Don't Want Immigrants? Then Have More Babies -- Uncomfortable Ideas About Demographics No One Is Honest About

*I generally refuse to publish unedited or sloppy blog posts, and so, with the time crunch that has come from having a second child, I have hundreds of rough drafts and never publish them. This blog post, as soon as the baby wakes up, wherever I am in the draft, I am going to hit publish. So it won't be perfect or remotely up to my standards. My husband says that my B-level work is still very worth reading. So... I apologize for the quality of this post. I hope he is right and it is still worth reading!*

This study made big news:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30677-2/fulltext

Populations around the world are expected to decline in a big way in the next hundred years. For some reason, educated, working women do not want to have enough babies to replace themselves. There is nothing Japan can do to get their women to have babies. Nothing Europe can do. They have "tried everything." Except an honest conversation about the problem.

All countries following the Western model need positive population growth. Why? Because of the Ponzi scheme that is their system of taking care of old people. Uncomfortable truth #1: We don't HAVE to take care of old people. It sure it a nice thing to try to do, but it is literally costing us children. Entire peoples may disappear from the world because the burden was too great. Mother Nature didn't intend for people to live so long, and those peoples who dedicate their resources to prolonging the lives of their old rather than caring for their young, those who try to defy Mother Nature, will perish, if not immediately, slowly, over generations. Dear Old People, Every five years you live past 65 costs you a grandchild. How many years passed 65 do you really want to live?

[Note: Many 65 year olds are still productive. I told a doctor friend of mine that I wanted to die with dignity while death was still a choice that I could consciously make, and she recommended that from the age of fifty on I get a cognitive evaluation every two years. Then I could measure my decline. The problem is that losing the ability/courage to die consciously will happen as part of the decline. Catching the right moment is hard. But if enough people tried to, we would have good data on the ideal time to say our goodbyes. (E.g. Maybe once you decline by more than 60% you will lose your ability to die consciously, so the right time to say your goodbyes is when you are at 70% and then at 65% you go.) I think many people, especially men, do go consciously. In The Myth of Male Power I read that the majority of suicides are committed by men over the age of 75. I wonder how many of these "tragic suicides" were actually acts of facing death bravely and rationally.]

Because Western countries must have population growth and their own people are not breeding, immigrants must be imported to prop up the system. Uncomfortable question: Are we sure that the freedom of the West isn't a breed expression of Native Europeans rather than something that any culture can acquire? We know that different types of ants build different types of homes, different types of bees build very different types of hives, etc., but the media and social sciences pretend all human breeds are the same. (Biological sciences no longer pretend this.) The question is: how similar CAN we be? Because the Western system is based on an extreme individualism that has not been able to work successfully in any of the collectivist nations where it has been tried. It is extreme individualism that leads to free societies and free societies that innovate. There are immigrants who become extreme individualists, but that is the exception rather than the rule--just Google the demographics of the Libertarian party.

A hundred years ago Native Europeans had a 25% market share of the world population. Today they have 10%. By the end of the century it will be 5%. Importing immigrants to sustain population will only work long term if those immigrants CAN become extreme individualists. Uncomfortable truth #2: For immigrants to become extreme individualists, we need to be encouraging assimilation, not cultural retention, the melting pot, not the salad bowl. And we need to fight any tribalism we see arising in Western countries. Dear Hong Kongers: You were nurtured in individualism for centuries, did you become individualists? Will you fight China for your freedom now or join the oppressive collective? Can individualism really be taught?

We don’t HAVE to constantly import immigrants. We could not support our old people instead. Or, we could tell American women the truth: Don’t want immigrants? Don’t want demographic change? Have more babies. But instead we get the message to have less babies because of overpopulation and no one understands why all the immigrants.

Uncomfortable truth #3: Don't forget IQ. The immigrants must not just be able to adopt extreme individualism to get humans to Mars, they must have high enough IQs. Instead, we live in Idicoracy. It's not just immigrant IQs that are a problem, but the breeding population in general. The army won't employ people with IQs lower than 84 because they will always cost more than they are capable of producing. Just as every five years an old person lives past the age of 65 another grandchild isn't born, every low IQ immigrant and every low IQ person who breeds, every person with an IQ of 84 or lower costs the birth of another baby with an IQ of 116 or higher.

If doing your part to help humanity meant not breeding and supporting others in their breeding, would you do it? Interestingly enough, smart liberals do this every day. They don't breed because of overpopulation, but they support high tax initiatives to support the children of the low IQ who breed even if they can't care for their children. Smart conservatives do this every day as well, through charity and adoption.

Uncomfortable truth #4: Africa is the only area of the world with positive population growth. But would it have positive population growth without Western charity? Are we not just choosing our old people over our own children being born, but African children over our own children being born? Dear Atlases of the World: The world needs more of you, not more of the people you carry. Stop carrying other peoples children and start making your own.

Industrialization leads to a plummeting of fertility rates. Uncomfortable truth #5: Another road to greater fertility in industrialized nations is allowing children back into the labor force. Perhaps with more regulations and oversight than there was 200 years ago. Children used to be so useful that people had lots of them. The Amish still put their kids to work and they have positive population growth. Simply allowing children to be useful again (maybe just a little?) could enable our old people Ponzi scheme to keep going. My eight year old worked thirty hours a week last year on a TV show, finished two grade levels, and had play time. But then, he learns quickly and has a  full-time mom, not sure most kids could do that. But they could probably manage working twenty hours a week and finishing one grade level with play time. Allowing children to be useful doesn't HAVE to mean coal mines and no play time.

Maybe I should not call these uncomfortable truths but rather uncomfortable conversations we should be having?

Uncomfortable truth #6: Oppressing women also leads to positive population growth. If educating women and allowing them in the labor force leads to the destruction of entire societies ... why on Earth would we do that? We are more interested in being fair than in being alive? Discussing this with my friends in Nicaragua, many women would actually be very happy to "be oppressed" at home with the children ... as long as their husbands do not beat them and do not abandon them. Women are forced into the workforce, not always because they want to be there, but because it is not safe to stay home with the kids. If you forgo your career (like I did) then your marriage better work out. It is super risky and makes the woman super vulnerable. In fact, being a mom who stayed home with her kids is one of the greatest predictors of poverty in old age. But we don't HAVE to solve this problem by sending women into the workforce. The problem could also be solved by not allowing men to have second, younger wives. (That's what happens in Nicaragua.) Strict marriage laws that forbid second marriage, stricter infidelity laws, stricter divorce laws, or just societal pressure could suffice to get women back at home raising babies. Or maybe second wives are fine, but no second families i.e. you have to marry a woman your own age. Or maybe divorce is only allowed after the children are grown, and your first wife is entitled to half your paycheck for the rest of her life. (I actually think that's how it should always be. Married men with wives at home should bring home two paychecks, one for him and one for his wife. Then they can negotiate spending from there. Too many stay at home women feel powerless to negotiate with their husbands as they see the money as "his.") If this sounds horrible to men, remember, in exchange you get the workforce back! No more tiptoeing and sensitivity training! No more sexual harassment lawsuits! No more sexist hires!

[Note: I am tossing out possible solutions in order to point out that we don't HAVE to do things the way we are doing. If the ideal of life is self-realization, no one will be married for very long, because self-realization requires growth and staying with the same person doesn't lead to that. But that is not the exercise in this post. The exercise is how to deal with non-replacement level fertility rates in developed nations i.e. the question implies coercion/statism immediately because individualists would not care about such things.]

