The only thing worse then not raising your voice at a child is never raising your voice. There is a time and place and wrong times/places happen. That is part of people interaction and not all people interact in the same way or very well.
I mean, yeah it sucks she’s missing her cartoons. I remember that mentality. I also remember pitching a fit about it never got me anything.
(I also almost never got to see after school cartoons because we lived so far away and both parents worked late).
Just to get this into perspective: I work at a theme park. Some people NEED the back or the front (of the roller-coaster), OR THEY WILL DIE. I hope some of you laughed at that, because I’m not kidding. For example, this one time, I asked “How many?” The answer I received was “I want the back.” This went back and forth a few times until I ascertained how many there were (2). I asked if she okay with 14 out of 15 rows, and this woman had a MELTDOWN. Never mind there are people being killed, murdered, raped, tortured in this world, I NEED ROW 15 or I’M GOING TO DIE.
Ahem. My basic point is you don’t always get what you want in life. It’s okay to be disappointed, even temper tantrum about it momentarily… but in the end, not a big deal.
I don’t understand how worrying about raising your voice to your children is a “first world problem” second and third world cultures still have children and how to raise them the best way possible is always a worry, wherever you may be, if you’re a parent. Wtf does this have to with roller coasters?
I honestly can’t think of a time where someone used the term “first-world problem” to describe something where they weren’t using it for comedic purposes. Given how callous the Internet is (yeah, I going with the Internet being a single entity, made up if everyone on it) I think a vast majority of folks online know that “first-world problems” are just a joke, and shouldn’t be taken too seriously (aside from the “it could be worse, so don’t worry about it” aspect of it)
My current first-world problem is that my coffee mug keeps the coffee too hot for too long (the horror!)
Yeah, “first world problems” is snarky and mean (like much internet humor is), but it’s mostly just a tongue-in-cheek way of laughing at what big deals people make over relatively little things. Like NEEDING the back of the roller coaster. Really? Maybe some people SHOULD feel guilty about bitching over petty things.
I think he was trying to point out just how idiotic some people can be and that yeah, most of this self entitled sh*t happens only in first world countries. In second or third world countries children generally don’t throw fits in order to get their way as their lives are not so spoiled and pampered. A child in a small African doesn’t scream and yell about wanting a candy bar because they know it’s hard enough just to get regular food.
But in America there are children who will not only scream and yell about not getting what they want, they will hit their parents or throw stuff because if they don’t get what they want “They Will Just Die”.
@SadSD, you’re completely missing Kate’s point, it’s not about raising your voice.
A first world problem – I’m gonna die if the color of my pop-tart isn’t what I want it to be.
A real-world problem – I’m gonna die because I don’t have food to eat.
Is it condescending to point out that the first objection in an overly wealthy society, what someone’s taking to be a matter of life or death and throwing a tantrum over is total nonsense?
I think it is more about the entitlement mentality. I used to be Medical and Safety Officer for my company’s Emergency Response Team. We had a potential release of a hazardous gas. We had to shut down an exterior corridor because it could be hazardous. I had collage educated engineers arguing with me about not letting them enter a hallway because of gas that could kill them so they could go get their car keys or cigarettes out of the break room. They were directed to go down the stairs, cross across the building and come up the stairs or elevator next to the break room. No, I got told, “I can hold my breath”. Worse there were people lining up to just walk down there until I threatened to have them all written up for failing to follow safety instructions. People are so wrapped up in thier own little bubble that they can’t see any other perspective at times. I finally quit because one of the stupid lemmings was going to kill itself and I would be responsible.
No, my point was 100% about the cartoon thing. I actually have a really strict policy on yelling (unless you’re joking with you’re friends, but that’s another matter altogether): do not yell unless someone is about to be hurt. Yelling angrily is rude, and scary. I think if everyone was recorded for a day, we would be surprised how often we raised our voices when we really didn’t need to.
…That’s my tiny rant on yelling. It’s something that bothers me.
Hunny I hear you. Well actually for me its front all the way on rollercoasters but I never through a fit about it. Anyways I work as a bank teller and sometimes we run low on certain denominations of money espeically on fridays because its payday and its the end of the week. Well we will get people who pitch a total fit if we tell them “Sorry but I can not give it to you in that way is it alright if we give it another” its frustrating sometimes
In all fairness, I don’t think missing the cartoons is Selkie’s biggest motivator here, although it is probably the one that’s easiest to put into words and has a deadline with it. In the first panel, she says “I don’ts wanna stays ins school!” and in the second panel she says “I don’ts wanna be heres!”
That got me thinking, Selkie is different. Other kids have called her a devil just for trying to talk to them. Amanda is in her class. It was way to easy for Amanda to convince a new kid that Selkie was a monster. Mrs. Haversham-Zhang stated outright that she had few friends amongst the other children. On top of everything else, she just got her shirt stolen not to long ago. School is probably not a place where she feels safe or happy, and right when she finally feels she’s made it through the day and is anticipating the promise of safety, comfort, and cartoons, she’s blindsided with an extension of her school day.
Todd heard her mention cartoons first, so he thinks that’s her only motivation, and he’s to preocupied being (rightfully) upset at what he thinks is the teachers playing a cruel joke to expend much brain power on trying to work out the meaning of a conversation he thinks should already be over. Selkie keeps pressing the issue because she’s not comfortable with spending extra time in this place without warning, reassurance, or even an explanation of why it is important (from her point of view it should be unnecessary to ask about the worksheet now that she has already explained it). Todd still thinks this is the cartoon and is upset that that’s her first priority when he’s trying to look out for her well-being. He snaps at her.
From Selkie’s point of view Todd has decided to keep her in a place where she feels unsafe longer than necessary on a whim, treated her concerns as unimportant, and yelled at her for trying to make him understand. From Todd’s point of view, Selkie was belligerently pestering him over unimportant issues when he was trying to take care of her.
I may be reading too far into this, but it felt like there was more to it than just an arguement over cartoons. Selkie looks a bit frightened in panel two, when she says that she doesn’t want to be here. And, in the previous page, she responds with a shocked “Whats?!” immediately upon the suggestion of going back inside. It seems like it would have to be a reaction to the idea of going back inside for her to react that way so quickly. If it was the cartoons themselves she was worried about, I would think she would be initially curious or confused as to why her Dad wanted to go back into school (which I’m guessing is unusual), followed by the “Oh no” when she realized this would interfere with cartoon time.
I really don’t think it was about missing cartoons … I think she doesn’t want to make a fuss about the test. She’s used to getting the least trouble from her classmates when she’s quiet and that’s her response to something like that word problem. So when her dad says he wants to talk to the teacher, she panicked.
You will. I promise. It’s part of being a parent. Being a *good parent* is knowing when you’ve done it, pulling your shit together, and apologizing to your kid afterwards. Then trying to change parenting tactics so you don’t keep doing all the time.
If anything, I think it’s *good* for a kid to see their parents be not-perfect-parents from time to time, especially if the parent then backs up, apologizes, and tries to make it right. It teaches the kid that nobody’s perfect, they don’t have to pretend to be, and this is what you do when you screw up.
It’s all about context. And you have to explain context. And you always have to love. Children can understand that anger is not a lack of love. So yeah, (their/your) actions have consequences, but love transcends all that.
Maybe because I grew up being spanked, and it never hurt me and I was well behaved as a child because of it. Maybe because I spanked my children and when my oldest was 16 she said to me that I was the only one in our family that she respected because I made her tow the line.
And kids who grow up respecting no authority at all will end up as self-centered b***ards, who respect nobody, and tend to think only of themselves. Internet’s full of them, and you won’t be able to convince me that that’s better than mild physical punishment.
Please notice that we’re not talking about beating a kid black and blue every day, no matter what they’ve done. There’s a very stark difference between physical punishment and physical child abuse.
So you’re saying every kid with ODD is a self-centered bastard? That’s like saying that every sociopath is a murderer… it’s wrong and it’s incredibly stigmatizing.
Pro-tip: it makes them immune to indoctrination, which generally leads to higher IQs (via favoring reflective thinking over intuitive thinking) if they aren’t abused by intolerant parents. But hey, believe what you want…
ODD is characterized by constant and persistent temper tantrums, argumentativeness, being spiteful and vindictive, and a pattern of blaming others for one’s own mistakes or misbehavior.
“ODD in adults is characterized by a pattern of behavior that violates the basic human rights of others, as well as disobeying societal rules. ”
It tends to result in very few friends, and an inability to keep a job as an adult.
I can see why any parent would be extremely averse to raising their kids in a way that would cause them to emulate ODD behavior. It’s painful for everyone else to deal with.
The majority of disrespectful or self-centered kids don’t have a personality disorder preventing them from improving their behavior.
Do you?
I’m confused. Where are you drawing the connection between what I said and a kid with ODD? I never once mentioned anyone with an actual disorder. Perhaps you’re projecting a bit too much?
Religious indoctrination has a slew of known effects on the cognitive abilities of a child, all of them negative. Decreased sense of empathy, decreased IQ, generally lessened vocal and communication skills, higher acknowledgement of authority… Yeah, it’s not like it’s a hard conclusion to reach.
