Some parents are just really really inadequate or abusive as parents.

They didn't even want to inquire and then decide what was best for their children. Too many parents are given a pass because some sort of "sacred virtue" is assigned to parenting and any mistake that does not include beating their children is somehow forgiven or given a pass.

The "they did the best they could" is a cop-out: did they do the best they could given their laziness, poor impulse control, vision that doesn't go beyond the fence of their backyard?

For example, I was an excellent student, the best in the school, in terms of awards and recognition. Not Einstein, mind you, but someone they should have identified as very talented from a scholastic/intellectual standpoint. My parents never saw this in me, for some reason, because now, I would immediately identify as very talented someone who did as well as I did. My parents never hit me or told me I was stupid or anything like that. They simply acknowledged that I was a good student and that was it. If they had said, this woman is talented, we need to support her, find her mentors, send her to the best universities, I have little doubt that I would have been very successful.

I was successful anyway, after traveling a winding and long road, but my path to professional and financial success could have been (these are my a priori odds) much easier and faster.

Now, you might say, if they had acted differently, maybe you wouldn't be here, etc., which is a very defeatist way of thinking. Their process was wrong and for no other reason than their "intellectual laziness".

I thought the conventional wisdom was that Einstein wasn't academically accomplished until his great works were published.

A lot of your story reminds me of my own but I've reached a different conclusion. Specifically I suspect I would have been accepted into certain magnet schools (pre college) with the sourcing and simple suggestion of taking practice tests. If I had a kid that I suspected would be capable of excelling in that kind of environment that is exactly what I would do to help improve the odds of said kid achieving that goal.

But I don't resent my parents for not bothering to help in this way. I'm honestly not sure why but I suspect it has to do with an unspoken and mutual lack of respect for "academics". The system is so easily gamed, and a gameable system is a flawed one.

Can this not be said for any action, any thought, including, if we are talking about parenting, beating the kids up? "It is the way I was brought up, my father always told me, a few slaps and they'll learn!". "I was feeling so alone and I could not control myself when they were crying, I am so sorry I decided to use the stove gas to put them to sleep, that's what my grandmother used to do!".

My belief is that that kind of "therapist's speech", which as becoming more popular as therapy became the fashionable path for people wanting to make changes in their lives, of "you did your best", "those were the tools that you had available at the time", has caused many to avoid their responsibilities by paying therapists (people who got "second hand smoke" did not even had to pay) like times back they used priest to carry the same function and getting the same result: absolution and comfort.

Some behaviour is just plain borked, but other behaviour is just more nuanced.

An example, some kids are extroverted, others intro. What works for one, may not be the same for another.

You may need to constantly work with an extrovert, so they are eventually, as an adult, be in control of their own exuberance. And with an introvert, work with them, trying to help them expand thier ability to interact.

An ability for both to live in a shared society.

But imagine a parent who was an extrovert, was constantly upset at, as a child, being told to calm down, or stop asking 1000 questions per second. Or even, just "give another a moment to talk".

So they, with an extrovert, do not do such things. And the extrovert does not learn control, and dicipline, and to give others some space sometimes, and becomes less capable of interacting with others as an adult.

Of course, this is a poor example, and poorly phrased, but I hope my point comes across.

We should focus more strongly on what is correct for the child, not how a parent may have misapplied childhood lessons to ourselves. For those lessons may be right for your child, even if not for oneself.

>and have been intentional about not falling into the same behaviors with my kids.

This is usually the problem. You are intentional on NOT falling into THE SAME behaviors, and probably will overreact on the opposite behaviors that is as abusive as the original.

Just because something is bad does not mean that the radically opposite is good.

It is not a good idea focusing on what not to do instead of on what to do.

E.g I have seen parents that were too constrained as kids removing all limits for their children. The kids getting into bad friendships and destroying their lives as a result of the neglect from their parents.

Or someone educated as a Catholic with sexual restrictions promote sexual promiscuity on their children, with very bad outcomes.

I find that whenever you make a decision, you are really sampling from what you’ve already seen.

