Derail MRAs Thread - Parenting Discussion

[Creepy-theticalanti]

.

[Radio]

In fairness though, why couldn't he have just walked to the car holding his son's hand like a normal father or mother would do? It would seem very suspicious in a crowded public place for someone to be carrying a child against their will completely out of the mall. While I'm sure he has a good deal of sexism to deal with, I doubt not everyone is as sexist against this father as he suspects. If he constantly resorts to physically asserting his parental authority instead of teaching his kid through words, it doesn't give the impression of a good father but rather one that is borderline abusive.

sorry, i know you have great intentions william but have you ever dealt with children for extended periods of time? children aren't always well-behaved heavenly pooplings of god and sometimes when a particular tantrum gets too bad, you have to carry them because they're being little shits and refusing to walk / lying down on the floor and thrashing around.

source: i am an uncle of 5 children aged < 10 years old.

[Reficulris]

In fairness though, why couldn't he have just walked to the car holding his son's hand like a normal father or mother would do? It would seem very suspicious in a crowded public place for someone to be carrying a child against their will completely out of the mall. While I'm sure he has a good deal of sexism to deal with, I doubt not everyone is as sexist against this father as he suspects. If he constantly resorts to physically asserting his parental authority instead of teaching his kid through words, it doesn't give the impression of a good father but rather one that is borderline abusive.

Eh, william, Children can be little monsters at certain ages. The "borderline abusive" comment is uncalled for and very harsh, be a bit more mercifull, maybe both kid and father had a bad day (well, it turned into a worse day lol). The point is not wether or not picking up a child is the right or wrong way to deal with such a kid, but why this guy gets taken into custody for it.

but than, I'm of the oppinion, in this case, that a few problems like this weigh up against the possibility of a child being abducted and no-one noticing.

I don't think in Holland/europe you would need hours to clear things up, just show ID and such, but i CAN immagine that it hurts to be distrusted by strangers when you're walking with your own kid,.

Immagine the trauma of the kid!! In the end, it still didn't get the toy!!!!


Edit: I remeber a time where I was walking with my Ex-wife and her brother of 15years younger through a supermarket. He begged for candy and my ex-wife said no. The kid said the legendary words "Don't hit me, mamma!!"

I was literally roling over the floor laughing, and she was standing there petrified by shame as all people in the supermarket looked at us like we where white trash childbeaters. The kid was a master manipulator

Edit2: his real parents would have, and did fall for that line btw, the kid was mystified that it didn't work on her.

[Reficulris]

See my above comment. It wasn't just simply "picking up a child". He had to have carried his screaming kid for SEVERAL MINUTES completely out of the entire mall, in front of hundreds of people. It must have been quite the scene.

Yes i saw your post, it's good and clear. It misses the point though. If a woman did the same thing it wouldn't be a similar problem socially (even though it'd still be bad for the kid, we agree here).

(moderately) bad parenthood isn't illegal, if it would have been a lot of prisons would be full of mums and dads, people suck at child rearing ;-)

[Reficulris]

Also: WHY IS NO ONE LAUGHING ABOUT MY HORRIBLE BROTHER IN LAW STORY???

[Reficulris]

To both you and @Radio - I don't completely disagree that there was sexism involved here - it's possible people could have been judging the situation with bias. However, I'm just pointing out that hundreds of people must have viewed the situation, and dozens of people called the police - so unless you believe that ALL OF THOSE PEOPLE WERE SEXIST. Other questions come to mind - how was this dad carrying his child? Was the child screaming in pain for him to put him down? Was he carrying him by his legs, underneath his arms, etc.? If we've already deemed that there was enough time, SEVERAL MINUTES, for people to have called the cops and 3 vehicles show up outside, then that was long enough time for the kid to have been hurt by how his dad was carrying him. Again, the dad mentioned nothing in his post by HOW he was carrying the child, but it was enough for dozens of people to quickly judge that it was wrong and have CPS case against him.

It's possible that the hundreds of people who saw the situation / the dozens who called the cops / the police themselves and / CPS are all being sexist against this dad, but in my opinion it's more likely that simply this one dad doesn't know how to properly handle his own kid or not hurt him when carrying him, and is blaming everyone else on being sexist.

In that sense you're totally right, there must have been at least something to catch their attention.

Is this where I suggest you conduct an experiment by abducting a child from a mall and seeing how far you can get with it? ;-)

[anndelise]

@William and @Reficulris
I'm going to chime in here regarding the dad carrying the screaming kid out of the store.

My daughter always had a hard time with change. Everything had to be exactly the same. When grocery shopping, if i didn't follow the exact same route, she would scream. I'm not talking whine, nor tantrum. I'm talking scream like she's being stabbed over and over and over again. (She has symptoms that place her as being on the autism-spectrum, but isn't autistic. This was all part of that.) it was high pitched, loud, piercing. Her back would arch suddenly when it would happen, and if she hadn't been supported in a seat, the arching would suddenly throw her on the ground. If you touched her, at all, no matter how gentle or caring, the stimulation would lead to her screaming even louder. If you tried talking to her, no matter how gentle and caring, the stimulation would lead to her screaming even louder. There's no words in her scream, just the loud high pitch ear piercing everyone drops what their doing to go save the obviously being killed child kind of scream.