Ok now this is how one should raze a child in my eyes; step one, when they start to understand better that’s when you as a parent needs to be an authority figure and teach a child what’s right and wrong acceptable punishments are the “look”, yelling, extra chores, timeout, and grounding, step 2, when their teens let them do what they will do and repermand them only when its severe, step 3, adulthood, treat them as equals and be a sorse of wisdom. Also yes you should teach a child what you believe in and all other belife systems. I think I came out ok but parents didn’t repermand me enough so I’m kinda rough around the edges.
The studies and research I’ve seen on religion and families show a greater resilience to trauma, improved social skills in children, and improved psychological health. Yes, there is a greater respect for authority figures like police, teachers, etc., but I’m not inclined to see that as a bad thing.
Nothing I’ve studied shows any correlation between a healthy family environment (religious or not) and the negative effects you listed. “Decreased sense of empathy, decreased IQ, generally lessened vocal and communication skills” are all things that result from abuse or cult situations, not normal practice of religious beliefs and moderate parental discipline.
Those who qualify as “high religiosity” have roughly 6-12 IQ points lower, in general, than atheists in the same socio-economic brackets.
religious people score lower on tests of empathy, including both animal empathy and human empathy for pain and hardships.
And resilience against trauma is because they’re deluding themselves, and they rarely benefit from trauma. I can’t consider that a benefit, since they aren’t learning.
I grew up in a pretty religious household.
My IQ is somewhere in the 133-137 range (depending on which test you refer to, as well as there being varying aspects within each test. My communication skills are exemplary, and am one of the most empathetic people I know. (And not just by my own judgement; many people have echoed my opinion on it.)
As such, I can tell you from first-hand experience and without regret or hesitation that you are completely full of shit. Either that, or you are trolling. If you ARE serious, however, you have a fundamentally flawed view on parenting, and should therefore never try it for yourself.
Not to be attacking anyone, but “asserting that you’re the parent” and “authoritative parenting” are 2 different things, so before anyone goes telling others to “learn a bit of psychology” (darn, too late) they should be sure of what it is they’re speaking out against, and not just being contradictory/rude in a troll-like manner (not saying anyone IS a troll, that could very well be your belief, but the manner it was brought up was quite…brusk)
That aside, it looks like this page gave everybody a feels (to use silly Internet-speak terminology)
No, it’s really not. The assertion that your status *as* a parent has any bearing by bringing it up is also an implication toward the submission to that authority, which is how authoritarianism is defined.
The effects of authoritarian parenting on a child is well documented, and is the subject of continuous research.
Just like people aren’t more wizened by their age, and teachers don’t always know the depth of their subject, parents are usually not the best source to derive information from.
“Authoritative parenting relies on positive reinforcement and infrequent use of punishment. Parents are more aware of a child’s feelings and capabilities and support the development of a child’s autonomy within reasonable limits. There is a give-and-take atmosphere involved in parent-child communication and both control and support are exercised in authoritative style parenting. Research shows that this style is most beneficial when parenting children.“ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parenting#Parenting_styles
Yes, and you’re the only one saying things about authoritarian. None of us have tried to argue for that. But you’re equating any punishments with authoritarian, rather than authoritative. Notice the “infrequent use of punishment”? You can punish a child without going overboard.
For someone who knows the studies, you could stand to learn a bit of psychology yourself. Most notably, the fact that saying ‘I’m right and you’re wrong’ is the single worst way to convince anyone of anything, even when you have evidence to back you up.
That flare of resentment you just felt when I told you you were wrong? That’s what everyone reading your posts feels. You come across as arrogant and dismissive of everyone else’s experiences, opinions, and beliefs. And *that*, more than anything, is what is going to keep people from listening to you.
I expect everyone to know the facts, and care very little for people who don’t or aren’t willing to do the research.
and I don’t have resentment, and it’s comical that you think I am capable of that.
If even one person does the research because of the points I posited, then I consider it a benefit. Anyone who doesn’t listen wouldn’t be likely to change something so personal anyway *shrugs*
Aita, I’m saying this with everyone’s best interests in mind, but your comments come over to me as those of someone with bipolar disorder, who is currently in hypomanic or manic phase. You’re aggressive, you’re argumentative, you lack compassion and empathy, you see things as black-and-white, and obviously must have the last word.
For the record, I didn’t say he was an “authoritarian parent”. I also do not believe in spanking. But would you prefer a child that just ran all over their parents? I’ve seen them, and they are obnoxious. Often, they turn into obnoxious adults.
At this point Todd should let Selkie know that there are things that are more important than cartoons – things like her. He’s doing this because somebody was messing with her.
You really don’t. Teaching empathy and questioning is all that’s required. You shouldn’t “teach” a child what your right-and-wrong are, for quite a few reasons.
I strongly disagree with this stance. Not teaching children the difference between right (or appropriate, or correct, or situationally correct, or whatever you want to use) and wrong (or whatever) behavior is detrimental to everyone involved, including anyone with whom the child may interact in the future.
All this crunchy, feel-good parenting stuff is great and all, but it totally misses the point that children NEED and WANT firm limits, and to know what is and isn’t acceptable. Did Todd lose his cool a little bit here? Yes, but Selkie was acting in an inappropriate (annoying and spoiled) manner and she needed to be taught that it wasn’t okay.
No, she doesn’t need to be taught, she needs to come to an understanding on her own. Todd didn’t explain *why* he was doing what he was doing, he didn’t explain the situation, and he didn’t actually ask for her input, he’s just doing what he wants and effectively ignoring her input.
A child can be self-governing, and *should* be, because it’s required of them as they become an adult. The world doesn’t have strict limits, why should children?
Wow, and I bet that if you have children that they are perfect little angels because you sit them down and explain things to them every they misbehave. *heavy sarcasm here*
I agree pashakitty, kids need rules and I’ve seen what happens when they don’t have a punishment. This is what I had and I’m better for it. Also before anyone says this is the old way of thinking I’m 16 years old and this is how I will raze my children. Adopted or biological it wont matter.
There are situations where punishment is appropriate, however it is not a substitute for teaching, guiding, and all the other things involved in parenting. You probably didn’t mean it this way, but if you never explain things to your kids and only punish them with no explanation. They’re not going to learn to differentiate between things they should and shouldn’t do, or between when it is or isn’t appropriate to do certain things. They are just going to learn that you get upset and punish them and punish them for reasons that range from “apparant” to “unknown and possibly non-existant.” That is going to make you seem like a loose cannon.
When you punish a kid, you have to make sure they know what they are being punished for. Otherwise, they won’t see it as a concequence of their own actions and will, instead, see it as a direct offense against them by you.
Not teaching children the difference between right (or appropriate, or correct, or situationally correct, or whatever you want to use) and wrong (or whatever) behavior is detrimental to everyone involved, including anyone with whom the child may interact in the future.
You miss the point. You shouldn’t have to teach a child what’s right and what’s wrong; you should be able to teach them how to determine the difference for themselves, and encourage empathy.
Aita, do you have kids? Because before I had kids there was a whole heckalot I swore I would never do (yell, use “Because I’m the parent”, so forth) and now I do those things.
Parents are human, too. We make mistakes. The best parents apologize afterwards. And sometimes kids need you to be firm with them.
Before judging a parent get to know THEIR background first. You may think I’m the worst worst worst parent ever when I yell at my kids, put them in time-out, or expect them to do exactly what I need to them to do without an explanation. But if I told you that I grew up with an abusive father that hung the threat of physical beatings over me to get me to comply, and always belittled me without apology, and demanded my presence around him because it fulfilled his need to have people around, even though he treated me like crap, you might understand that I’m doing the best I can with my kids and the life I’ve been given.
The best I’m trying to do is give my kids a leg up out of the hell hole that’s been in my family for generations. It’s not perfect, but it’s the best I can do.
Whew, back. Reread what I said and thought it didn’t look coherent.
What I’m trying to say is I’m tired of being judged, or having people in similar situations as me being judged, by those who don’t/are unwilling to understand things.
The motto in our family is, “You’re a person, I’m a person, and the decisions we make will take everyone’s needs into consideration, but we will make the best choice for the family.”
Sometimes that means the parents do what the kids need done. Sometimes that means the kids will do what the parents need done. But the family as a whole get the best decision made.
So that means that sometimes I need get get some leniency from my children because I don’t have a deep well to draw upon. I do the best I can, but sometimes they will get yelled at or sent to their rooms for a bit while I decompress. It makes me a better mom.
So, yeah, there are ideals in parenting. But not every parent has had their ideal upbringing and they’re just doing the best they can. Be compassionate.
You’re doing better than the previous generation, perhaps, and there’s merit in that… but if you know the ideals and cannot serve them, why did you choose to have children?
Wow, arrogant much? Not all parents choose to have children. I was an underage teen parent. My first child I got pregnant with by accident, I thought I was sterile. When I realized that I was pregnant I decided that I wanted to give my child up for adoption because I was only 13. I was a kid my self, my mother (who had given a child up for adoption and forever regretted it) refused to let me give my child up.
So I bucked up and did the f**cking best I could. You have no right to judge other parents because you do not know what their individual story is. Until you have walked a mile in someone else’s shoes you will not know their pain and sorrow. And you still haven’t answered whether or not YOU actually have any children. I’m guessing at this point that you don’t because it is very easy for childless people to be idealistic and condescending when they haven’t actually been in the situation themselves.