If haven’t seen a lot, your decision making is really constrained. If you’ve only seen bad decisions, you will make a lot of the same ones. You won’t even know that they’re bad.

The hardest part of life really is figuring out what you don’t know yet. And it’s really, really hard.

My grandfather, partly from trauma and partly from what I believe is hereditary mental illness, swung back the other way, peacing out instead of parenting, leaving my father to get into a lot of trouble as a kid, and witness some different traumatic things.

My father swung back towards being unable to control his anger, and with frequent mood swings between depression and rage. Although, aside from spanking he didn't beat his kids, just pets and walls.

I'm the first generation that has been working towards treating my hereditary mental issues - taking mental health meds, going to counseling. I'm hopeful that I can break the cycle, but enough of a realist to realize I am lacking on a lot of parenting things that I need to learn from outside sources instead.

Put the average child in the position of the average parent and you will see the difference.

Think of how abusive the average parent is, then imagine them trying to parent with 10-20 years less development.

I'm just that in general, the heuristic is accurate that parents have better decision making than their children. The very real counter examples (eg abuse) don't negate the trend.

That said, all parents make bad decisions to the detriment of their children. The severity and frequency is what constitutes abuse vs mistakes.

e.g. If gen 1 only used witty condescending remarks to teach their children that they're dumb, then 2nd gen can realize that this severely damages their kids' self-esteem. If gen 2 recobers from that abuse they may choose the path of taking their kids serioisly even with their shortcomings. The 3rd gen might take some kind of offense in that but there is less of a reason to grow in resentment towards gen 2 while they raise gen 3.

Times change. Subsistence farming doesn't cut it anymore. The lessons learned from that generation are something we have to grow out of.

Some don't. It may be that the parents overcorrect and never teach their kids right/wrong, or it could just be the kid being a problem, or any number of other issues.

My dad spanked me with his hand when I was a toddler. Not overly hard, and not after age 4, but still.

Do I think my dad could have made better parenting choices? Yes. Am I happy that he made substantial advances from what he learned as a kid? Also yes.

A small number of parents are legitimately abusive and should have their kids taken away. Some parents are amazing and talented care givers. Most are just muddling through and fall somewhere in between.

As a parent I am doing my best to keep raising the bar - no corporal punishment over here! But I am sure my children will still find myriad ways in which I have failed them as a parent. Kids don’t come with a manual, and “professional advice” is astoundingly inconsistent/conflicting. I think most parents are doing their best, it is just a hard and poorly understood problem.

This quote also leaves out the second part of their conversation -- the speech's emotional climax -- where Disney tells Travers she needs to forgive herself. This doesn't apply to me. I have nothing to forgive myself for.

https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/uk/21/04/effect-spanking-br...

Most parents are probably bad at parenting, based on the observation that most people are bad at most things and there isn't much in the way of training available compared to the size of the task. But most youths are even worse parents and have wildly misunderstood the constraints, goals and threats involved.

It took me 20 years to undo some of the more direct damage done to me by forcing me into a path I didn't want. Parents being completely wrong for the right reasons is very much a thing.

That doesn't even count psychological damage almost guaranteed to lurk in there pretty much forever

I know that my children will wish I did things differently. Whether that is location, discipline, activities, internet access etc etc. I know they will wish I made more reasoned choices in the moment. That I was never tired, distracted, frustrated. That I let them spend their time as they wished not as I feel is best for them.

Parenting is a parade of tough choices using vague heuristics and life experience. Being well intentioned is a bloody good start.

As a child though, many decisions my parents made were with the view of demonizing outside groups and "protecting" their kids from any contrarian viewpoints. Catching up socially took years, and there are some extreme harms that I still deal with to this day. My goal is to make sure my kids have a well-rounded social life, a consideration for others, and an understanding of a gamut of ideas.

Surely it is easier in hindsight. Nevertheless, there’s this golden rule of “parents should always be forgiven” when if fact it should be “children should not be forced to keep their connection to parents if they don’t want to”.

You, as a parent, are not giving them the “chance to live”, you are bringing them to a world where they probably want to be happy, and if you failed to make them happy they should not be forced to keep you in their life because “a parent gave them the privilege of living”.