The only solution for the scream was to wait until she screamed herself out and hope she takes some breaths in between.

Except for when it would happen in a store. Every. single. grocery shopping trip.
The employees became used to it, shaking their heads when they would see us come in.
I would receive lots of helpfule advice like "just don't let her do that". Really? And how do you propose I don't let her do that? Should I smother her mouth? Should I hit her? Should I lock her up in a closet at home while I go on a grocery run? "I don't know, just don't let her do that."

Then there were the people complaining. You know, like the stories you hear about being on a plane for a couple of hours while some 'bad parent' let their child cry the entire trip, making everyone else's lives miserable, not caring about anyone else's comfort, etc. but if that parent on the plane gives in to her crying child, then she gets complained about because she's teaching the kid to throw a tantrum to get what he wants, or is teaching her kid bad habits, or is being a bad parent because her child is ruling her actions, etc etc. She's damned no matter what she does, simply because her child dared to cry in the presence of other people.

Yes, this happens even off the planes, like in grocery stores.
I had to remove my daughter from the stimulation so she could have a chance to recover. Yes, William, that meant carrying her out of the store, or pushing her out in the stroller. (Ever tried pushing a food cart in a store while also pushing a stroller? Not easy. And taking a screaming child with an arched stiff back out of a cart seat to put into a stroller is nigh impossible...and remember, the touch makes it even worse.) So usually it was abandon cart to carry her outside. I learned quickly enough that there is no safe place to sit outside while your kid is screaming at the top of her lungs, with arched back. So I began taking my car. At first I would sit in the car with her while she screamed. But the car makes it even louder and louder and louder, reverbrating off the walls and windows until it feels like she's screaming straight into your ears. And it doesn't stop! This screaming from any kind of change happened at home constantly. We're talking at least 10 times a day, every f'n day. (And yes, I took her to the dr to try to get help, to try to find out what's wrong. But people who didn't know her would see the screaming and just jump to the conclusion that i must have done something wrong and that's why it was happening. So I could never get anyone to spend the time trying to help me figure out what was going on. The most i got was "night terrors" for when it would happen at night (about 3-5 times a night), due to the sleep/dream sequence. (I think her dreams led to the night ones.)

Anyways, back to the car. After 3 years of this, every day from birth, I finally had to start removing myself from her else I was at risk of losing my temper. So I finally began standing outside the car while she screamed herself out inside it. Yes i had windows open for airflow. And I was always right there, leaning against the car, waiting until the sound changed enough to let me know that she was starting to come to herself again and would finally accept some soothing touches and whispers.

And of course, I was constantly being judged and accused of all sorts of things. People would assume it was a tantrum...it wasn't even close to one. There's a definite difference between a tantrum and that scream. She was constantly being kicked out of day care because of that scream. And I couldn't get someone to babysit her until an Indian family moved in. But we always had to be careful about when they could watch her, and for how long before the screaming would begin anew. Thankfully they were willing to work with me to help her. They were the first one's to mention autism to me. But at the time autisitc children were generally viewed as introverted, while my daughter was definitely an extrovert.

And before you jump in like those other ignorant judging people, know that before i knew I was pregnant, I had been taking psychiatry meds for at least 7-8 months. And that I didn't know I was pregnant until I was 5 months along. Which means that the first 5 months of her existence she was being filled with a variety of psychiatry meds as we tried to find something that would stabilize me. One of those meds is now somewhat known for altering something in the fetus' brain that blocks it from being able to make new neural connections. Which means that the learning process for the growing child is slow, and painful. New stimulus, changes in routines, etc would be difficult for the child to process, and I am convinced after what my daughter went through, that it was also physically painful somehow.

As she aged, gradually her screaming and 'night terrors' slowed down, didn't last as long, turned from the stiff arched back screams into her covering her ears and closing her eyes to block further stimulus while she tried processing what was happening. At 18yo she still covers her ears and closes her eyes when faced with new...and thus confusing...info/requests...but now she has a team of people helping her. It took 16 years before anyone (other than me and that indian family) finally sat up and took notice that maybe there was something psychologically/medically going on.


Now, back to the parent gender thing. Knowing what i've experienced in terms of other people's judgments, actions, attitudes, etc, I can easily imagine that a male parent going through even just a quarter of what I went through, would easily be accused of far worse than I was.

[Reficulris]

@William and @Reficulris
I'm going to chime in here regarding the dad carrying the screaming kid out of the store.