Irrelevent? What a steaming load.
Parenting in the real world is nothing like an academic theoretical discussion. Nothing like a child having a diaper bomb in LA rush hour, encountering a real bear in the woods, and/or having to counsel your kid on the appropriate responses (note plural) to dealing with bullies to turn theoretical into harsh reality.
I will note that as discipline, both on and off campus has declined, so has the overall quality of our schools. I do not wish education to languish in the dark ages, but many things that were standard 40-50 years ago contributed to a better education environment. Would it be that we could retain some of the more effective ones and merge them with the glories of the information age.
Also, this line wasn’t intended to be hostile, I was genuinely curious. This is indeed my getting to know “what their individual story is”. I was hostile elsewhere, and you deserve an apology for that as well… I tend to speak about societies, not about individuals.
Oh, because a lot of this shit didn’t come to fruition until I had kids. I’vehad severe PPD and clinical depression. Should I give them away to someone else, then? Do YOU want my kids? Make them perfect?
Oh, because a lot of this sh*t didn’t come to fruition until I had kids. I’ve had severe PPD and clinical depression. Should I give them away to someone else, then? Do YOU want my kids? Make them perfect?
That’s a suitable answer, and makes sense with what you’ve said elsewhere. I apologize if it seems I was being hostile with that question, I was genuinely curious.
Curiosity is fine. But what you’re doing, having an ideal set and being extremely rigid about it, is not fine, IMO. You have to understand that we parents are people, too. And if you’re going to sit here and tell us that we need to be perfect and understanding for our kids because they’re people, then pay us the same consideration. We are people doing just the best we can. Instruction manuals are not passed out at our children’s births, and we don’t have chips implanted into our brains to make us choose correctly each time a situation comes up. Cut us some slack.
I know childless and child-free people hate hearing this, but you just cannot understand parenting until you are parenting. Not babysitting, not nanny-ing, parenting.
Are you a troll? At first I thought you were being ironic, then I thought you were working based on some kind of alternate life philosophy I didn’t completely understand (although the line about the laws of physics was funny), atacking someone’s choice to have a family just because they can’t adhere to ideals in a manor that only a non-real being in a non-real world could is going way too far.
Spoken as someone who obviously doesn’t have children. The parent who sits there and becomes their child’s friend and doesn’t impose boundaries or how to behave in public and understand that no means no is doomed to have a spoiled selfish person who thinks that everything they want should be given to them. A raised voice is sometimes necessary to let a child know that is enough, the subject is not up for debate and that the discussion is over.
No Aita it’s not. For the simple reason you cannot teach someone who isn’t listening and a child who is throwing a temper tantrum, whining, or nagging is only listening to themselves.
Also you absolutely should teach a child what is right and wrong. They don’t have the experience or perspective to understand the “what” and “why”. Teaching children that is the responsibility of every parent.
No, she did not say children are stupid or foolish, she said they’re inexperienced. And it’s true. I truly believe that children think like adults, but they haven’t had enough lifetime experiences to always make the best choice. That’s why parents are there to guide their children, and sometimes that guiding is accompanied with raised voices.
She stated they’re either incapable of learning (stupid) or unable to comprehend (foolish).
And no, that doesn’t need to be accomplished with raised voices. There’s no benefit from raising your voice, and explanation can usually be found without relying on assertion of authority (making exceptions for retarded children, those with sense debilitation, etc.).
Aita, I have to side with Arrianna on this one, someone throwing a tantrum etc. is not listening. The sort of conversation you are advocating for can only happen when both parties are engaged in it (i.e. listening). Sometimes that sort of learning isn’t possible or practical. Sometimes humans yell even though they know they shouldn’t, in the comic Todd feels bad that he lost his temper immediately after he yells he’s on his way to apologizing. To me, that’s good parenting; he made a mistake, but realized it and is trying his best to make up for it.
I also have to disagree about raising your voice never being helpful… sometimes the only way to be heard is to raise your voice. this doesn’t necessarily mean angry yelling, which would (likely) be detrimental and ought to be avoided. Also children should have boundaries and be taught what is and is not acceptable, if only because there are boundaries even for adults. In life it is simply not acceptable to do some things and the rules and discipline of a home are, in some ways, a mirror of the rules and discipline in the rest of society.
And before you go off about discipline being something horrible, discipline is not the same as punishment. Punishment is done in anger and is harmful (beatings, verbal abuse, deprivation…), discipline is a consequence of an action and is done with the intent of correction of a mistake and learning (time outs, grounding, extra chores). Spanking falls somewhere in the grey borderland between the two. It was never used in my household, but I’m not about to judge where it falls for someone else.
Aita, you are being a bit of a troll, Arrianna didn’t say and likely didn’t mean to imply that children are stupid or foolish. She said they don’t have the experience or perspective to always understand what is wrong or why. And she’s right, children do not come pre-programmed with knowledge of right or wrong or the why’s and where-for’s of life. They are impulsive and have to learn everything from scratch. Young children won’t understand some explanations or will think the explanation is irrelevant because they lack the experience which would help them understand. If you’ve never seen experienced, let’s say snow (pretend you came from the equator and have no idea it gets cold enough to kill people ever), then an authority figure telling you to put on a winter coat etc. because it is cold outside will not make sense. Having only experienced perhaps what I might call chilly weather, you might attempt to go outside without protection even after being warned. If it’s a one way door, as decisions are mostly, then it could be very bad to go ahead and do things your way, a very long cold walk to get back inside. As a parent/authority figure, it would be their responsibility to protect their charges as best they could, ordering someone to put on a coat or making sure that Selkie is not being bullied by her teachers even if no explanation is offered or only a brief one (“I want to talk to your teachers about…”).
Also and I’ll make this brief, your comment about retarded/debilitated children is offensive.
But hey, we can agree to disagree right? 🙂
My comment about retarded and/or debilitated children shouldn’t be offensive, I was making a comment that I cannot reasonably expect a child with developmental problems or various disabilities (say, blindness or deafness for big examples) to be able to understand something, but I can easily expect any child to have comprehension skills. a child has basic empathy and certainly an understanding of cause and effect, of pain and suffering.
Good Greif, Aita, there’s one of you at every party. I could debate you all night, but here on open forum I’ll keep it short and sweet.
1) You’re intellectually killing yourself when you try to demonize people who don’t agree with you.
2) I believe your views on raising children are misguided and unrealistic because they don’t take into consideration the natural immaturity of a child.
3) Immaturity doesn’t mean stupidity or foolishness or whatever else. It means immaturity… as in not-yet-mature, as in.. not physically or neurologically developed into an adult.
4) When you’re responsible for another human being, you need to act decisively, and sometimes quickly, without explanation. A parent doesn’t always have the luxury of being able to explain each move to the child, nor is the child always willing to listen when they’re all worked up from misbehaving.
5) Part of learning is observing and experiencing action and consequence. Like anything else, you need to go bit-by-bit. Would you hand an eight-year-old a trigonometry worksheet and expect him to complete it perfectly? Of course not, because he hasn’t reached that level in math yet. So why would you expect a kid that age to work out life-problems like an adult, when he hasn’t reached that level of knowledge in human relations? The parent’s authority and guidance is like the K-through-twelve of life. It’s the foundation that allows kids to build on that experience and form their own identities and ideas into adulthood.
Now that I’ve said my piece, I’m gonna’ step back a bit to not get into a whole post-war. If you want to debate/rebut or get a response, my e-mail is tagged somewhere near my name.
Raising your voice at someone is more acceptable than hitting them, yes? If you see no difference between those two, I’m going to suggest you re-read whatever child psychology book you’ve read, or make sure to read one that’s been written since 1990.
I have no children of my own, nor do I intend to have (biologically at least), and my arguments on child rearing are based purely on psychology and biology.
Humans, like all monkeys and apes, are born with an innate sense of morals and fair play, but humans also come with a huge amount of cultural rules and taboos that need to be observed to get along with others, and these must be taught to the child.
An indifferent parents who doesn’t punish wrong actions and reward good actions, is only raising a child who will grow up to care about themselves only. Being completely self-centered can be dangerous to those around such persons, since they won’t care anything about your well-being.
Cultural taboos should be ignored, and “fitting in” isn’t a goal. Unless it’s illegal because of the taboos (which would be informing the child of the law), it’s largely irrelevant.
By teaching your child to adhere to taboos you’re also teaching them to ostracize people who don’t, usually. That’s some intellectual diversity you’re supporting there…
Cultural taboos? Ok, let’s have a few. Remember, these are all cultural taboos, though they may or may not be part of laws in some parts of the world.
1. Don’t wipe your arse and then eat with the same hand without washing it first. It’s a cultural taboo, though based on what we know about hygiene.
2. Wear clothes in public. That’s another one that we don’t really think of, but which is also cultural only, if weather would otherwise permit nakedness.
3. You can’t physically attack/maim/kill a stranger, just because you felt like it. Basically if you cared nothing for other people, what would stop you from doing anything you like? (Until police got involved.)
And since child abuse was one of the topics, how about 4. You don’t have sex with children. That’s also cultural, and not one that’s followed in all cultures.
Do I need to go on or can we agree that certain cultural taboos are based on common sense and real life issues. Basically speaking, your rights stop where the other person’s rights start.