Uncomfortable truth #7: Democracy doesn’t work. Aristotle pointed out that democracy will always lead to socialism, because in order to get votes, those in power offer free stuff. There always has to be more free stuff to beat the last guy, so socialism is inevitable. This could be postponed by only giving
the vote to the producers in society, not the leeches. And that seems fair to me. Those of us paying taxes should get a vote. Old people no longer paying taxes shouldn’t and anyone on welfare definitely not. Just throwing out ideas.

And lastly, respectful parenting hinges on a highly individualist society. Collectivists cannot be respectful to their children because their children are soldiers for their tribe, not free agents to lead lives of self-realization. Collectivist societies suck. But they might outcompete individualist societies because we are can’t seem to join together to protect and defend our culture. Individualism, as beautiful and innovative as it is, will be gone if we individuals do not join together and stand up for it ... and if we don’t breed. But as individualists -- do we even care?

A Different Way to Think About Death: Dying People Need Our Permission To Die and Company While They Do So

I've been reading book about death for a while, wanting to grasp the psychology of it, wanting to know more about my own future. One thing that struck me is that those who care for the dying say they need two things above all: permission to die and company while they do so. In our society today we are terrible at meeting that first need.

What do we do when we see a dying creature?

In some times and places compassion for a dying animal meant giving it a quicker death. Now it means fixing it, at all costs, and caring for it, if necessary, for the rest of its life. Now it means prolonging its death for as long as possible. And if it is dying and there is nothing we can do, lying about it.

What we are doing, that we claim to do in the name of compassion, is not compassion. It is avoidance of pain and fear of death.

We, the living, don't want to confront death. We would rather the burden of carrying a dying creature for fifty years than a week at his bedside holding his hand while he dies. Yet that is what the dying need, I have read. Not to be our burden. No one wants to be a burden.

We know this, deep down, that no one will accept burden status, so we lie to them. We tell stories to make them feel entitled to being burdens; we play a dishonest psychological game with ourselves pretending that they are not burdens, that it is meaningful to carry them, that good people are genuinely happy to do so, that it is their right to be carried, that they deserve it, etc.

But this dishonesty is not kind because dying people need two things: our permission to die and company while they do so.

To turn them into a burden and then lie to them, telling them they are not a burden, is to deprive them of our permission to die.

More than denying them permission, it gives them the message that they are bad to die. It also deprives them of a possible meaningful death.

"Am I a burden to you?" What if they need to hear that they are? What if that is what will give them the strength to face what is perhaps the scariest thing a person will ever have to face? What if we said, "You are a burden to me, a heavy one. I am struggling under the weight of carrying you. But I will carry you, until you are ready to go."

The journey of death is the journey of acceptance. How can the dying find meaning in their death if we refuse to? What if their death could have meaning? What if instead of their death being a failure, it can be a gift they give those who survive them, a lightening of the burdens of the living?

The faceless society cannot bear the dying, individual people must. Because it is the desire to not burden those individuals that gives the dying the strength to go, that enables their death to be a gift. I would so much rather my death be a gift to those I love than a traumatizing event that causes them pain.

Not saying we should run around telling people to die. Not saying death will ever not be painful. But I would like to see a cultural shift in our attitudes about death and especially about choosing to die instead of live and the many times it is a highly rational choice. We treat death as such a tragedy, but it is the fate of each and every one of us. It is not a failure on the part of the dying person. Memes talk about the "courage" of those "fighting cancer" in their "battle against death." I think that often the far more courageous choice is actually the choice to go gracefully. Sometimes the battle is desperation and fear. Especially when I see pictures of courageous toddlers fighting to survive and destroying the lives of all those around them in the process. The toddler isn't courageous of course. And neither are the parents. It is not courageous to sign up for twenty years of medical bill slavery so that a sick child can die in his teens instead of now. Facing death, your own and the death of those you love, is often the far more courageous choice.

Someone wrote to ask me about my position on the elderly and here is what I have to say: In Tibetan Buddhism it is said that a person spends the first half of his life learning to live and the second half learning to die. The elderly are those in the final stages of learning to die. They should never be infantilized nor turned into burdens against their own wishes. Their death is natural and right and should not be prevented or prolonged, rather it should be treated as sacred, beautiful, and theirs.

The dying need two things from the living: permission to die and company while they do so. Most people die today, sadly, without the former. Like labor, the "no" instead of the "yes" can make the experience last much longer than it would have otherwise. Death can be dragged on for years if someone is given the message that their death will cause pain to others.

And the latter not everyone actually needs, just most people. I will want someone to hold my hand. But many people are so connected to their spirituality that they don't need anyone there. If that is the message an elderly person gives by choosing to stay in his own home alone, so be it. He doesn't want to be a burden. That is actually far more natural and right than convincing him he would not be a burden. He should be praised as heroic, honest, emotionally aware, brave, and generous. It is not sad to know that, no matter how much your family loves you, caring for you would be a burden for them – a burden they would bear, but a burden you don't wish them to bear. It is beautiful to refuse to be their burden, beautiful to give them that gift.

Perhaps this isn't a new way to think about death at all. I have read of hunter gatherer tribes in which the old were expected to get lost in the forest. That was how they died. No one offered to carry them. No one insisted the tribe go slower. Similarly, old vikings, when they saw that they were becoming burdens on the living, left to fight in a battle. They did it consciously, knowing they would not survive the fight. They said their goodbyes and then picked a cause to die for. Of course, their main cause was that gift they wanted to give their families. Because life was understood to be endless toil and death was understood to be rest, it was easy to talk about the burden of caring for the old. Contrast that with today, when we can't seem to have honest conversations about death at all.

Dynasties: How to Avoid "Blue Collar to Blue Collar in Three Generations"

 I am currently studying family systems, what leads families to stay together, and what tears them apart or encourages their dispersement. Seventy percent of all generational wealth transfers fail. And then there is the proverb that is, statistically speaking, almost always true: "Blue collar to blue collar in three generations." Why?

 

The story generally goes like this: An ambitious middle-class man creates great wealth and starts a family dynasty. His children try not to mess it up, but mostly they are lazy and/or uncreative. The fortune is no long grows, rather, it stagnates. The grandchildren are worse than the children, even less creative, and sometimes despots, and now the fortune decreases. By the time the great-grandkids are grown, there is no fortune. The dynasty is over, and the family is back to blue collar work.

 

I have been coming up with theories about how families can fight the proverb since I began working for families who were dealing with these issues. For a long time, my answer has been: Your children are headed toward the mean because you are not raising them – middle class nannies and teachers are. Want your children to have your values, habits, and skills? You need to be the one who raises them.

 

But recently I have come to a second realization. In some ways, it only appears that the children are "not great" like the parents. And it only appears that the parents are all that great. Because most of the time it takes three generations to make the "great creator." I think the story is six generations long.

 

Generation 1: The pioneer generation. They struggle for survival in a new ecosystem. 

 

Concrete Example: A young man, raised by an unsuccessful Inn Keeper, decides to be a farmer as there is an opportunity for cheap land out west. He goes there. It is wilderness. It is far from anyone he knows. Though he knows how to run an inn, he does not actually know how to farm. And though his parents weren't ideal, at least he knew people in the town where he grew up. Now he knows no one. But he is hardworking and determined to make something of himself. Survival isn't easy or guaranteed at first, but he plugs away, clearing the land, breaking in the soil, building a tiny cabin, and saving. He marries and works his tail off to feed his offspring. He has to create a new family culture because the only thing he was able to learn from his own parents was what not to do. So, he does not turn to drink, does not divorce, does not indulge in overspending, etc, but he is a lot better at knowing what not to do than what to do.

 

Generation 2: The second generation continues what the pioneers began. With hard work and perseverance, they will do well, but they will never make it big. Outlying success will allude this generation.

