• FrankGSterleJr
    94
    In the movie K-PAX, the visiting extraterrestrial ‘Prot’ says to the clinical psychiatrist interviewing him: “On K-PAX, everyone’s children’s wellbeing matters to everyone, as everyone takes part in rearing everyone else’s offspring.”

    I’ve always found this concept appealing: Unlike with humans, every K-PAX-ian child’s good health seems to be in everyone’s best interest.

    “It takes a village to raise a child.”

    At the risk of being deemed Godless thus evil (or, far worse, a socialist), I strongly feel that the wellbeing and health of all children needs to be of genuine importance to us all. And healthy, properly functioning moms and dads are typically a requisite for this.

    But I'm not holding my breath, as I've found that most people are pessimistic and/or hostile towards such concepts. To many people, such ideas, if ever implemented, would be too much like communism thus, by extension, somehow the end of the world.

    Meantime, too many people will procreate regardless of not being sufficiently knowledgeable of child development science to parent in a psychologically functional/healthy manner. They seem to perceive thus treat human procreative ‘rights’ as though they (potential parents) will somehow, in blind anticipation, be innately inclined to sufficiently understand and appropriately nurture their children’s naturally developing minds and needs.

    As liberal democracies we cannot or will not prevent anyone from bearing children, even those who selfishly recklessly procreate with disastrous outcomes. We can, however, educate young people for this most important job ever, even those who plan to remain childless, through mandatory high-school child-development science curriculum.

    After all, a mentally as well as physically sound future should be EVERY child’s fundamental right — along with air, water, food and shelter — especially considering the very troubled world into which they never asked to enter. And the wellbeing of ALL children needs to be of great importance to us all, regardless of how well our own children are doing.

    Mindlessly ‘minding our own business’ often proves humanly devastating. Yet, largely owing to the Only If It’s In My Own Back Yard mindset, however, the prevailing collective attitude (implicit or subconscious) basically follows: ‘Why should I care — my kids are alright?’ or ‘What is in it for me, the taxpayer, if I support social programs for other people’s troubled families?’

    While some people will justify it as a normal thus moral human evolutionary function, the self-serving OIIIMOBY can debilitate social progress, even when social progress is most needed. And it seems this distinct form of societal penny wisdom but pound foolishness is a very unfortunate human characteristic that’s likely with us to stay.

    Still, we can resist that selfish OIIIMOBY. If I may quote the late American sociologist Stanley Milgram, of Obedience Experiments fame/infamy: “It may be that we are puppets — puppets controlled by the strings of society. But at least we are puppets with perception, with awareness. And perhaps our awareness is the first step to our liberation.”
    ______

    “The way a society functions is a reflection of the childrearing practices of that society. Today we reap what we have sown. Despite the well-documented critical nature of early life experiences, we dedicate few resources to this time of life. We do not educate our children about child development, parenting, or the impact of neglect and trauma on children.”
    —Dr. Bruce D. Perry, Ph.D. & Dr. John Marcellus
  • Leontiskos
    2.9k
    At the risk of being deemed Godless thus evil (or, far worse, a socialist), I strongly feel that the wellbeing and health of all children needs to be of genuine importance to us all.FrankGSterleJr

    I don't know that anyone would disagree with you. It is always a question of how to achieve such a goal.
  • Vera Mont
    4.2k
    Buy fewer missiles and smoke granades, give the mega-rich fewer tax breaks and allocate the saved resources to family planning, local clinics, wholesome school lunches, good daycare centers and community gardens*.
    *Essential to healthy child-rearing: they develop a taste for fresh vegetables, learn where food comes from and how to produce it, and the communal atmosphere is a socializing influence.
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    I’m with you. So what is stopping us? Why don’t we just organize, find some like minded people, and implement our philosophy by living it and doing it?

    I have a theory. "From the cradle to the grave" was the ambition of the British welfare state. It turns out they weren't speaking about our welfare and security, but rather the length of time citizens have to spend working for the state in order to fund its schemes. That is precisely where the socialism comes in, and it quickly resembles serfdom.

    The problem is that in accepting this bargain we have given up our responsibility to members of our own community. Larger and more powerful institutions have promised to do it for us, or at least that’s the bill we’ve been sold. All we need do is give it some of the fruits of our labor and it will provide a host of services for children and those in need. But if the institution takes the earnings of n hours of our labor, it is like taking n hours from our lives because those n hours are spent providing for someone else. This is time and resources we could use toward helping those in need. So, since we have delegated our responsibilities to one another to this institution, and we toil to fund it, our efforts towards each other are already exhausted. Why would someone give resources to children if he already gives resources to the institutions that are meant to serve, educate, and protect the children?
  • Vera Mont
    4.2k
    Why don’t we just organize, find some like minded people, and implement our philosophy by living it and doing it?NOS4A2
    A lot of people are. You just need vision, courage and the ability to communicate.
    Of course, whether you find like-minded people to co-operate depends partly on your goal.
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    That's great. Then nothing needs to be implemented but the freedom to do it.
  • Vera Mont
    4.2k
    That's great. Then nothing needs to be implemented but the freedom to do it.NOS4A2

    Nobody can 'implement' freedom. In societies where the law does not prevent association among people, freedom to change a community need only be exercised. How a community functions is up to the people who live in it.
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    Nobody can 'implement' freedom. In societies where the law does not prevent association among people, freedom to change a community need only be exercised. How a community functions is up to the people who live in it.