Aita one question for you, since I’m curious, what do you do when yoru child rejects your explanation and proceeds to demand, at ever increasing volume, whatever it is that you don’t want to give them?
For example: 5 year old Timmy grabs a candy bar as we go through the check out line at the grocery store “Mom, can I have this?” Mom says “No, Timmy, we can’t afford to buy candy today. Please put it back.” Timmy (being 5 and not understanding finances) starts begging, while clinging to the candy bar.
By your reasoning, Mom should continue to stand there and hold up the line, while explaining to an uninterested child that there isn’t enough money in the budget for candy today. Or mom should put back the healthy food she picked out and buy the candy. Right? Or am I missing an option?
My choice in such situations (and raising 2 boys, there have been many) is to raise my voice enough to be heard through the kids’ noise, say “NO,” remove the candy from their little hands, and tell the child “We will discuss this more in the car.” IMO there IS a benefit to raised voices at times, and to children knowing that there are some choices they get to make but others that will be made for them. My kids learned that when asking turns to begging/whining, mom gets annoyed and they don’t get what they want. If they are old enough to listen, and aren’t throwing screaming tantrums, then they will get explanations once there is time for them. That is not and will not always be immediately. It’s helpful to have children who respect that “No” is “No” because parents said it. I do value explaining the “Why” behind the “No” but understanding the “why” is not a requirement for cooperation from my boys.
Yep, Reo, I think you’re right. No point talking further with someone who only wants to antagonize everybody. At least I got a good laugh from the budget comment, though!
My job as a parent is to teach my children right and wrong. Teach them why. When they are old enough to make their own decisions they have the background to make intelligent ones.
Children are not born with the ability to make their own decisions. We need to teach them HOW to do so. They are not born with the ability to understand everything going on in the world. It is our job to introduce the world to them so they know how to deal with it.
Awwwww… Poor Todd and poor Selkie. They’ll discover soon enough these moments happen once in a while between parents and children. Life will move on. Been going that way a lot with my 3.5 year old (terrible twos my foot). Parenting is a grand adventure and learning experience in accepting your humaness and discovering new methods of controlling your temper so you can remain the adult. 🙂
BTW, Dave, are you a parent? If not, you will be an awesome one. 🙂
I love the frame with the red with white nagging words. That is *exactly* how it feels right when you have a bad moment. Pretty darn hard on those of us who have had abusive childhoods as we are always second-guessing ourselves.
But the fact is kids can push buttons—especially our own kids. It happens to begin with for anyone you are very close to (in a way this means that Selkie and Todd are entering a new wonderful stage of their family memberhood). It’s not that that kids don’t know better, it’s that they have a harder time controlling their impulses and slip into rude behavior easier (IOW, they “forget” easier).
i love the shading in this one, I am not sure how to explain it but somehow it has more “feeling” in it, like when you tone down lights and use candles instead. it’s softer even though I’d say the shadows are more noticable. also the facial expressions on this one are totally awesome espescially in panel 3 and 6, they convey very well what they feel at that exact point of time. Even though panel 5 is so adorable I just wanna cry, she looks like Puss in Boots :3
It’s funny how yelling goes by family. In my family, when we’re angry/upset, we yell. It isn’t considered more than an expression of your feelings. And it’s pretty safe that way, cause everyone knows what it’s for. But for example one of my brothers’ girlfriend comes from a family where both parents are deaf (she and her siblings hear just fine), and she has an absolute melt-down at raised voices. Since she’s now an integral part of the family (engagement is on planning stages), me and my mom sat her down once and explained how yelling works in our family, so she doesn’t freak out at it happening when she’s around. 🙂
There’s nothing wrong with getting angry with your kid. Sometimes it’s necessary to do it. Man, my little brother would tune me out when I tried to tell him to stop doing something that was wrong so a lot of the time I’d have to yell at him to get him to even acknowledge me. Same thing with my little sister, except she’s far worse. My parents never properly disciplined my brother and sister, so they turned into spoiled little brats who cried and threw a fit (Even hitting other people.) if they didn’t get their way. Not disciplining a child is the worst thing you can do for them.
I’m not sure how to explain it, but I feel like Todd is going to learn how to really parent from this point forward. Sometimes it feels like Todd is trying to be a friend to his daughter more than a parent. Maybe I’m off on this, but to me sometimes he seems more older brotherly than fatherly. This is coming from someone with no kids and many brothers, though, so it could just be me that feels this way. He’s doing great for just becoming a dad. It’s just that I hope he can get more of a fatherly feel as he gains parenting experience.
I’m not fond of parents who try to ‘befriend’ their child. My mom did that with my sister and now they smoke weed together and pop pills because she wants to be the ‘cool’ mom who doesn’t teach their child right from wrong and what good morals are.
Don’t kill people. Don’t do things that can harm yourself or others. Pretty clear cut things like that.
I mean of course there are exceptions to everything, depending on the situation at hand.
I mean, I don’t really care that they smoke weed together, nearly everyone I know smokes the stuff. I do care that they pop pills or crush them up and drink them with alcohol together to get a fix. Pretty sure that’s a big wrong right there. I mean, if she wants to kill herself, by all means, go for it. Her life and what not, but she shouldn’t taint her kid in the process. Though, my sister was bound to end up that way, living and being raised by that woman.
Which is why I’m glad I was raised by my grandmother. She taught me right from wrong and what good values are. Sure, some of her stuff I didn’t necessarily agree with, but she never beat me and she was never high as a kite or drunk off her ass. Plus I was always given a place to live, had food and clothing and was raised in a mostly positive environment. Not everything was perfect, but hell, no place is. At least I grew up well and I’m not a bigot or something.
My grandmother taught me to treat other people the way I’d want to be treated and to love and forgive people even if they’re shitty and mean. She also taught me to be generally nice to everyone and that my actions effect others so I should think about the things I intend to do before I do them. She also taught me that I shouldn’t have sex at a young age, nor should I drink or do drugs at a young age, but was free to do so once I was older and not under her roof. (Though she wouldn’t necessarily ever agree with me doing drugs. I think she’d be alright with weed though. I don’t do drugs either way so whatever.)
My sister on the other hand was raised to do whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted at whatever age she wanted. She grew up with no limitations in her life. She was allowed to get a boyfriend at 8 years old. Slept around with guys when she was 10. Got branded a whore in her school and was allowed to drop out of school because she ‘didn’t like it’ and was allowed to smoke, drink and do drugs at a very young age.
Raising your child as a ‘free spirit’ without any ‘rules or discipline’ to ‘limit their creative mind’ just makes for a rebellious screw up. Besides, that’s a horrible environment without any sense of stability. Kids need stability to be alright. Otherwise they get all screwed up and run wild if they’re left to their own devices with no sense of guidance.
Oh of course I feel bad for her. The thing is, when my grandmother offered to let her live with us; she did at first. Then she got annoyed because of all the rules. She wasn’t allowed to sleep around, she wasn’t allowed to have a boyfriend, she wasn’t allowed to stay out until 1 a.m. with people double her age. She got angry. She spread lies and said my grandmother beat her and treated her badly and eventually went back to her mother and did all of the things she wanted.
Of course I feel bad for her. I still do. I blame her mother entirely for what happened to her, but she had a chance to live a good life and refused it because of the ‘rules’ she didn’t want to live by.
So yeah, I feel like not monitoring what your children can and cannot do is bad parenting. Treating your child like your ‘bro’ or your ‘friend’ is horrible parenting. Parents are parents and friends are friends. Parents teach their children right and wrong and they can decide later on in life if they want to abide by their parents morals and rules.
If teaching your child not to hit others, not to disrespect adults, not to bad mouth people, and not to do drugs and sleep around is bad parenting, well then I’m going to be a horrible parent and I’ll be proud to be one. :l
So then, Aita. You are in favor of showing children how to become drug addicts in lieu of actually being a parent? I can only assume that, since you ignored everything else she said.
Also, I don’t know about you, but if my kid wanted to attend a party with no parental supervision whatsoever and they were young and inexperienced or irresponsible, you can be sure I wouldn’t let them go just because they want to. I’m not going to send little Becky or whatever I name my kid, somewhere just because they want it and they think it’s good for them because they think they know what’s best for them. Just like I wouldn’t let my kid sleep around and get knocked up or riddled with STDs just because they want to do it.
Course, I guess your means of parenting is different. I’m sure your kid would survive for a good 5 minutes since you’d let them jam a fork into a light socket because you felt like it was their right to do so and it’s not necessarily they ‘wrong’ thing to do, am I right?
I mean, that’s perfectly alright. You can raise your kids any way you want to. 😀
I am enjoying the shading hue you are testing, it is a subtle difference, but everything looks more 3D in a way. It just pops really well. Selkie’s sad eyes are adorable also!
This strip has brought a heavy atmosphere over and a great change. I love the shading here, and the expressions are well built. It’s amazing how Dave’s art keeps on improving! Anyway… I do hope some fanart can cheer someone up… Drawing Selkie has become a great therapy! So cute! So adorable! So fishy!
There is Seal Selkie to flop around the fanart page! http://fav.me/d5lmkz3
Keep up the great work Dave, don’t forget… I’ll be lurking in the shadowssssssss… drawing neverending fanart and not showing it to you!