 

Concrete Example: The children of the pioneer don't need to spend a decade breaking-in virgin soil, learning the native plants of this ecosystem, clearing the land, or even figuring out what values lead to success. They inherit this wealth of knowledge, and they improve upon it. They build bigger houses, barns, and better tools. They plant trees for beauty, not just for food. Their father was only ever able to think about the current year. Because they are already on top of that, they plan ten years ahead. They grew up knowing people in the area - small time farmers like themselves, so unlike their father, they have a support network (not to mention the best support network their is, successful family members nearby). They also build on the family culture. Their parents were good parents, but they want to be even better.

 

Generation 3: The outliers. They can do what their parents and grandparents could not. Biographies will be written about them. They will be heralded as the creators of a dynasty.

 

Concrete Example: The grandchildren of the pioneers are born into a family successful enough that they have free time. Their family farm is already productive and beautiful, so they focus on improving it even more, making it not just beautiful but glorious, and making it not just productive but top notch. They grew up watching their parents be alluded by the big leagues, and they know exactly what they need to do to go big. They go to school, and college. They network. They have a support network of a higher caliber than their parents did. Their family has now made it, and they are revered for their success.

 

But their childhoods are not given enough credit. Their parents and their grandparents, keeping it together despite the rigors of pioneering in a new field, are not given enough credit. Those who came before them don't become part of the family myth. Whether it's Stephen "Wonderboy" Thompson or Beyonce or Gwenyth Paltrow, the third-generation outlier becomes this heroic individual who did it with help from his parents, sure, but not to the extent that anyone imagines.

 

And now we get to their children.

 

Generation 4: How do you follow up a truly incredible parent? Hopefully the Generation 3 Outlier used his success to find the best possible mate he could and then settled into focusing on his own children. More likely, he will be seduced by his own success and not able to give it up. He will spend his life focusing on attaining even higher echelons of success. He will fail to raise his children. A child of an outlier, say, Beyonce's kids for example, has a choice when it comes to work:

-Don't work and live off the family money

-Try to outdo Mother

-Try to do my own thing (i.e. be a pioneer in a new field and/or ecosystem)

 

Family systems experts generally recommend to heirs that they do their own thing. Thus, they inevitably end up not being very impressive. The experts recommend having compassion for them. 

 

Much of the time, families return to pioneering before the third generation is even reached. Perhaps the family has bought into the cultural myth that everyone must have a One True Passion, and the point of childhood is to find it. Many in academia believe that if all children worked in fields different from their parents, they would not be able to benefit from nepotism, and the playing field would be leveled for all. If everyone was always a pioneer, we would all be equal!

 

The hard life of a pioneer is also often the end result of twenty-two years in school. Well-meaning parents deprive their children of the wealth of knowledge they would have received from a childhood at their side. So, they end up, at twenty-two, starting as a pioneer in their parent's business - a pioneer because even though it is their parent’s line of work, they have no experience in it.

 

The fourth-generation children, the children of outliers and successful people, will most likely never be that successful, not because they are lazy or losers or less than their parents, but simply because they are pioneering in a new field. They will struggle just to survive in their chosen career in ways that their parents cannot possibly understand.

 

A second or third generation success cannot fathom what it is like to arrive in the wilderness and learn an entire ecosystem. This is another reason why so many children of successful people choose to be pioneers – because the successful parents advising the children have no idea how hard it is. As a rule, the successful people were not pioneers. They think success is easy and anyone can do it.

 

Concrete Example: the generation-four child of the outlying farmer is told that he can do anything with his life. All he has to do is work hard and he will be a success like his father. So, he goes to college and studies film. When he graduates, he moves to Los Angeles to be a director. He spends his family's money lavishly and, though he is able to get a foothold, he doesn't find any success in his career. It is so depressing for him, measuring himself up against his father, that he turns to drink. He is a horrible parent to his own children.

 

Generation 5: Raised by a miserable father who drinks and beats his child.

 

Concrete Example: The child from this generation decides that the movie industry ruined his dad. His family still has enough money for him to go to college, so he studies something safe, like business. He gets a job in Chicago running an inn and, as a pioneer, struggles just to survive. He wasn't raised with any good examples of hard work, rather he grew up learning how to be depressed and drink his problems away. This is what he does.

 

Generation 6: Back to blue collar.

 

Concrete Example: The fortune is gone now. The family is now blue collar again. Generation 6 will not be able to afford college. This child is raised by an alcoholic failure who runs an inn. All he knows about his future is that he doesn't want to be like his father.

 

And so it starts over again

 

************

 

I think the proverb should be: "Blue collar to Blue Collar in Six Generations." And I think the problem is a general failure to understand that success takes generations to build.

 

So, what does this mean for you and your family or me and mine? I think it would be helpful for families to place themselves: Are you a pioneer, pioneering in a new line of work that you did not learn from your parents as a kid? Are you second generation, successful and perhaps even very wealthy, but not to the level that biographies will be written about you? Are you third generation, the outlier that most likely your child cannot top? 

 

If you are a pioneer, you will most likely think your career is a dead end. You will hope your child does something "better." College will fix it! This is your mistake.

 

I met a guy the other day named Matt. He never went to college. He was raised by a single mother, an immigrant. She worked a minimum wage job and could barely feed him when he was a kid. He quit school at sixteen. He is now forty-years-old and owns thirty two convenience stores. He makes a fantastic living. How did he pull that off?! Hint: He was not the pioneering generation.

 

His mother worked at a 7-11 for his entire childhood. She couldn't afford daycare, and they didn't know anyone, so he hung out at her 7-11 after school. He knew how to run the place by the time he was twelve. Started working there himself when he was fourteen. Saved up and bought his first 7-11 when he was twenty-five. Killed it. Most people who run 7-11's don't understand how to run them, he told me. He does.

 

The lesson: If you are a struggling pioneer don't assume your child will struggle as hard as you. You paved the way. Your child has been paying attention. Invite your child to your life. He will do it better. Don't assume your career is a dead end or you life isn't a worthy one to invite your child to join. If you can just keep it together, despite the insane difficulty of your life, your children will do great.

 

The other lesson: Many people would look at Matt, the guy who owns thirty-two convenience stores, and mistake him for the pioneering generation, after all, his mother never owned any convenience stores. This is not the case. Matt is the second generation in his family to work in the field of convenience stores. Unfortunately, because Matt chose a line of work his childhood had perfectly prepared him for, he thinks that anyone could do what he did, anyone willing to work hard can reach his level of success. That is the mistake the second generation makes.

 

And one more lesson: If pioneers can just provide their children with basic survival and a good parent-child relationship, the family will rise. But pioneers need to stick to it and not flail about.

 

Laura Ingles Wilder's story is a good example of pioneers that could have made it, but instead, flailed about, not settling down, not focusing on providing their children with enough nutrition for them to reproduce well. Their children lived to adulthood, so it seemed like they were successful. They probably told themselves that they were fine parents. Three of the daughters married. But there was only one grandchild for Ma and Pa Ingles and she could not have children. There were no great-grandchildren. The evidence points toward malnutrition related infertility, the physical degeneration Weston A. Price writes about. 

 

If you are second generation, your weakness will be having no idea how hard it is to be a pioneer. Picture Matt's mother and how successful she was, or Pa and Ma Ingles and how successful they were. If you sentence your child to the life of a pioneer, that will likely be that level of success, not yours.

 

Also, don't assume your kid wants to do his own thing if he knows the true choice. Don't send him down the pioneer track by sending him to a "good school" and being able to afford after school activities or a wife at home that prevents him from hanging out with you at the office all day. Your mistake will be one of ignorance, not appreciating what your parents did that you were able to build on. Be clear with your kids: You can be a pioneer, but you most likely will not find the level of success I have found. If you want to start studying the family business now (at seven years old) you have a chance at becoming an outlier.

