the house
            • look both ways when crossing the road

            If a parent’s job were protecting their kids, these would read:

            • Don’t let your kids near roads or cars
            • Don’t give your kids control over the door
            • Don’t let your kids cross roads

            Like, if I was given care of a dog for a week while their owners went on vacation, and my job were to “protect the dog”, I wouldn’t be putting the dog in any of the situations where its own choices were the source of its safety.

            Are you ready to stop pretending that you don’t see?

            • breadsmasher@lemmy.world
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              5 months ago

              The first line of my reply literally says I dont think this is what you mean, BUT …. I very clearly stated I assume that isnt exactly what the commenter meant. The rest of my comment is to clarify what the poster defined as “protection”.

              If someone came up to me and asked protect something, contextually yes obviously I understand that.

              That isnt the situation here. The comment chain is someone with a “hot take” on what “parents protecting children” means. It being a hot take I feel it is completely valid to put aside any assumption that the commenter is talking about “well obviously I mean protect them from x y z”. Because its a potentially unpopular hot take. It’s not a common idea in society.

              Unless you can read minds it is very possible this commenter meant it literally. IE how kids are raised in the film 300. “Heres a stick. go fight a wolf kid”.

              Im not writing it off. I assumed what they meant but followed up for clarification. Did you just expect replies to be “agree” or “disagree” with zero further discussion?

    • AchtungDrempels@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      I thought you’d be talking about letting kids climb up high into trees, going into the city on their own, let them hang out at the skatepark without supervision, stuff like that.

      But no, it’s about computers and kids not being able to see goatse. Lol. That’s lemmy i guess.