Just a bit of artistic critique,your faces don’t seem to be very constant. Todd’s face looks different in almost every panel he’s in. I know it’s something that’s pretty darn hard to get over, but considering all of the amazing artistic evolution we’ve seen with this strip so far, I’m confident you’ll get over it fairly quick. It’s just a suggestion of what to work on next. 🙂
I know you’ve said outright that you tried to make Todd look less ‘boyish’, but maybe you overdid it. He looks like he went from ’25-year-old man’ to ’45-year-old drill instructor’ overnight.
Even tho I’m only 16 I can do the dad stare. Its pretty easy when you and your parents basically raze your older brother’s stepchild by yourselves. And yes I think that kids need boundaries and that kids need to at times be spanked not hard just enough that they wont want to do that again. Not in this case tho the dad stare would’ve worked very well
The sooner she realizes that a whole bunch of whining leads to no good the sooner she’ll learn better bargaining tactics, as well as reading peoples’ moods better. In moderation, yelling at kids is an excellent teaching tool. Teaches them exactly where the line is that they shouldn’t cross, and it doesn’t hurt ’em.
Just remember to use it sparingly, because if they learn that you yell all the time they’ll stop paying attention to when you yell.
sorry had to post this as a reply,cant figure out how to just leave a comment(possible webpage issue..)
I love your comic Dave,you’re doing a FANTASTIC job,in terms of art and story,and your content is always moving emotionally and intellectually. This comic is one of the few bright spots in my life and I adore reading it, please dont stop writing it anytime soon,and try to ignore the little comment trolls that show up from time to time. I know they’ll never apologize for their atrocious behavior so I will, dont let people like that discourage you and dont let them make you hate reading comments either. I’ll be honest,people like that make me DESPISE reading through comments and make me nervous about leaving them. But I wanted you to know how much I adore your comic =hugs for awesome Dave= keep on being awesome =3
Orrrrr maybe I’m not really trolling? Maybe I think discouraging immature behavior (a ten year old acting like a five year old, etc.) is a good thing?
Actually here’s the deal: I happen to know two twenty-somethings who are friends with my younger brother. They go to him all the time for advice, often when they’ve caused some kind of social disaster because they’re completely clueless. We’re talking things like “Should I go and meet my old boyfriend, you know the one who beat me up those times, all alone by myself.” or “Oh man, I need to go buy that game again because I traded it in and bought it again and traded it back in and I don’t have it right now.”
I exaggerate the phrasing out of the need for brevity, but those are real examples of situations their complete cluelessness has caused. And I blame their parents, because more than anything else that they have in common, none of the parents ever disciplined them. And now they’re out in the world and they’re completely unprepared to deal with the simplest matters, let alone really important things.
So yeah, I believe that sometimes you need to yell at kids FOR THEIR OWN GOOD. Not all the time. Not inconsistently. Not when they’re too young to understand. Not when they don’t need it. Not when accidents happen. NEVER out of anger. But if you never yell at them, you are ruining their potential, because they’ll assume that nothing they ever do deserves being yelled at.
Honestly, as a parent myself, I agree with you. Whining is very frustrating but children – even adults – do it. My sister has three and tends to yell (single mother) more than anything and her kids have more or less stopped listening to her.
It’s unfortunate but lots of kids are raised differently in those situations. It also doesn’t mean she’s a *bad* parent, but raising your voice with three whining children – instead of one older one like Todd, also an adopted child – doesn’t do any good.
So ignoring the random banter back and forth from up above (I’ll try to catch you on League later and talk about it. it seems very interesting actually), I quite adore the new shading technique, Dave. Looks great, as as someone said above (I can’t remember who) it DOES make it look very 3D and pops out at you.
Also you’ve heard from experience I’m sure that *you know who* has done this to me on several occasions. “Mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy” -_-
I find it interesting that the majority of people assume Selkie is actually trying to stop them from missing her cartoons. I’m sure that’s part of it, but I see it more that she’s used to staying quiet as a defense mechanism. To her, letting the homework thing go isn’t only a good idea, it’s her immediate reaction because she’s used to jokes being played on her. I had a lot of bullies as a kid and I remember getting very use to mean jokes being played on me.
And if you notice, she doesn’t mention cartoons in this page. She says, “I don’t want to be here.” She’s desperate to get out because she doesn’t want to make trouble … because in the past making trouble just gets her more resentment.
So this comment thread has, well, blown up. There are a lot of conversations going on here where, quite simply, I don’t really know WHAT to say or add to it. But I wanted to pop in and let everyone know (if you did not already assume this XD) that I am reading each comment personally as they come in.
I never know which comic I post is going to spark a landslide of conversation like this. Amazes me each time. 🙂
I probably shouldn’t detail this, because it embarrasses my parents when I bring it up, but I was spanked as a kid when I either got out of line (and I mean, taking a baseball bat to the television) or when I refuse to obey a direct imperative (such as the time I was grounded from reading the comic’s page, then snuck it to the living room and read them anyway while my mom was cooking).
Even though spanking was only used on me as a corrective tool… I hated it. I hated it intensely and to the point where I am still, as a grown adult, slightly resentful of the act. I love my parents very much and have a great relationship with them. But a small part of me resents having my butt lashed, all the same.
I am not a parent myself, despite what the comic may suggest about me (although I’d like to be one day), but I do hope that when I am a parent, I can make correcting bad behavior work without breaking out the wooden spoon. XD
Amen. I wanted to thank you for touching on such a fraught subject. Discipline is always a touchy thing. I think you’re handling it beautifully. Again, thank you.
My parents made us sit in a corner, confiscated toys, didn’t let us go on playdates, etc. I’ve been physically punished exactly 2 times total by them, once per parent, and those were enough to teach me the lines you can’t cross – the snapping line of the parent.
So I say from my experiences that infrequent use of physical punishment works for discipline in teaching the child what line you can’t cross without serious consequences, but spanking someone for any little thing, that I don’t agree with.
From my own folks, I hear that I was spanked as a child. That said, I have no memories of it. I’m told it happened twice, but my Dad could only recollect the cause of the one incident, and believe me, I earned that one.
Most of my punishments were labour related. Now that I’m an adult, my Dad likes to joke that he doesn’t get random days off from the yard work anymore.
The worst labour I remember came after I took the car without permission to a party in high school. Had to help my uncle fence his land; believe me, you only need to do that once.
Overall, though, my punishments were few and far between; it didn’t take long for them to become unnecessary. What I took from all that is a good parent doesn’t need to be a tyrant. Just a firm and consistent stance.
My parents usually took away my books or my library card when I misbehaved. It worked embarrassingly well, but I did get physically punished a few times by my parents. It was more of a knee-jerk reaction to something I’d done than anything else, (i.e. catching and playing with a brown recluse, trying to look inside the neighbor’s beehive after being told not to, etc).
Discipline and parenting are so tricky, but I’ve been having a lot of fun seeing how you handle all of it in the comic. Thank you for writing and drawing it.
I got spanked when I was very, very young. Like, in diapers young. So I couldn’t even feel it since the diaper took the brunt of it lol honestly, the noise itself was the thing that bothered me. As I got older, I just got things taken away or scolded with a lecture. Probably wouldn’t spank my own kids unless they crossed a serious line. Even though, only as a last resort. I’m not morally against spanking, I just think there’s not much point to it since small children tend to do whatever it is they did before the spanking shortly after and older children can just be talked to, to understand what they did was wrong.
I mean, I guess not ALL kids can be talked too, but yeah. I had to resort to slapping my brother once because he went bonkers and started to hit me in his fit of rage and talking to him (Which eventually escalated into yelling.) failed to get his attention. He completely tuned me out. So I slapped him. That got his attention and he stopped his fit instantly. Of course then he told on me, but at least he stopped throwing a fit and hitting me.
Frankly I am enjoying the discussions almost as much as the comic.
Disciplining Selkie will have its own unique challenges, as she may have slightly superior physical abilities, venom, claws and fangs.
Then again a snowball fight with her may be more tramatic than for a regular kid.
I honestly really love the comic and everything so far and the art style, but one thing that keeps bothering me a little is the proportion of some things like the length of the arms. I guess this is only my opinion and other than that, I wanted to say I love your comic so far.
Indeed. I have this nagging fear that I will do this at just the wrong time when I become a father ;_;
The only thing worse then not raising your voice at a child is never raising your voice. There is a time and place and wrong times/places happen. That is part of people interaction and not all people interact in the same way or very well.
I mean, yeah it sucks she’s missing her cartoons. I remember that mentality. I also remember pitching a fit about it never got me anything.
(I also almost never got to see after school cartoons because we lived so far away and both parents worked late).
I have three words for you: first-world problems.
Just to get this into perspective: I work at a theme park. Some people NEED the back or the front (of the roller-coaster), OR THEY WILL DIE. I hope some of you laughed at that, because I’m not kidding. For example, this one time, I asked “How many?” The answer I received was “I want the back.” This went back and forth a few times until I ascertained how many there were (2). I asked if she okay with 14 out of 15 rows, and this woman had a MELTDOWN. Never mind there are people being killed, murdered, raped, tortured in this world, I NEED ROW 15 or I’M GOING TO DIE.