The key take away is to be clear with children about the real choice. Hard work is not all it takes to reach a second generation level of success at a reasonable age.

 

For example, Laura Ingles Wilder found success as a pioneer in the in the field of writing – when she was seventy years old.

 

If you are adult second-gen who just realized how hard it is going to be to be a pioneer, but its too late to spend your childhood learning the family business, consider accepting your pioneer status and focusing on your children: They can be second generation in whatever field you are pioneering, or, if you raise them at Grandpa's office, they can take your place as the outlying, third generation.

 

Before I move on to third generation, it should be mentioned that staying at what I am calling second generation levels of success is something a family can actually maintain for many generations. The third generation doesn't have to become outliers. They can build on their family's wealth while focusing on their children. They can grow the company, but not be consumed by it. In fact, in my current studies of the institution of family, the most successful families (in terms of their long term ability to maintain a high level of wealth and stay together as a family) follow this model.

 

If you are third generation, and people are writing biographies about you, you are in the riskiest spot. If you have made outlying success, you will most likely struggle the most at parenting because your success keeps you stuck in the maiden/squire phase of life and because your children will grow up in your shadow.

 

You could try to lessen the shadow, toning it down at work. This would happen naturally if you let go of your maiden/squire phase. If your focus becomes your child, and you bring your child to life with you. What happens? You can't do as much. You have to slow down. If you are Beyonce, you do maybe three shows a year, and you prepare for them for months – they take a lot longer to prepare for because your five-year-old is there wanting to learn the dance routine too. You don't make quite as much money because your time is being poured into your child. But in the end, it's wonderful, because you are not a maiden trying to attract the attention of the highest status mate you can anymore. You are a mother now, trying to raise a child who can attract the highest quality mate. You can't buy a good mate for your kid. You can only focus on your child, helping her to become the best potential mate she can be.

 

That's how I can see a third generation successful family working. It is also currently the only way I can see outlying success work at all in a family that thinks in long-term ways (encourage outlying success in the young as a mating strategy, but once mated, get out of the limelight). Because otherwise, outlying successes are so difficult for the next generation to overcome, that I am not sure a family thinking long-term should even strive for it. In many ways those who choose outlying success for their career might consider forgoing having children as to do so is inconsiderate of them. The outlying success who continues to be so after his children are born is not a good parent, and if he ever does graduate from squire to king, he is the king who cannot give up his throne.

 

Another option for outlying families would be to take the child destined for a pioneer career, and your fourth generation child isn't going to follow your career, perhaps he can pick something you exposed him to, so he will have a better chance of not being a total pioneer. For example Brad Pitt's kids could consider architecture or directing or working for the UN. In this way maybe they can pull off (almost) second-generation status. Should they choose chemistry, they will be pioneers. It's fine to choose chemistry, but they should be made aware of the reality of the choice they are making.

 

Another strategy for a third generation parent is to have the child pick something when he is very young. In this way, both child and parent have ten to twenty years to learn about that field, giving the child possible second-generation status by middle age. The danger is that the parent will underestimate the level of involvement needed on his part, thinking that that $150/hr tutor is enough. The tutor is not enough. Every line of work is its own world, it's own ecosystem. If you own a soap business, you can buy your child acting lessons from the best teachers in the world, but if you don't take the time to meet people in the film business, and develop relationships with them, your child will end up a pioneer. 

 

Anyway, not saying there are not exceptions or that this is The One True Rule. It's just a trend that I have noticed.

 

You may not understand what I mean when I say "pioneer" unless you have read this post: http://roslynross.blogspot.com/2015/03/nature-versus-nurture.html. You may not understand what I mean when I say "maiden" or "squire" later unless you have read this post: http://roslynross.blogspot.com/2016/07/living-right-story-parents-as-kings-and.html

 

What Maids, Cooks, Drivers, Gardeners Have to do with Raising Children

*I just updated the Nicaraguan gulch post with this paragraph, but I thought it also deserved its own post.

I ran into an Argentinian couple the other day. They met in New York and lived there until the birth of their first child. They found raising children in NYC to be unbearable, so they moved to Nicaragua. Not Argentina. Not elsewhere in the US. Why? Because they wanted more children. And in Nicaragua (unlike the US or Argentina) they could afford it and enjoy it. Because to truly enjoy raising your children you need help, they told me. In Nicaragua they could afford the maid, cook and driver that make raising children so much more enjoyable.

This hit home for me because I worked for some of the wealthiest families in Los Angeles--they had full time maids, cooks, and nannies--but raising children in those lonely houses was still unbearable.

I envisioned how a city gulch (a place where one could enjoy raising her children) could work, but it required too much capital to get it going. So I chose the farm gulch, where raising Anders is every bit as idyllic as I imagined it would be. It's not perfect, but if there were 120 voluntaryists here it would be as close to perfect as my ideal life could possibly be.

It's hard for egalitarian Americans to understand the value of having help. The fact is: All parents would be significantly happier with maids, cooks, drivers, gardeners, personal secretaries, and the like. Raising children is not a two person job. Yes, I would rather the help be grandparents, bachelor uncles, spinster aunts, strange cousins, and single friends but that was not an option for me. So I chose the paid staff. What I don't consider a viable choice is the two parents doing it alone. It's just too miserable and hard.

Every parenting book talks about the time crunch, and how you have to lower your cleanliness standards, lower your organizational standards, lower your cooking standards, lower your expectations of your own behavior: That is the only way the two-parent household can cope with parenting. This is nuts.

When raising children our behavioral standards and cooking (nutrition) standards should be of the highest quality in our lives. Or at least that's what I wanted for my parenting experience. So, like the Argentinians, I live in Nicaragua.

"It was a very simple decision for us," the Argentinian woman told me, "if we still lived in New York, my younger two children would never have been born."

I concur!

That being said, let me state the problem in a different way so that other solutions become apparent: A child is a 98 hour a week responsibility, not including nights, cooking, and cleaning. 98 hours is a hard load to carry. This load would be easier divided up among three people. Interestingly enough, here in Nicaragua I have a cook, a maid, and me here to care for one child. This is easy and an enjoyable way to do things. But with this arrangement, I could handle a lot more kids, up to six I would say. Now, I can't pop out five more kids because I spend about five months of the year in Los Angeles (or Santa Barbara or Whistler or wherever we decide to go). Those months are grueling. But, what if, in Los Angeles, three sets of parents decide to live together and share a cook and a maid? Now, not only do I have a cook and a maid in Los Angeles, I have companionship at home and so does my son! Now parenting is more enjoyable.

The same can be done in other places. I think parents would be wise to form groups of 4-5 couples. The couples decide to raise their children together. Perhaps they buy one big house or apartments all next door or they live in a neighborhood and make one big backyard instead of five backyards. Better yet maybe there could be a house with four different wings and then a shared play space for the children and cooking space in the center. This is very similar to the extended families that reared children for so many centuries. The kids are happy because they have people to play with. The women are happy because they have people to cook and clean with. The kids can connect with more than just their moms (they have other adults around). Better yet if the guys work within walking distance or at home so the working world can be part of their lives as well. But now we are getting into the "City Gulch" idea I wrote about before:
http://roslynross.blogspot.com/2013/01/my-ideal-unschool-community-here-and-now.html

I am not saying that the two parent household isn't doable. Children have been raised in two person households (and one parent) for almost a century. I am saying that it is not enjoyable. Sure, everyone loves their kids. But man is it hard! So hard, that most people, as soon as they leave their extended family situation, will opt for having just 1 kid. The birthrate in all affluent societies is always negative. Immigrants live with their extended families and have a lot of kids. Then they adapt to the Western way of doing things, switch to a two parent household, and voila, negative birth rate for them too.