    Sure they can. It's easy. Just stop getting in their way.
  • Vera Mont
    4.2k
    Just stop getting in their way.NOS4A2

    Who are they, how am I in their way, and what have they got to do with how you relate to your community?
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    I was talking about the individuals in the communities you mentioned. Let them organize and live however they wish. I wasn't saying you were getting in their way; I was saying that by not getting in their way you're implementing freedom.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    That is precisely where the socialism comes in, and it quickly resembles serfdom.NOS4A2
    .... and do you really think that capitalism doesn't resemble serfdom?
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    Well, I think every system is capitalist. The only thing that differs between them is who they believe should control capital. But yes, I think any system modelled on the republican state relegates us to the status of serfs.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    I don't know that anyone would disagree with you. It is always a question of how to achieve such a goal.Leontiskos
    I agree - no-one would disagree - until it comes to the question of what children need. Then, we're all over the place.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    But yes, I think any system modelled on the republican state relegates us to the status of serfs.NOS4A2
    What other state, other than anarchism, wouldn't relegate us to serfdom?
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    The only thing that differs between them is who they believe should control capital.NOS4A2
    ..... but what they all have in common is that it isn't us.
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    What other state, other than anarchism, wouldn't relegate us to serfdom?

    In my opinion it would be a state whose only concern is to protect natural rights and provide equal access to justice.

    ..... but what they all have in common is that it isn't us.

    In one it could be you; in the other it couldn't.
  • Tzeentch
    3.8k
    After all, a mentally as well as physically sound future should be EVERY child’s fundamental right — along with air, water, food and shelter — especially considering the very troubled world into which they never asked to enter.FrankGSterleJr

    It's rather remarkable then that you're asking of them that they make half the world's problems their own.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    In one it could be you; in the other it couldn't.NOS4A2
    There's always a group of people in control, who exclude most of us. In either state, in theory, I could join the group that's in control. But then I would have to serve them.
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    The group in control is always the state. There are only two classes of people worth pondering: the state and the rest of us.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k

    Exactly. Capitalism and socialism - Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

    So we have only two things to fear - the state and everyone else.

    Why don’t we just organize, find some like minded people, and implement our philosophy by living it and doing it?NOS4A2
    Excellent. But you should think it through. It is not capitalism or socialism as long as everyone is a volunteer and so can leave when they want to. When that stops - and it always does - Society begins.
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    Now you're speaking my language. Thomas Paine wrote that writers tend to confound Society and Government, as if the two were one and the same, so I appreciate your distinction.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    Now you're speaking my language. Thomas Paine wrote that writers tend to confound Society and Government, as if the two were one and the same, so I appreciate your distinction.NOS4A2
    I don't know much about the detail of what he said. But Government does like to think of itself as above the fray. In some ways, it is, but in other ways it is just one part of it. Whether its use of physical force gives it a special role or not depends on whether the force is used to keep the peace or to squash opposition. There is also the awkward point that the people who are the Government are also members of Society and so liable to see society from a point of view within it.
    So although the two are not just one and the same, they are not two clearly distinct entities.

    I suspect also that he thought that the "common man" was a special group, with special rights. That makes him just another spokesman for an interest group. (I'm getting at the idea that the majority can become tyrannical just as easily as any other sub-group in a society).
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    Paine's Common Sense is worth a read if you're ever bored.

    I think what you write is true. And the distinction between the two is becoming less and less apparent as government grows. Let but the State confiscate all social power, and its interests will become identical with those of society—this appears to be one of the most fundamental assumption of statism in general, whether communist or liberal or conservative. But the State's function is anti-social in both origin and function. That's why I tend to worry about schemes such as the one suggested in the OP.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    But the State's function is anti-social in both origin and function.NOS4A2
    I don't know what you have in mind when you say that. I don't see how state can exist without society, or society without the state. They are interdependent.
    It's nice to think of a society that works by co-operation and not compulsion. But I don't see how that is possible. At the same time, compulsion can only get so far. So a society based only on compulsion won't get far.
  • Ludwig V
    1.7k
    they (potential parents) will somehow, in blind anticipation, be innately inclined to sufficiently understand and appropriately nurture their children’s naturally developing minds and needs.FrankGSterleJr
    Yes. The idea that we all know how to bring up children, just because we have been through it ourselves, or because of "instinct" is arrogant beyond belief.

    We can, however, educate young people for this most important job ever, even those who plan to remain childless, through mandatory high-school child-development science curriculum.FrankGSterleJr
    On the other hand, anyone who is can be confident that their study and research has revealed to them the correct way to do that is also arrogant beyond belief.

    The only thing that's certain is that no-one knows for sure. It's wiser to muddle through with a great deal of humility and with as much restraint as possible.

    The greatest error of all is to think of bringing up children as like making a cake. It is an interaction, in which the child is a partner, not a passive subject.
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