Ahem. My basic point is you don’t always get what you want in life. It’s okay to be disappointed, even temper tantrum about it momentarily… but in the end, not a big deal.
I wish my cousin would understand that. But then, being a spoilt brat leads people to believe the sun shines from their butts anyway.
I don’t understand how worrying about raising your voice to your children is a “first world problem” second and third world cultures still have children and how to raise them the best way possible is always a worry, wherever you may be, if you’re a parent. Wtf does this have to with roller coasters?
No, the ‘first-world problem’ is “I’M MISSINGS MYS CARTOOOOOOOONS”.
I hate the phrase “first-world problems”. It’s a condescending guilt trip that makes you sound like you’re better than everyone else.
And yes, I’m aware hating the phrase “first-world problem” is a first-world problem. You don’t have to point that out to me.
I honestly can’t think of a time where someone used the term “first-world problem” to describe something where they weren’t using it for comedic purposes. Given how callous the Internet is (yeah, I going with the Internet being a single entity, made up if everyone on it) I think a vast majority of folks online know that “first-world problems” are just a joke, and shouldn’t be taken too seriously (aside from the “it could be worse, so don’t worry about it” aspect of it)
My current first-world problem is that my coffee mug keeps the coffee too hot for too long (the horror!)
Yeah, “first world problems” is snarky and mean (like much internet humor is), but it’s mostly just a tongue-in-cheek way of laughing at what big deals people make over relatively little things. Like NEEDING the back of the roller coaster. Really? Maybe some people SHOULD feel guilty about bitching over petty things.
You nailed it. Raising your voice has nothing to do with where you live- it’s MISSING YOUR CARTOOOOOOONS! : )
I think he was trying to point out just how idiotic some people can be and that yeah, most of this self entitled sh*t happens only in first world countries. In second or third world countries children generally don’t throw fits in order to get their way as their lives are not so spoiled and pampered. A child in a small African doesn’t scream and yell about wanting a candy bar because they know it’s hard enough just to get regular food.
But in America there are children who will not only scream and yell about not getting what they want, they will hit their parents or throw stuff because if they don’t get what they want “They Will Just Die”.
Ugh… that was supposed to say in a small African village.
@SadSD, you’re completely missing Kate’s point, it’s not about raising your voice.
A first world problem – I’m gonna die if the color of my pop-tart isn’t what I want it to be.
A real-world problem – I’m gonna die because I don’t have food to eat.
Is it condescending to point out that the first objection in an overly wealthy society, what someone’s taking to be a matter of life or death and throwing a tantrum over is total nonsense?
I think it is more about the entitlement mentality. I used to be Medical and Safety Officer for my company’s Emergency Response Team. We had a potential release of a hazardous gas. We had to shut down an exterior corridor because it could be hazardous. I had collage educated engineers arguing with me about not letting them enter a hallway because of gas that could kill them so they could go get their car keys or cigarettes out of the break room. They were directed to go down the stairs, cross across the building and come up the stairs or elevator next to the break room. No, I got told, “I can hold my breath”. Worse there were people lining up to just walk down there until I threatened to have them all written up for failing to follow safety instructions. People are so wrapped up in thier own little bubble that they can’t see any other perspective at times. I finally quit because one of the stupid lemmings was going to kill itself and I would be responsible.
No, my point was 100% about the cartoon thing. I actually have a really strict policy on yelling (unless you’re joking with you’re friends, but that’s another matter altogether): do not yell unless someone is about to be hurt. Yelling angrily is rude, and scary. I think if everyone was recorded for a day, we would be surprised how often we raised our voices when we really didn’t need to.
…That’s my tiny rant on yelling. It’s something that bothers me.
Hunny I hear you. Well actually for me its front all the way on rollercoasters but I never through a fit about it. Anyways I work as a bank teller and sometimes we run low on certain denominations of money espeically on fridays because its payday and its the end of the week. Well we will get people who pitch a total fit if we tell them “Sorry but I can not give it to you in that way is it alright if we give it another” its frustrating sometimes
In all fairness, I don’t think missing the cartoons is Selkie’s biggest motivator here, although it is probably the one that’s easiest to put into words and has a deadline with it. In the first panel, she says “I don’ts wanna stays ins school!” and in the second panel she says “I don’ts wanna be heres!”
That got me thinking, Selkie is different. Other kids have called her a devil just for trying to talk to them. Amanda is in her class. It was way to easy for Amanda to convince a new kid that Selkie was a monster. Mrs. Haversham-Zhang stated outright that she had few friends amongst the other children. On top of everything else, she just got her shirt stolen not to long ago. School is probably not a place where she feels safe or happy, and right when she finally feels she’s made it through the day and is anticipating the promise of safety, comfort, and cartoons, she’s blindsided with an extension of her school day.
Todd heard her mention cartoons first, so he thinks that’s her only motivation, and he’s to preocupied being (rightfully) upset at what he thinks is the teachers playing a cruel joke to expend much brain power on trying to work out the meaning of a conversation he thinks should already be over. Selkie keeps pressing the issue because she’s not comfortable with spending extra time in this place without warning, reassurance, or even an explanation of why it is important (from her point of view it should be unnecessary to ask about the worksheet now that she has already explained it). Todd still thinks this is the cartoon and is upset that that’s her first priority when he’s trying to look out for her well-being. He snaps at her.
From Selkie’s point of view Todd has decided to keep her in a place where she feels unsafe longer than necessary on a whim, treated her concerns as unimportant, and yelled at her for trying to make him understand. From Todd’s point of view, Selkie was belligerently pestering him over unimportant issues when he was trying to take care of her.
I may be reading too far into this, but it felt like there was more to it than just an arguement over cartoons. Selkie looks a bit frightened in panel two, when she says that she doesn’t want to be here. And, in the previous page, she responds with a shocked “Whats?!” immediately upon the suggestion of going back inside. It seems like it would have to be a reaction to the idea of going back inside for her to react that way so quickly. If it was the cartoons themselves she was worried about, I would think she would be initially curious or confused as to why her Dad wanted to go back into school (which I’m guessing is unusual), followed by the “Oh no” when she realized this would interfere with cartoon time.
I really don’t think it was about missing cartoons … I think she doesn’t want to make a fuss about the test. She’s used to getting the least trouble from her classmates when she’s quiet and that’s her response to something like that word problem. So when her dad says he wants to talk to the teacher, she panicked.
Gotta agree with you on this one, those who are bullied learn to not make waves in order to survive (pardon the aquatic pun).
You will. I promise. It’s part of being a parent. Being a *good parent* is knowing when you’ve done it, pulling your shit together, and apologizing to your kid afterwards. Then trying to change parenting tactics so you don’t keep doing all the time.
AMEN!
If anything, I think it’s *good* for a kid to see their parents be not-perfect-parents from time to time, especially if the parent then backs up, apologizes, and tries to make it right. It teaches the kid that nobody’s perfect, they don’t have to pretend to be, and this is what you do when you screw up.
It’s all about context. And you have to explain context. And you always have to love. Children can understand that anger is not a lack of love. So yeah, (their/your) actions have consequences, but love transcends all that.
Dawwwww.
I can’t really call them puppydog eyes, so what? Guppyfish eyes?
puppy dogfish eyes. Possibly.
Sounds about right!
I love how the hall light over Todd’s head looks like a sad halo.
Aw, Todd. You didn’t /really/ do anything wrong. It’s just asserting that you are the parent and losing your temper are two different things. <3
Nope, authoritarian parenting *is* wrong, and it causes a lot of psychological problems.
You’re never right *just* because you’re a parent, and that mindset is toxic to children. Might want to learn a bit of psychology there.
Aita- There are hundreds of different parenting techniques and each has its drawbacks.
They’re easily classified into four different groups, and only one of them is valid in this day and age.
Sorry Aita, I call BS. Just because that’s what you believe doesn’t make it the end all be all of parenting.
Word.
Oh my god, you probably think spankings are abuse, too.
Spankings, most disciplinary methods, and submitting a child to religion or other indoctrination, yes, they’re all abuse.
Notably defined by the fact that it causes long-term damage with no unique benefit.
Why would you say they aren’t?
Maybe because I grew up being spanked, and it never hurt me and I was well behaved as a child because of it. Maybe because I spanked my children and when my oldest was 16 she said to me that I was the only one in our family that she respected because I made her tow the line.
Yes, because respect of authority is *such* a positive trait…
And kids who grow up respecting no authority at all will end up as self-centered b***ards, who respect nobody, and tend to think only of themselves. Internet’s full of them, and you won’t be able to convince me that that’s better than mild physical punishment.
Please notice that we’re not talking about beating a kid black and blue every day, no matter what they’ve done. There’s a very stark difference between physical punishment and physical child abuse.
So you’re saying every kid with ODD is a self-centered bastard? That’s like saying that every sociopath is a murderer… it’s wrong and it’s incredibly stigmatizing.
Pro-tip: it makes them immune to indoctrination, which generally leads to higher IQs (via favoring reflective thinking over intuitive thinking) if they aren’t abused by intolerant parents. But hey, believe what you want…
ODD is characterized by constant and persistent temper tantrums, argumentativeness, being spiteful and vindictive, and a pattern of blaming others for one’s own mistakes or misbehavior.