The solution in some societies has been more and more compartmentalization of life and government involvement in the family. "Oh no, we have a negative birth rate! Let's get them to have more kids by paying for child care and school!" The problem is: This doesn't fix the problem. It makes parenting doable but not enjoyable. Children raised by other people become alienated from their parents. Children removed from the world require parents to be removed from the world or to be separated from their children. Instead, people interested in solving the negative birth rate problem need to think: Under what set of circumstances is raising children enjoyable. If it is enjoyable people will do it more.

The solution I propose is:
1. Invite children back into the world
2. Keep families together
3. Get rid of the nuclear family as a child-rearing model

Lastly, if you want to go all conspiracy theorist, consider that the government does not benefit from happy families that are wonderfully bonded and love each other. Governments do not like multigenerational extended families because they are their own little worlds--and if they get big and strong they may end up wanting to be their own government.... Governments benefit from raising the kids. They get to decide what values are imparted onto them. They make the kids into "Americans" instead of proud member of "Clan Garrett." The loyalty is to them, not the family. The family bonds, severed in childhood, keep the government in power. Moreover, the harder and more miserable parenting is, the more willing people are to hang their children to the government to be raised (free school! free daycare! let's be like Sweden!)

Not saying there is a conspiracy going on. Just saying people make decisions based on what benefits them. Those in power are not benefited by competing powers.

Another way to think about it though is that multigenerational families is akin to tribalism. And tribalist societies (collectivist societies) suck. The Christian church went to a great deal of effort to dismantle the extended family--and it is possibly their success at that that led to the creation of the West, of individualism, of the invention of the scientific method and everything we enjoy today that has been invented because of it! So ... we need to find a balance of individualism and collectivism. Pure individualism is too lonely. But Collectivism is too corrupt and uninventive.

Does NVC Always Work? Is War Always Bad? Is Compassion Always Good?

A reader emailed me, "Roslyn, do you think there are times when NVC does not work?  I know it is just fiction, but for example, would there have been a way for Hank Reardon to meet Lillian's needs?"

NVC is a communication tool that would allow Hank to connect with Lillian. Connection does not mean we are able to or even should meet the other person's needs.

However, with connection, it is likely that clarity will be reached surrounding what needs aren't being met. This doesn't mean that Hank could or would choose to meet Lillian's needs. It just means that there is finally clarity for both of them about what needs are not being met.

NVC helps people get their needs met because it helps to clarify what exactly is going on in a way that also fosters connection. So:

-Perhaps Hank would have realized that he could meet Lillian's needs. Great, problem solved.
-Perhaps the new clarity surrounding the issue would have made an alternate solution present itself. Again, problem solved.
-Perhaps the new clarity would have made Lillian realize that what she had been asking of Hank was unfair. Perhaps she would have realized that she needed to spend some time grieving the human condition instead of blaming Hank. Again, problem solved.

But using NVC doesn't necessarily mean people will get their needs met!

-Perhaps, more likely, Hank would have realized that he could not or did not wish to meet Lillian's needs. In this situation, Lillian will suffer the pain of unmet needs.

Suffering people do better when NVC is being used because:

-Perhaps, because Lillian would feel understood and connected to Hank, she would accept the suffering. Perhaps because NVC kept her present, she would be able to get in touch with her pain and not avoid it.

But there is no guarantee. At all. Because:

-Most likely Lillian Reardon is a pain-avoider, incompetent at dealing with pain, even with Hank using NVC. In attempts to avoid the simple (yet difficult) act of feeling her pain, Lillian would numb out with various drugs or  lash out at Hank.

And then they are back where they started.

Let's say Hank is an NVC Genius. Perhaps he will continue to work with Lillian, staying connected to her and empathizing with her through all her attempts to make war with him. Perhaps this will go on for years. Will Hank ever get his needs met? Will he ever get through to Lillian? Will they ever have a mutually beneficial relationship or will he just be her therapist for the next ten years? And... why on Earth would Hank do that for Lillian?

Playing therapist only works out for Hank if he gets paid (in some form). Playing therapist for free is very taxing and not at all compassionate for the self. In pop culture this is described as the experience of giving and giving and giving to another person and ending up just feeling taken from. It's not a reciprocal relationship. There is no mutual enjoyment or mutual benefit. It leaves one person feeling good and the other feeling tired.

These are the real questions:

-NVC is worthwhile to stop wars. But should all wars be stopped? How much time should be dedicated to war-makers? What do we do with people who insist on war-making despite our efforts at keeping peace? 
-NVC is worthwhile to connect with those you want to share your life. But if you are doing NVC as a favor to help someone ... you have encountered an ancient and common aspect of the human condition that philosophers have been debating for thousands of years. How can the broken people be fixed? Should they be?

The heroes who are competent at life (they are actually just normal men but they are seen as heroes because they are so rare) note that they are. But they are surrounded by those who are not. They see those who are not competent at life and feel confused, and they want to help. "All you have to do is stop making self-destructive choices. It's so easy!" And yet ... the incompetent are incapable in some way. It's not easy. So the heroes dedicate their time and energy to psychoanalyzing the incompetent and trying to figure out how to help. The war-making incompetent of course don't let the heroes even decide whether or not they want to help, they demand attention at every turn––or else.

The solution (for me):

Compassion for the poor, the sick, the dying, the stupid, the war-makers, yes! By all means, yes! But take them off your shoulders. Compassion for them does not mean carrying them. It doesn't mean dedicating your life to trying to make them heroes like you––it's the same thing! Whether you are carrying them or have dedicated your life to solving their problems, you have still lost your life.

Perhaps, the world would be a much better place if heroes stopped dedicating their lives to those they feel sorry for, and started dedicating their lives to those who inspire them.

Young children do this instinctively. They are repelled by unhappy people, by sickness, by failures. They are drawn to people who appear happy, healthy, beautiful, strong, and successful. They emulate them. (And they often get it wrong––humans are tricky, often appearing happy and successful even when they are not.) Some people make it to adulthood still wanting nothing more than to dedicate their lives to their heroes. If you can't be a hero yourself, this is the next best thing.

But that is not the message religions give us (or our education). We are taught that the ideal is to be like Mother Theresa, and spend our lives tending to the dying. Worse, we are taught that no one should die, and we must do everything in our power to stop it.

Heroes, as Ayn Rand taught us, are their own destroyers. They don't help each other. They don't even get to hang out and inspire one another. Instead they spend their lives suffering, trying to help those who are dying ... to not die.

Compassion for the dying should not mean preventing the death. To prevent a death by enslaving the living is to fail to have compassion for the living. Today there is an imbalance of compassion, for others and not for the self, for the dying but not for the living.

When I was in fourth grade I once spent an entire math period with my hand in the air. My teacher passed over me. She helped so many kids, and many who didn't even have their hands in the air, but she never came to me. By the end of the period everyone else went to recess, and I stayed after and asked her why. "I want to help people who actually need help," she said. "You don't need help. You never will." Oh, Miss Stone, but what could kids like me do if you did help us? What could the world be like if the heroes were given the resources that are currently funneled to the dying in the name of compassion?

Compassion for the dying should also not mean lying to them. I don't know why we think it is compassionate to lie. The dying should not be despised. They have not failed. They are not bad. Death is an inevitable part of life. But ... they are also dying. The weak are weak. The failing are failing. It's okay to fail. But the lies we tell about this aren't helpful to anyone. Lying is not just unhelpful and inauthentic, it is cruel to the heroes.