Yes parenting is hard. Yes I understand parents make unoptimal decisions all the time. That’s their problem.

Being well intentioned and caring is the bare expected minimum. Why do we need to repeat this?

You are welcome to throw stones if it makes you feel better, but try not to get hit when one flies back through your window in a few years.

No shit sherlock. Here are some more hot takes for you:

    - too much screen time is bad
    - hitting children is generally counter productive
    - feeding a toddler highly processed foods full of sugar is not a good idea

Sorry this conversation frustrates you. Guess you're still dealing with toddlers which is not something I had considered until now. I thought we were talking about much, much older children. Teens even.

It never adds anything meaningful to a discussion. Most often, it’s used by someone with little or no experience with a role or responsibility judging someone who is trying to carry out that role, however imperfectly.

This sadly depends a lot on the community. Being well-intentioned but misinformed in fundamental ways can cause a lot of harm.

[1]: https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/heuristics-that-almost...

“If they were right, I’d agree, But it’s them they know, not me.”

Yes.

> (preferences).

No. The parent is supposed to use their best judgment about what is best for the kid given the kid's reasonable long-term preferences [1]--not the parent's preferences. Or, to put it another way, what is best for the actual kid, not what would be best for the parents if they were in the kid's position. The two are often very different.

[1] I say "reasonable long-term preferences" to make it clear that I am not saying parents should indulge a kid's preferences for sugary foods instead of nutritious ones, lots of TV instead of a better mix of intellectual activities, and no exercise. I'm talking about cases where the adult the kid will grow up to be will genuinely say they are different from the parents in this respect and wish their preferences as a kid had been respected.

> Or, to put it another way, what is best for the actual kid, not what would be best for the parents if they were in the kid's position.

Most parents act in the best interest of a kid, not themselves. The outcome varies because parents model of the world usually flawed in many ways and they actually make bad decision thinking they have made good ones. E.g. my friend is obsessed with pre-school development. This is likely because she perceive herself as not smart and wants her son to be smart. She force her son to exercise, he can read and do some math at the age of 3. Long term this is bad for the kid. Unfortunately she cannot realize this. Doing so would require a level of knowledge and self-awareness she does not have. I her eyes she makes perfect decisions.

Why? I was exercising, reading, and doing some (very simple) math at age 3, and I turned out ok.

How did you arrive at this conclusion?

The more I observe the more I understand good parents are exceedingly rare. The vast majority of parents fuck up one way or another. Which shouldn't necessarily be surprising, parenting is very hard!

But I'm not comparing adults with other adults. I'm comparing adults with children. I would be surprised to find a child that was smarter than their parents; it happens, but it's rare.

Put the average child in the position of the average parent and you will see the difference.

Pre-teens don't have practical adult skills and have poor or non-existent emotional regulation. Teens have some adult skills, are learning or experimenting with others, and have patchy self-regulation.

So it makes perfect sense not to allow kids to do things that are dangerous to others, and to limit what teens can do with strong guide rails.

But when it comes to world view and insight, teens can certainly be wiser than their parents. They may not know what to do with their insight, but they're not wrong - just inexperienced.

Meanwhile many adults are hopelessly naive and may be actively self-harming, especially politically and culturally. And when adults have addiction and/or Cluster B issues, even fairly young kids are more likely to be reliable and responsible.

taking insights from teenagers...really? Do you know what kind of "insights" I had in my teenage years? They are downright cringe.

I think that's true in general, but when it comes to making decisions about the child I think that has to be weighted against another heuristic that's often but not always true: that people know what's best for themselves better than other people do. I think people often wrongly neglect that principle when it comes to children assuming that they don't know what they're talking about without taking the time to listen and understand their point.

Up to mid 20's, yes.

> stupid parents are rare

Not even uncommon.

Are you by any chance over 25 but under 40? :)

I think it’s inarguable that experience is valuable, and age correlates very well with experience up to that mid-20s point, but around that point people start to settle into a groove and the extra n years experience is actually just the same year’s experience repeated n times.