“ODD in adults is characterized by a pattern of behavior that violates the basic human rights of others, as well as disobeying societal rules. ”
It tends to result in very few friends, and an inability to keep a job as an adult.
I can see why any parent would be extremely averse to raising their kids in a way that would cause them to emulate ODD behavior. It’s painful for everyone else to deal with.
The majority of disrespectful or self-centered kids don’t have a personality disorder preventing them from improving their behavior.
Do you?
I’m confused. Where are you drawing the connection between what I said and a kid with ODD? I never once mentioned anyone with an actual disorder. Perhaps you’re projecting a bit too much?
Seriously? You think teaching a child a religion is abuse?
I just lost any respect I had for your opinions on childcare.
Really? You don’t?
Religious indoctrination has a slew of known effects on the cognitive abilities of a child, all of them negative. Decreased sense of empathy, decreased IQ, generally lessened vocal and communication skills, higher acknowledgement of authority… Yeah, it’s not like it’s a hard conclusion to reach.
Ok now this is how one should raze a child in my eyes; step one, when they start to understand better that’s when you as a parent needs to be an authority figure and teach a child what’s right and wrong acceptable punishments are the “look”, yelling, extra chores, timeout, and grounding, step 2, when their teens let them do what they will do and repermand them only when its severe, step 3, adulthood, treat them as equals and be a sorse of wisdom. Also yes you should teach a child what you believe in and all other belife systems. I think I came out ok but parents didn’t repermand me enough so I’m kinda rough around the edges.
I’d love to see some sources for your claims.
The studies and research I’ve seen on religion and families show a greater resilience to trauma, improved social skills in children, and improved psychological health. Yes, there is a greater respect for authority figures like police, teachers, etc., but I’m not inclined to see that as a bad thing.
Nothing I’ve studied shows any correlation between a healthy family environment (religious or not) and the negative effects you listed. “Decreased sense of empathy, decreased IQ, generally lessened vocal and communication skills” are all things that result from abuse or cult situations, not normal practice of religious beliefs and moderate parental discipline.
Those who qualify as “high religiosity” have roughly 6-12 IQ points lower, in general, than atheists in the same socio-economic brackets.
religious people score lower on tests of empathy, including both animal empathy and human empathy for pain and hardships.
And resilience against trauma is because they’re deluding themselves, and they rarely benefit from trauma. I can’t consider that a benefit, since they aren’t learning.
I disagree with everything you just posted because of my own studies and research in psychology.
I grew up in a pretty religious household.
My IQ is somewhere in the 133-137 range (depending on which test you refer to, as well as there being varying aspects within each test. My communication skills are exemplary, and am one of the most empathetic people I know. (And not just by my own judgement; many people have echoed my opinion on it.)
As such, I can tell you from first-hand experience and without regret or hesitation that you are completely full of shit. Either that, or you are trolling. If you ARE serious, however, you have a fundamentally flawed view on parenting, and should therefore never try it for yourself.
Not to be attacking anyone, but “asserting that you’re the parent” and “authoritative parenting” are 2 different things, so before anyone goes telling others to “learn a bit of psychology” (darn, too late) they should be sure of what it is they’re speaking out against, and not just being contradictory/rude in a troll-like manner (not saying anyone IS a troll, that could very well be your belief, but the manner it was brought up was quite…brusk)
That aside, it looks like this page gave everybody a feels (to use silly Internet-speak terminology)
No, it’s really not. The assertion that your status *as* a parent has any bearing by bringing it up is also an implication toward the submission to that authority, which is how authoritarianism is defined.
The effects of authoritarian parenting on a child is well documented, and is the subject of continuous research.
Just like people aren’t more wizened by their age, and teachers don’t always know the depth of their subject, parents are usually not the best source to derive information from.
“Authoritative parenting relies on positive reinforcement and infrequent use of punishment. Parents are more aware of a child’s feelings and capabilities and support the development of a child’s autonomy within reasonable limits. There is a give-and-take atmosphere involved in parent-child communication and both control and support are exercised in authoritative style parenting. Research shows that this style is most beneficial when parenting children.“
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parenting#Parenting_styles
Now I’d like to see the opposite argument linked to, please? (And if you cry foul for using Wikipedia, I’ll point you to the citations 4-8: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parenting#cite_note-4 )
“Authoritative” != “authoritarian”.
As Ben said, this is actually my counterargument. Authoritarian and authoritative are contrary parenting styles.
Yes, and you’re the only one saying things about authoritarian. None of us have tried to argue for that. But you’re equating any punishments with authoritarian, rather than authoritative. Notice the “infrequent use of punishment”? You can punish a child without going overboard.
For someone who knows the studies, you could stand to learn a bit of psychology yourself. Most notably, the fact that saying ‘I’m right and you’re wrong’ is the single worst way to convince anyone of anything, even when you have evidence to back you up.
That flare of resentment you just felt when I told you you were wrong? That’s what everyone reading your posts feels. You come across as arrogant and dismissive of everyone else’s experiences, opinions, and beliefs. And *that*, more than anything, is what is going to keep people from listening to you.
I expect everyone to know the facts, and care very little for people who don’t or aren’t willing to do the research.
and I don’t have resentment, and it’s comical that you think I am capable of that.
If even one person does the research because of the points I posited, then I consider it a benefit. Anyone who doesn’t listen wouldn’t be likely to change something so personal anyway *shrugs*
Aita, I’m saying this with everyone’s best interests in mind, but your comments come over to me as those of someone with bipolar disorder, who is currently in hypomanic or manic phase. You’re aggressive, you’re argumentative, you lack compassion and empathy, you see things as black-and-white, and obviously must have the last word.
I’ve been there, I know the symptoms.
Take care of yourself, please?
For the record, I didn’t say he was an “authoritarian parent”. I also do not believe in spanking. But would you prefer a child that just ran all over their parents? I’ve seen them, and they are obnoxious. Often, they turn into obnoxious adults.
Sometimes a dad has to do what a dad has to do.
At this point Todd should let Selkie know that there are things that are more important than cartoons – things like her. He’s doing this because somebody was messing with her.
You have to tell children what appropriate behavior is. Some times they don’t respond and you have to escalate.
If this is the highest level of escalation Todd ever has to do with Selkie he is a very lucky dad indeed.
Best get used to it.
You really don’t. Teaching empathy and questioning is all that’s required. You shouldn’t “teach” a child what your right-and-wrong are, for quite a few reasons.
I strongly disagree with this stance. Not teaching children the difference between right (or appropriate, or correct, or situationally correct, or whatever you want to use) and wrong (or whatever) behavior is detrimental to everyone involved, including anyone with whom the child may interact in the future.
All this crunchy, feel-good parenting stuff is great and all, but it totally misses the point that children NEED and WANT firm limits, and to know what is and isn’t acceptable. Did Todd lose his cool a little bit here? Yes, but Selkie was acting in an inappropriate (annoying and spoiled) manner and she needed to be taught that it wasn’t okay.
I am *technically* a “child” and I agree with this.
No, she doesn’t need to be taught, she needs to come to an understanding on her own. Todd didn’t explain *why* he was doing what he was doing, he didn’t explain the situation, and he didn’t actually ask for her input, he’s just doing what he wants and effectively ignoring her input.
A child can be self-governing, and *should* be, because it’s required of them as they become an adult. The world doesn’t have strict limits, why should children?
Wow, and I bet that if you have children that they are perfect little angels because you sit them down and explain things to them every they misbehave. *heavy sarcasm here*
Once again… ugh! That was supposed to read “every TIME they misbehave”.
I agree pashakitty, kids need rules and I’ve seen what happens when they don’t have a punishment. This is what I had and I’m better for it. Also before anyone says this is the old way of thinking I’m 16 years old and this is how I will raze my children. Adopted or biological it wont matter.
I think Aita was using sarcasm to express disapproval of the choice to ignore Selkie and not offer an explanation.
There are situations where punishment is appropriate, however it is not a substitute for teaching, guiding, and all the other things involved in parenting. You probably didn’t mean it this way, but if you never explain things to your kids and only punish them with no explanation. They’re not going to learn to differentiate between things they should and shouldn’t do, or between when it is or isn’t appropriate to do certain things. They are just going to learn that you get upset and punish them and punish them for reasons that range from “apparant” to “unknown and possibly non-existant.” That is going to make you seem like a loose cannon.
When you punish a kid, you have to make sure they know what they are being punished for. Otherwise, they won’t see it as a concequence of their own actions and will, instead, see it as a direct offense against them by you.
The world does have strict limits. They’re called “laws.”
You’re under no obligation to obey laws, so long as you accept the penalties that come with your actions, they’re just a set of reactions.
Unless you’re speaking of physical laws, which yeah, those are limits, but I doubt that’s the case.
“unless you’re speaking of physical laws”
That was brilliant!
If you think the world doesn’t have strict limits you’re living in a fantasy.
You miss the point. You shouldn’t have to teach a child what’s right and what’s wrong; you should be able to teach them how to determine the difference for themselves, and encourage empathy.
Aita, do you have kids? Because before I had kids there was a whole heckalot I swore I would never do (yell, use “Because I’m the parent”, so forth) and now I do those things.
Parents are human, too. We make mistakes. The best parents apologize afterwards. And sometimes kids need you to be firm with them.