To lie about what is beautiful, to lie about what is glorious, this game of pretense lacks compassion for the living. The strong, beautiful, healthy, happy - the heroes aren't just ignored, they are not seen. They are made to be invisible. And if they dare point out that they exist, they are made to feel as if they are bad, as if their success causes the dying to die. The dying were already dying before Atlas put them on his shoulders. His refusal to carry them didn't cause their death.

Great books on this subject include Atlas Shrugged, Loving What Is, and Nonviolent Communication. I don't know what it will be like for you, but the titles of the latter two turned me off to the point that I owned them but did not read them for years! I promise they are worth reading! Even if you are not a "touchy-feely" type. I also like Twilight of the Idols and Might is Right.

I Think I May Be Pro Yelling

I have a good friend with two kids under the age of five and a husband who is away a lot for work. She reads a parenting blog that I also enjoy, but unfortunately the woman who writes the blog has led her to conclude that if she ever "loses it" in front of her kids, she is "abusing them" and "ruining them for life." Good parents don't "lose it."

By "losing it" she means yelling. I keep seeing this on Facebook as well, "Yelling is abuse," people write. Never yell at your kids or you are the cause of murder and war.

I don't have the answer yet (more reading/thinking to do) but here is what I know so far and can share with you that gives me the inkling that this cannot be true.

Humans don't usually yell with intent to abuse, but rather because they don't feel heard.

When yelling-humans are listened to and feel heard, they generally stop yelling. And they feel grateful and connected to the person who listened to them.

When triggered-humans don't feel heard, they are capable of doing dangerous things in order to be heard. Their yelling is a wonderful and helpful social signal for us to stop and listen.

When a human doesn't feel heard, but has been raised not to yell, he doesn't not "lose it."  He just loses it in a non-yelling way, often by calmly and vindictively engaging in various manipulative or passive aggressive behaviors.

Or he loses it by causing violence to himself, the violence of stuffing down his feelings and needs with ice cream, television, video games, sex, workaholism, alcohol, pharmaceuticals, etc.

In many ways, yelling is actually more honest than not yelling. This reminds me of Foucault's Discipline and Punish. The physical punishments of history were--in many ways--simply more honest and open than the sneaky ways we punish/express power now.

For parents, yelling is not nearly as damaging to children as serenely and kindly rewarding and punishing them--controlling them. I wrote an entire book about this, so I wont go into it here, but using force against anyone is The Most Harmful Thing. Force can be done with violence, manipulation, or a quiet and serene expressions of power.

On that note: Maybe it all depends on intent and interpretation. The facial expression of disgust is supposedly the most disconnecting/destructive for relationships. I had a very loud yelling-mother who none-the-less made me feel very loved. I had a father who never yelled, but who I always felt despised me--I can still vividly remember the look of pure disgust on his face when he caught me doing something that displeased him. But I imagine there are people who could say the opposite.

Are we serving our children when we teach them that yelling-people are bad-people "abusing" them?

Most children yell. What do children decide about themselves by hearing that yelling is abusive and people who yell are bad?

Oh wait--is yelling only abusive when an adult does it?

That doesn't work for me. Non-contradiction axiom.

And people who teach their children to that yelling-adults are bad--but yelling-children are okay--are saying, "I am better than you. I am in control. You are not. You will be as good as me one day. But right now you are Bad." I don't think it's possible to excuse a child's yelling, but not an adult's, without implying the child is bad.

What if children were taught that yelling-people are just people with overwhelming unmet needs and need to be heard?

(With the caveat to know the difference between a yeller who needs to be heard and a yeller who has crossed the threshold of safety and may harm you and therefore you should get away.)

On that note: People who have lost their shit can be very dangerous. I do not think that the "benevolent authority" parents do their children a service by falsely giving them the message that they are powerless and incapable of making someone lose their shit.

Children can make people lose their shit. It may be a good thing for children to experience this at home where it's safe, so they know not to push strangers--or Grandpa--too far.

I have read, like these people crying abuse, the literature that states that those who have bosses who yell are much more likely to have high blood pressure and therefore (if high blood pressure is an actual cause and not just correlated) suffer from heart attacks.

So yelling raises blood pressure, but does it raise blood pressure because of how you were raised--to believe that yelling is abuse, and you are being abused, and this person is bad?

If you were raised to believe that a yelling person needs your compassion and listening and mirroring, if you felt like yelling-people weren't actually that scary because you had the skills to connect with them and help them through... would yelling still raise your blood pressure? Or would you feel like a competent person? There is a good chance my son will have a friend or a relative or a wife who one day yells at him--and I want him to feel competent at staying connected to that person and helping them through. This is what NVC teaches.

Another interesting thing I know is that the "not yelling" rule is an upperclass rule. Upperclass folks do not yell. They are in power and to yell--to imply people aren't hearing them--would lower their status, so they are taught as children to never ever ever ever yell. (This is conjecture. We don't actually know why upper class people tend to teach their children to not yell, but we do know that trend-wise, teaching children not to yell is an upper class thing.)

Middle class parents tend to follow this dictate as they are always interested in doing whatever upper class people do.

Lower class people yell. They also (often) beat their kids. And for those who consider this normal, it is not damaging. Studies have been done on this. I am not advocating beating children, but it is important to know that abuse is a judgement word, an interpretation. Many people believe they have been abused when people yell at them, other people just think this is normal human behavior and really don't worry about it so much. Same with hitting.

The never-yelling families tend to be not only upper and middle class, but also from WASP backgrounds. WASPs were the original never-yellers, and considered themselves superior to the nasty ethnic folks who yelled all the time.

To be anti-yelling is to be racist! Just kidding.

I took care of a lot of upper class children who basically melted down if anyone ever yelled, who literally couldn't handle someone yelling, who had no idea what to do if a fight broke out, etc. I don't think it is helpful for children to be raised to be this helpless. But then, I was raised lower class and that is a rather lower class position. (Lower class parents want their children to be "tough." Though I am not raising Anders to be "tough" around yelling-people, but rather, to feel competent at connecting with them.)

As adults, I see the children from the yelling-is-bad families blanketly write people off for the rest of time if they ever have an emotional outburst. These adults don't realize that this may be class prejudice and/or racism. That person who yells may have no idea that yelling is as inappropriate as you think it is.

Yelling is just one form of "losing it". Everyone "loses it" at some point in their lives, and most will "lose it" fairly often. The experience of being overcome with unmet needs--this is a common human experience. I watch newborn babies get overwhelmed and lose it. Young children do the same. Adults are no different. As adults, we might know how to "put off" our emotional release until we are home alone, but we all "lose it." It is not weird. It is not something that only happens to bad people. It is not even a rare occurrence. I do not think parents do their children a service by failing to introduce them to and teach them about this aspect of reality.

"Losing it" will never be socialized away. So what is a good way to lose it?

I would rather Anders yell, so that I can know there is a problem, listen, and help, than secretly stuff his face with a pint of ice cream.

As a parent, what if losing it in front of your kids is... wonderful? They are going to lose their shit. They probably do often. How you respond to them when they lose it, is exactly how you should teach them to respond to you when you lose it.

How you lose it is the model for how they will lose it when they get older. If you "lose it" into a bottle of wine or a video game ... that is actually more disconnecting than yelling. At least the yeller wants to talk to you.

In my personal experience, the NVC (listening to the yeller) response is actually far more effective than shaming them. It is the proper response to children who are flipping out ... and adults. No contradiction.

I have read that anger is a mask for tears. People yelling actually need to cry. But they don't want to appear weak or admit their powerlessness or they "don't cry" so they yell instead. Maybe if crying were more socially acceptable, there would be less yelling?

I remember in Marshall Rosenberg's book Non Violent Communication, he yelled at his kids about his needs, "I am feeling overwhelmed! I see mess and I want to see clean! I am so tired I can barely deal!" or something along those lines. I remember thinking, "If one is going to yell, that is how to do it properly."