My daughter always had a hard time with change. Everything had to be exactly the same. When grocery shopping, if i didn't follow the exact same route, she would scream. I'm not talking whine, nor tantrum. I'm talking scream like she's being stabbed over and over and over again. (She has symptoms that place her as being on the autism-spectrum, but isn't autistic. This was all part of that.) it was high pitched, loud, piercing. Her back would arch suddenly when it would happen, and if she hadn't been supported in a seat, the arching would suddenly throw her on the ground. If you touched her, at all, no matter how gentle or caring, the stimulation would lead to her screaming even louder. If you tried talking to her, no matter how gentle and caring, the stimulation would lead to her screaming even louder. There's no words in her scream, just the loud high pitch ear piercing everyone drops what their doing to go save the obviously being killed child kind of scream.

The only solution for the scream was to wait until she screamed herself out and hope she takes some breaths in between.

Except for when it would happen in a store. Every. single. grocery shopping trip.
The employees became used to it, shaking their heads when they would see us come in.
I would receive lots of helpfule advice like "just don't let her do that". Really? And how do you propose I don't let her do that? Should I smother her mouth? Should I hit her? Should I lock her up in a closet at home while I go on a grocery run? "I don't know, just don't let her do that."

Then there were the people complaining. You know, like the stories you hear about being on a plane for a couple of hours while some 'bad parent' let their child cry the entire trip, making everyone else's lives miserable, not caring about anyone else's comfort, etc. but if that parent on the plane gives in to her crying child, then she gets complained about because she's teaching the kid to throw a tantrum to get what he wants, or is teaching her kid bad habits, or is being a bad parent because her child is ruling her actions, etc etc. She's damned no matter what she does, simply because her child dared to cry in the presence of other people.

Yes, this happens even off the planes, like in grocery stores.
I had to remove my daughter from the stimulation so she could have a chance to recover. Yes, William, that meant carrying her out of the store, or pushing her out in the stroller. (Ever tried pushing a food cart in a store while also pushing a stroller? Not easy. And taking a screaming child with an arched stiff back out of a cart seat to put into a stroller is nigh impossible...and remember, the touch makes it even worse.) So usually it was abandon cart to carry her outside. I learned quickly enough that there is no safe place to sit outside while your kid is screaming at the top of her lungs, with arched back. So I began taking my car. At first I would sit in the car with her while she screamed. But the car makes it even louder and louder and louder, reverbrating off the walls and windows until it feels like she's screaming straight into your ears. And it doesn't stop! This screaming from any kind of change happened at home constantly. We're talking at least 10 times a day, every f'n day. (And yes, I took her to the dr to try to get help, to try to find out what's wrong. But people who didn't know her would see the screaming and just jump to the conclusion that i must have done something wrong and that's why it was happening. So I could never get anyone to spend the time trying to help me figure out what was going on. The most i got was "night terrors" for when it would happen at night (about 3-5 times a night), due to the sleep/dream sequence. (I think her dreams led to the night ones.)

Anyways, back to the car. After 3 years of this, every day from birth, I finally had to start removing myself from her else I was at risk of losing my temper. So I finally began standing outside the car while she screamed herself out inside it. Yes i had windows open for airflow. And I was always right there, leaning against the car, waiting until the sound changed enough to let me know that she was starting to come to herself again and would finally accept some soothing touches and whispers.

And of course, I was constantly being judged and accused of all sorts of things. People would assume it was a tantrum...it wasn't even close to one. There's a definite difference between a tantrum and that scream. She was constantly being kicked out of day care because of that scream. And I couldn't get someone to babysit her until an Indian family moved in. But we always had to be careful about when they could watch her, and for how long before the screaming would begin anew. Thankfully they were willing to work with me to help her. They were the first one's to mention autism to me. But at the time autisitc children were generally viewed as introverted, while my daughter was definitely an extrovert.

And before you jump in like those other ignorant judging people, know that before i knew I was pregnant, I had been taking psychiatry meds for at least 7-8 months. And that I didn't know I was pregnant until I was 5 months along. Which means that the first 5 months of her existence she was being filled with a variety of psychiatry meds as we tried to find something that would stabilize me. One of those meds is now somewhat known for altering something in the fetus' brain that blocks it from being able to make new neural connections. Which means that the learning process for the growing child is slow, and painful. New stimulus, changes in routines, etc would be difficult for the child to process, and I am convinced after what my daughter went through, that it was also physically painful somehow.

As she aged, gradually her screaming and 'night terrors' slowed down, didn't last as long, turned from the stiff arched back screams into her covering her ears and closing her eyes to block further stimulus while she tried processing what was happening. At 18yo she still covers her ears and closes her eyes when faced with new...and thus confusing...info/requests...but now she has a team of people helping her. It took 16 years before anyone (other than me and that indian family) finally sat up and took notice that maybe there was something psychologically/medically going on.


Now, back to the parent gender thing. Knowing what i've experienced in terms of other people's judgments, actions, attitudes, etc, I can easily imagine that a male parent going through even just a quarter of what I went through, would easily be accused of far worse than I was.

Many people are dumb judging assholes it's the thing that i've always disliked the most. It's so easy to assume the worst from distance. Sorry you had to go through that.

[InvisibleJim]

[Words]

Feminists are weird.