owen cyclops@owenbroadcast
each parenting “issue” is a fractal trapdoor into true philosophical problems that have no answer - it’s a shame that so many notable philosophers either didn’t have kids or, apparently, didn’t find raising them very interesting (which, admittedly, may have been the style at the time).
here is just one example:
A) a child is presenting picky eating. first question: is this actually “a problem”? is this a pathology, or is the child learning “how to eat”?
in some situations, eating the wrong thing will kill you. so, surely the child has to go through some process wherein they learn how to assess food. is “picky eating” just us seeing this process from the outside? or, is it a serious pathology in a nascent stage? that’s two totally different ballgames.
B) now, whatever answer you chose there determines how you deal with it. now, there are wrong answers based on your input. because if this is a natural stage of development, where the child is learning “how to eat”, how to select foods - interrupting it is bad. if that’s the case, you’re interrupting a vital development process.
but, if that’s not the case, and you’re seeing an actual problem developing, it’s the opposite: in that situation, letting it develop is a dereliction of your duty. you’re making a huge error.
so, which is it? there’s literally no way to check this. it’s entirely up to you.
C) now, you can coerce the kid into eating, somehow. you can make them do it - usually with some type of bribery. so, let’s say you could get into a situation where the kid will eat the things he doesn’t want to eat, because you, the authority figure, are kind of making him do it (or getting him to do it).
is that good? is that teaching them to trust authority - and you? now the kid is eating all these healthy foods, and they’re doing it because they know you’ll give them a cookie later.
is that bad? are you teaching them that their mind and body might be telling them something, and that they should ignore it if an authority figure tells them to? is that a good thing? we’re almost already at: are people inherently good (can develop naturally) or bad (must be brought into submission), aren’t we?
so: listen to your body (which is telling you to only eat hot dogs) , or, trust authority (instead of yourself)? again, no way to check your answers here, it’s just entirely up to you.
so, here’s a kid who always eats all their healthy food, because they want to have cookies later - versus a kid who eats what their mind and body is telling them to eat, which right now happens to be only a handful of things.
which kid is in a better position? is the first kid failing to learn to listen to their body? now one of the most important basic actions to their life (eating) isn’t self directed or in response to actual bodily needs, it’s all subservient to a pleasure seeking desire (cookies) that’s being used as a coaxing mechanism by an outside force (the authority figure, you). they’re eating for outside “reasons”.
is the picky kid developing the ability to self direct their own eating - which seems like a pretty critical skill, or, are they on track to become one of those people who eats only chicken nuggets?
there’s no way to know any of this. and it’s all a microcosm of extremely large important questions - even just here we have: the individual vs authority, the mind body dichotomy, the question of innate intelligence, and more - that likewise have no concrete or fully resolved answers anywhere.
all this plays out in a situation where you have total control, basically, and are playing at the highest stakes possible. so suddenly, all this stuff you’ve read that was always purely abstract is right in front of you requiring hard immediate answers all the time. just eat the food - your body is far more intelligent than people think - but, it’s wrong right now, just listen to me and trust my authority, but later, question all authority, just, eat the food bro. it’s good. bro. just eat it.