So... I am leaning on the side of being yelling-accepting. But more research is required.

And to be clear: I don't think parents should start yelling at their kids all the time; I just don't think it's abuse. I don't think it's a tragedy. I don't think it damages children for life. I think the parent who yelled should tell her child she was feeling overwhelmed and could really use a hug.

But, many people wrote to me after I published this piece, there are yellers who seem to be yelling for power and control of the other person rather than from emotional upset. There are people who seem to be yelling to harm others! What about them?

That's exactly what NVC teaches – boundaries. We can listen to and empathize with a yeller without being controlled by him/her. When someone is yelling, it is never about you. It is always about them, etc. Yelling has no power over you, if you don't give it power over you.

I think that most of the time, the person who sees the yeller as wanting to control them is misreading the situation. If Anders wants me to buy him a toy, and I say, "No," he may be upset and yell. If I listen, empathize, mirror, and hug him, he usually is totally fine with not having the toy. It may have appeared as if he was yelling to manipulate me into buying him the toy, but what he was really needing was empathy.

Really.

I have seen this work with myself as well. I can be very upset about something that my husband did or didn't do, and after he listens to me and empathizes with me, he doesn't need to DO anything else. The empathy, the listening, that was what I needed. It's quite incredible to experience and quite beautiful. I absolutely love what NVC has taught us!

When you condemn something, when you hate it with all of your being, when people who do X are categorically super-bad, it's because you have used force against yourself to not engage in this behavior that you have desperately wanted to engage in. This was one of my epiphanies. I had already read about this in various psyc books, but I didn't truly understand it until one day I was shopping in Beverly Hills and became obsessed with how terribly everyone else was dressed. I sat down on a bench and people watched and berated everyone who passed in my head. "Schleppers!" I thought. "You should all be ashamed! You disgust me, look at yourselves!" Then I became fascinated with my own hatred of everyone, and it hit me: I forced myself to "look presentable" at all times, even when I was tired, even when I didn't feel like. I loathed spending an hour getting ready, resented it, but felt I had to look nice. I thought good people look presentable. I had even started to hate going to parties because it required an hour in front of the mirror! In that moment (about 5 years ago) I gave myself permission to be a total schlepper if I didn't feel like dressing up. I became a classic Californian, wearing my yoga pants and flip flops--in Beverly Hills even! After about two years of basically looking terrible all the time, I started to enjoy dressing up again. But now it's different. Now I dress up sometimes, when I want to, and it's fun. I actually love a chance to get dressed up and go to an event! The rest of the time I don't dress up. And that's okay.

My point is: The people condemning yelling ... really really really want to yell. And they can't. Because that would make them bad. And that kills them. If they can't, you should't be allowed to either! And if you do, you are bad!

As much as I think yelling is not a tragedy and should not be treated as such, as much as I think losing it with people is better than losing it into ice cream, it should also be noted that the idealization of the never-yeller is also based in reality, but we have confused the cause with the effect!

In our brains we categorize, look for patterns and trends. Then we generalize. Successful people and good self-care and communication skills are correlated. People with good self-care and communication skills tend to not resort to yelling very often. Perhaps they appear to us as wealthier or perhaps just happier. Either way, our brains are always seeking to learn from those who have what we want e.g. I want to be more like that person! He seems so happy and successful! I want to follow the example of those successful people! (This is probably the same reason why I was interested in dressing "presentably." I had noted the difference between how my lower class people presented themselves and how the upper classes presented themselves and decided to adopt the behavior of the class I wanted to join.)

Not-yelling (often) is the result of having good self-care and communication skills, not the cause.

Which means if you find yourself yelling often, most likely there are some things you want to look into. Either better self-care is required so more you have more of your needs met or better communication or emotional skills are required. People successful at getting their needs met won't "lose it" often.

I think people who have learned the beautiful and valuable art of communicating in peaceful and empathetic ways to get their needs met are admirable. They are heroes. But heroes are the exception, not the rule. And it is important not to mix the cause with the effect.

There are many horrible communicators out there who do not yell. There are people who say all the right things with derision and scorn in their voices. People who remain calm at all times – except for that facial tick. People who stonewall and think they are superior for it.

Many people who don't yell are not yelling because they have fantastic communication skills. They are not yelling because to yell would make them "bad." They don't yell and write the person who upset them off. They don't yell and play video games for five hours straight until they forget about what happened.

It's important, when communicating our ideals to the people around us, that we communicate causes not effect. We must admire the hard work and fortitude of those who earn great wealth – not the wealth itself as it could have been gotten in less-than-ideal ways. We must admire people with great communication skills, not people who "don't yell" as if that is the single thing required for being a good communicator.

Great communication skills + the self-esteem to assert ones needs + good boundaries and self-awareness + a strong connection with loved ones = people who rarely find the need to yell for all the right reasons.

These heroic and admirable people are easy to recognize because they don't have a problem with people who yell – they have empathy for them. Other people's emotions don't "control" them, so they don't fear them. They are comfortable with themselves, so they don't need other people to be like them.

Naturally anyone ranting about people who yell being abusive ... is not a good communicator, not empathetic, not in touch with his own emotions, and is not yelling for all the wrong reasons.

Privilege: This Idea Has Got To Go - The Road to Peace Does Not Start with Division

I recently succumbed to a quiz on Facebook that let me know that I am "not privileged" because I was born into poverty, and I am female. But I am "privileged" to be white, heterosexual, educated, happy to be female, and to not feel ashamed of or oppressed by my (lack of) religion.

This idea has got go. Let me explain--

Privilege means "special treatment." Academia has decided that to be a "normal" member of a given society necessarily means to be "treated better" than those who are "not normal."

In one sense academia is absolutely correct: of course it is easier to be "the norm" than it is to be different. Take something as benign as height. I am a woman who is almost six feet tall. This means I was teased a lot in elementary school. It means I am taller than 75% of men in this country--I did not enjoy the "privilege" of a large dating pool when I was younger. This means I "feel oppressed" every time I go shopping because the waistline of almost all shirts and dresses hit me at my breasts. It means if I want to wear heels I will be taller than every man at the party and sometimes even mistaken for a man. It means I had to get used to be stared at. It means the first thing anyone ever says to me at a bar is something about my height. It means that feeling comfortable in any standard seat--cars, busses, trains, planes--is a hopeless dream. It means that all kitchens, bathrooms, and showers will require me to hurt my back to use them. And that the only bed long enough for me to be comfortable in costs a fortune and doesn't fit in most bedrooms.

Yet no one wants to hear about how hard it is to be tall, so back to my point:

I went to Scandinavia once, and it was Heaven. I was finally the norm. I actually didn't even realize how uncomfortable (physically) the short-norm is here in Los Angeles until I went there. It sucks being a tall person living in a world designed for short people. Short people don't know how lucky they are! Not because it's inherently better to be short, but simply because in this society at this time it's more comfortable to be short because that is the average, norm, standard, etc.

Should short people feel guilty about this? Should they try to make it up to me? And: would it be accurate to describe them as "privileged?"

I think this would be a misuse of the word "privileged." I think "normal for our society" or "standard" or "average" or "mainstream" would be more clear. Academia uses "privileged" instead to" evoke awareness." But by "evoking awareness" they actually mean "You Should Feel Guilt."

The problem with inflicting guilt on those who are normal in some way is obvious: Who gets to decide which areas of normal are a privilege and which areas are not? Today, it is a "privilege" to be wealthy, white, heterosexual, and Christian. But it is not considered a "privilege" to be short, to eat the Standard American Diet, to follow Standard American Medical Dogma, to be a member of a Dominant Political Party, to feel seen and understood when watching Mainstream Television, to follow Mainstream Parenting Practices,  or to communicate in Standard American Judgement-Speak.

