I am not a parent, first of all. I have to say that. It doesn’t mean that I’m oblivious to parental issues. On the contrary, I have paid great attention to how parents raise their children, how they care, how they interact, how they strategize about their child’s education, both at home and in school.
Most parents care about the kind of person their child becomes. Most parents care about equipping their children to deal with challenge, to get along with other people, to respect them, to communicate. They give them tools, they set examples.
I don’t know what the MOST important thing is, but I think that teaching their children that they can’t always get what they want has to be toward the higher end of the list.
More below.
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George Lakoff has written extensively about the ‘strict father’ and ‘nurturant parent’ dichotomy in raising children.
Regardless of which model parents choose, or how they prioritize the tradeoffs, they all know their children are going to face situations in which they aren’t going to get their way. PARTICULARLY with a strict father, they aren’t going to get their way, and they have to learn to accept that, to deal with it, to cope.
So, why is it that the PARTY of ‘strict fathering’ is so unconscionably tolerant of an individual who is pathologically incapable of accepting a situation in which he doesn’t get his way??? A person incapable of self-control? A coward who unceasingly blows dog whistles to draw even violent attacks upon his adversaries? Those HE is incapable of dealing with, because he cannot lead, he cannot serve, he cannot comprehend anything not serving his interests, his selfishness? His limitless and highly deluded ego?
On Daily Kos, a bastion of progressive thinking and relating, you risk losing your account if your interactions with others devolve into ad hominem attacks. Yet, this individual makes those all the time. It makes no difference what his counselors advise, he can’t help it. He cannot control himself, he cannot accept even WISE counsel to refrain from displaying before the world his pettiness, his childishness, his lack of qualification for ANY position of influence.
And what makes it worse is the failure of those in his party to accept THEIR responsibility to ‘correct’ their child’s behavior. They abdicate that responsibility on an hourly basis, have since he became their party’s nominee. They ignore they fact that THEIR credibility would be bolstered if they didn’t.
As would the credibility of any supporter of that party and that individual, on even the most personal level, should they finally open their mouths and acknowledge that he has completely failed to learn the lessons that even their youngest children have mastered or are mastering. It’s time for them to speak, and acknowledge what the whole world knows to be true. He isn’t worthy to even be dogcatcher. They need to say it. And repeat it every time he transgresses. They aren’t strict, they aren’t nurturant, they are hypocritical sheep. They accept things they would NEVER accept from their child. And he is the first to laugh at them for it. He relishes their sheep hood, their hypocrisy. It serves his every selfish ambition.
We don’t laugh. The problem is too serious. Too much is at stake.
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