Why not?

I have never felt as oppressed for being female as I have for being super tall. Yet being female is what I get to complain about. Being from a poor background made my life a lot harder, but not nearly as hard as eating the WAPF diet. It's legal for me to work super hard to try to change social classes. It's not legal for me to eat how I want to. And despite my high quality education, people think of parents like me (who unschool their children and don't vaccinate them) as abusive. Because of my political views (Libertarian) I have FBI agents show up at my meetups and follow my social media. It is definitely scary to be openly homosexual in some places in this country. But it is also quite scary to be openly Libertarian.

And you know what--I know quite a few wealthy, white, heterosexual, Christian men who are not be able to eat what they want to because it is illegal, who suffer intense oppression for their political views, who feel physically uncomfortable all the time because of their size, who are shamed and despised by society for not raising their children in a mainstream way, who live in fear of CPS showing up at their door, who are considered weird for not wanting to sleep with 100 women, who feel angry, oppressed, and unfairly treated by their society. Is it possible that the "privilege" invented by academia is based on a subjective experience that no one gets to fully escape?

Is there really a guy so average that he has never felt judged or oppressed by his society in his entire life? Because I've never met that guy. Everyone I have ever gotten to know, once I know him well enough, turns out to have a freak flag of some kind.

I would like to suggest the following:

1. In any human group there will always be an infinite number of ways people can be categorized.

2. In every category there will be a bell curve--a norm.

3. Norms are always in flux, always changing.

4. The current Norms--and those people who represent them--are not the enemy. 

4. The enemy is and always will be: the oppression of those who are not the norm, the minority of any given bell curve.

5. Everyone is a minority in some way.

6. The smallest minority, the minority everyone should fight for, is not the categorization of the day, but the individual. The oppression we should all fight is the oppression of the individual. The respect we should all demand is the respect for the individual. Not a given category.

7. Focusing on the category du jour doesn't unite, it divides. It doesn't lead to peace, it leads to war. Regulation, force, condemnation, guilt--these all lead to war.

8. The road to peace is changing our focus, from the "who is the bigger victim" contest, to a discussion of what we are needing in this moment--which is usually the freedom to be ourselves.

9. The road to peace is clarity, honestly, and vulnerability. When I am feeling angry about some perceived oppression, the way for me to connect with my oppressor is not self-righteous indignation, but the truth of my experience, which is usually: "I feel so lonely." When I see a movie with not a single intelligent female in it. When no one in my social class understands me. When I wander the aisles of grocery stores starving and there is literally nothing I want to buy. When I see condemnation or disgust on your face--I feel so sad, so lonely, and so scared. At first I think I want to fight my oppressors, to hit them, to make them suffer as I have suffered … but the truth is I just want them to have compassion for me, for how hard it has been, how hard it will be to be different. The great news is that feeling different and lonely are universal human emotions that everyone can empathize with. 
10. Individualism is the answer. Not compassion for my gender, but compassion for the person in front of you, not compassion for my economic class, but compassion for person in front of you, not compassion for "what it must be like to be x," but compassion for the individual in front of you.

This is how our brains work. A category of people is abstract. Compassion felt for an abstraction is not real compassion but abstract compassion, hypothetical compassion. Real compassion, felt compassion caused by our mirror neurons, the compassion that leads to peace can only happen when humans perceive the person in front of them--and we can only perceive, focus on, and get mirror neurons for one person at a time--one REAL person.

We were all raised in school to feel compassion hypothetically. I would like to suggest that this is not the way.

The other day I had to listen to my friend tell me that the government needs to "nudge" me to make the "right" decisions. I had two choices, I could say: "I feel so scared when I hear you say that you want to force me to do what you think is good for me instead of letting me decide for myself. I feel so scared." Or I could say, "I will fight you to the death for my right to make 'bad' decisions, you evil oppressive scum!"

Which one of these roads will lead to connection, mirror neurons, compassion, respect, and peace?

Notes:

-My brother, who is 6'8" spent many years being angry that the first thing anyone ever said to him was about his height. I took a different approach, choosing instead to see the constant comments about my height as an attempt to connect with me. My height is not the norm. It would be silly for me to pretend otherwise and sad for me to get angry at people who don't know just how many people comment on my height every day. I read an article on Facebook recently in which a black girl expresses a similar wish, that she could get through a week without someone commenting on her race. I imagine redheads are equally bored with comments about their hair. But anger at everyone who accidentally points out that you are not the norm in some way is not the solution. 

-I can hear the academically brainwashed (who I have just alienated with that judgement:) saying, but some norms lead to unfair social advantages?!! Those born to wealth do have an unfair advantage! Tall people have an unfair social advantage even if they suffer physically! First of all, tall men maybe, but at least in my experience--there are plenty of potential male employers out there who have no desire to hire a woman taller than they are. 

-Again: stop categorizing. Focus on the individual. If you focus on the individual as a whole, we all have our advantages and our disadvantages. It is only when you name a category that one of us can be a winner and the other a loser. Look at whole people. If you look at a whole person you will find that no one has it that easy. We all have our struggles. We have all experienced pain.

-I am not suggesting that "Life is fair." Nor am I suggesting that "Life is not fair." Any abstract statement should only be made in a certain context, so I could say, "Life is fair in death. We all die." Or I could say, "Life is unfair in its very nature. Humans tend to value fairness. Mother Nature doesn't."

-Humans are so obsessed with this abstract idea of fairness that many cultures invented an afterlife that would finally make things fair! Common sense: There is no way to make life fair (please YouTube Harrison Bergeron). Like I have argued before--if wealthy people should pay a penalty for the advantages wealth provides, pretty people should have to pay a penalty for their faces and strong people should have to pay a penalty for their athleticism. Where does it stop? This obsession with fairness? And who gets to decide what is the best advantage to have and what advantage is not important? You cannot decide for me. This has to be an individual decision based on individual experiences and values. Wealth is an advantage for some children; it is a disadvantage for others. Abstractions should not be made outside of a context.

-When we communicate honestly about envying someone who we think got lucky in some way, we find that all people are … people. Imperfect. Struggling. When we say, "Man, you are so lucky you were born to wealth. You should feel really guilty." They cannot reply honestly. They are not allowed to complain. They are not allowed to feel what they feel, to be real, honest, and human. They cannot connect with us. If we were really in touch with what was really going on, we might say, "Oh man I envy you for being born into such wealth!" He can connect with that, he knows what envy feels like, and he can say honestly, "Well ... I had a lot of money, but a miserable childhood. In fact, I'm still miserable. I've been envying you this whole time because you of your close relationship with your family and how happy you seem!"

-We cannot make life fair. I wrote a blog post about this before--http://roslynross.blogspot.com/2014/12/book-review-kohlbers-theory-of-moral.html

-Though I disagree with Kohlberg, I do agree that Level 7 moral thinkers (the highest level of morality) give up on fairness and focus on compassion. Read NonViolent Communication!

-What should we do about how unfairly mother nature confers her advantages? Nothing. Because to "fix" it requires playing God, punishing some for their so-called advantages and rewarding others for their so-called disadvantages. This creates a society of people who all want to be disadvantaged. It creates a society of people who feel punished for what was not their fault--and for what is good about them. It creates a victim mentality and a war mentality instead of a connecting and compassionate mentality. 

-But that is a utilitarian argument. What should we do about unfairness? We should never act on an abstraction that isn't contextualized. Once there is an actual context--which means individuals--we can decide the best way to get our needs met. But in the abstract, we deal with hypothetical people. This doesn't work.