Before judging a parent get to know THEIR background first. You may think I’m the worst worst worst parent ever when I yell at my kids, put them in time-out, or expect them to do exactly what I need to them to do without an explanation. But if I told you that I grew up with an abusive father that hung the threat of physical beatings over me to get me to comply, and always belittled me without apology, and demanded my presence around him because it fulfilled his need to have people around, even though he treated me like crap, you might understand that I’m doing the best I can with my kids and the life I’ve been given.
The best I’m trying to do is give my kids a leg up out of the hell hole that’s been in my family for generations. It’s not perfect, but it’s the best I can do.
Whew, back. Reread what I said and thought it didn’t look coherent.
What I’m trying to say is I’m tired of being judged, or having people in similar situations as me being judged, by those who don’t/are unwilling to understand things.
The motto in our family is, “You’re a person, I’m a person, and the decisions we make will take everyone’s needs into consideration, but we will make the best choice for the family.”
Sometimes that means the parents do what the kids need done. Sometimes that means the kids will do what the parents need done. But the family as a whole get the best decision made.
So that means that sometimes I need get get some leniency from my children because I don’t have a deep well to draw upon. I do the best I can, but sometimes they will get yelled at or sent to their rooms for a bit while I decompress. It makes me a better mom.
So, yeah, there are ideals in parenting. But not every parent has had their ideal upbringing and they’re just doing the best they can. Be compassionate.
You’re doing better than the previous generation, perhaps, and there’s merit in that… but if you know the ideals and cannot serve them, why did you choose to have children?
Wow, arrogant much? Not all parents choose to have children. I was an underage teen parent. My first child I got pregnant with by accident, I thought I was sterile. When I realized that I was pregnant I decided that I wanted to give my child up for adoption because I was only 13. I was a kid my self, my mother (who had given a child up for adoption and forever regretted it) refused to let me give my child up.
So I bucked up and did the f**cking best I could. You have no right to judge other parents because you do not know what their individual story is. Until you have walked a mile in someone else’s shoes you will not know their pain and sorrow. And you still haven’t answered whether or not YOU actually have any children. I’m guessing at this point that you don’t because it is very easy for childless people to be idealistic and condescending when they haven’t actually been in the situation themselves.
I’m curious as to why you thought you were sterile, and why you allowed your mom to make a decision for you.
Whether or not I have children is irrelevant, the discussion is of ideals and the adherence thereto.
Irrelevent? What a steaming load.
Parenting in the real world is nothing like an academic theoretical discussion. Nothing like a child having a diaper bomb in LA rush hour, encountering a real bear in the woods, and/or having to counsel your kid on the appropriate responses (note plural) to dealing with bullies to turn theoretical into harsh reality.
I will note that as discipline, both on and off campus has declined, so has the overall quality of our schools. I do not wish education to languish in the dark ages, but many things that were standard 40-50 years ago contributed to a better education environment. Would it be that we could retain some of the more effective ones and merge them with the glories of the information age.
Also, this line wasn’t intended to be hostile, I was genuinely curious. This is indeed my getting to know “what their individual story is”. I was hostile elsewhere, and you deserve an apology for that as well… I tend to speak about societies, not about individuals.
Oh, because a lot of this shit didn’t come to fruition until I had kids. I’vehad severe PPD and clinical depression. Should I give them away to someone else, then? Do YOU want my kids? Make them perfect?
Geez.
Oh, because a lot of this sh*t didn’t come to fruition until I had kids. I’ve had severe PPD and clinical depression. Should I give them away to someone else, then? Do YOU want my kids? Make them perfect?
Geez.
That’s a suitable answer, and makes sense with what you’ve said elsewhere. I apologize if it seems I was being hostile with that question, I was genuinely curious.
Curiosity is fine. But what you’re doing, having an ideal set and being extremely rigid about it, is not fine, IMO. You have to understand that we parents are people, too. And if you’re going to sit here and tell us that we need to be perfect and understanding for our kids because they’re people, then pay us the same consideration. We are people doing just the best we can. Instruction manuals are not passed out at our children’s births, and we don’t have chips implanted into our brains to make us choose correctly each time a situation comes up. Cut us some slack.
I know childless and child-free people hate hearing this, but you just cannot understand parenting until you are parenting. Not babysitting, not nanny-ing, parenting.
Enough. That is enough.
Are you a troll? At first I thought you were being ironic, then I thought you were working based on some kind of alternate life philosophy I didn’t completely understand (although the line about the laws of physics was funny), atacking someone’s choice to have a family just because they can’t adhere to ideals in a manor that only a non-real being in a non-real world could is going way too far.
Spoken as someone who obviously doesn’t have children. The parent who sits there and becomes their child’s friend and doesn’t impose boundaries or how to behave in public and understand that no means no is doomed to have a spoiled selfish person who thinks that everything they want should be given to them. A raised voice is sometimes necessary to let a child know that is enough, the subject is not up for debate and that the discussion is over.
No Aita it’s not. For the simple reason you cannot teach someone who isn’t listening and a child who is throwing a temper tantrum, whining, or nagging is only listening to themselves.
Also you absolutely should teach a child what is right and wrong. They don’t have the experience or perspective to understand the “what” and “why”. Teaching children that is the responsibility of every parent.
No, enabling a child to learn is the responsibility of the parents.
And your viewpoint asserts that children are foolish or stupid, or both, which they aren’t.
No, she did not say children are stupid or foolish, she said they’re inexperienced. And it’s true. I truly believe that children think like adults, but they haven’t had enough lifetime experiences to always make the best choice. That’s why parents are there to guide their children, and sometimes that guiding is accompanied with raised voices.
She stated they’re either incapable of learning (stupid) or unable to comprehend (foolish).
And no, that doesn’t need to be accomplished with raised voices. There’s no benefit from raising your voice, and explanation can usually be found without relying on assertion of authority (making exceptions for retarded children, those with sense debilitation, etc.).
Aita, I have to side with Arrianna on this one, someone throwing a tantrum etc. is not listening. The sort of conversation you are advocating for can only happen when both parties are engaged in it (i.e. listening). Sometimes that sort of learning isn’t possible or practical. Sometimes humans yell even though they know they shouldn’t, in the comic Todd feels bad that he lost his temper immediately after he yells he’s on his way to apologizing. To me, that’s good parenting; he made a mistake, but realized it and is trying his best to make up for it.
I also have to disagree about raising your voice never being helpful… sometimes the only way to be heard is to raise your voice. this doesn’t necessarily mean angry yelling, which would (likely) be detrimental and ought to be avoided. Also children should have boundaries and be taught what is and is not acceptable, if only because there are boundaries even for adults. In life it is simply not acceptable to do some things and the rules and discipline of a home are, in some ways, a mirror of the rules and discipline in the rest of society.
And before you go off about discipline being something horrible, discipline is not the same as punishment. Punishment is done in anger and is harmful (beatings, verbal abuse, deprivation…), discipline is a consequence of an action and is done with the intent of correction of a mistake and learning (time outs, grounding, extra chores). Spanking falls somewhere in the grey borderland between the two. It was never used in my household, but I’m not about to judge where it falls for someone else.
Aita, you are being a bit of a troll, Arrianna didn’t say and likely didn’t mean to imply that children are stupid or foolish. She said they don’t have the experience or perspective to always understand what is wrong or why. And she’s right, children do not come pre-programmed with knowledge of right or wrong or the why’s and where-for’s of life. They are impulsive and have to learn everything from scratch. Young children won’t understand some explanations or will think the explanation is irrelevant because they lack the experience which would help them understand. If you’ve never seen experienced, let’s say snow (pretend you came from the equator and have no idea it gets cold enough to kill people ever), then an authority figure telling you to put on a winter coat etc. because it is cold outside will not make sense. Having only experienced perhaps what I might call chilly weather, you might attempt to go outside without protection even after being warned. If it’s a one way door, as decisions are mostly, then it could be very bad to go ahead and do things your way, a very long cold walk to get back inside. As a parent/authority figure, it would be their responsibility to protect their charges as best they could, ordering someone to put on a coat or making sure that Selkie is not being bullied by her teachers even if no explanation is offered or only a brief one (“I want to talk to your teachers about…”).
Also and I’ll make this brief, your comment about retarded/debilitated children is offensive.
But hey, we can agree to disagree right? 🙂
My comment about retarded and/or debilitated children shouldn’t be offensive, I was making a comment that I cannot reasonably expect a child with developmental problems or various disabilities (say, blindness or deafness for big examples) to be able to understand something, but I can easily expect any child to have comprehension skills. a child has basic empathy and certainly an understanding of cause and effect, of pain and suffering.
I don’t see why you wouldn’t expect these things.
Good Greif, Aita, there’s one of you at every party. I could debate you all night, but here on open forum I’ll keep it short and sweet.
1) You’re intellectually killing yourself when you try to demonize people who don’t agree with you.
2) I believe your views on raising children are misguided and unrealistic because they don’t take into consideration the natural immaturity of a child.
3) Immaturity doesn’t mean stupidity or foolishness or whatever else. It means immaturity… as in not-yet-mature, as in.. not physically or neurologically developed into an adult.
4) When you’re responsible for another human being, you need to act decisively, and sometimes quickly, without explanation. A parent doesn’t always have the luxury of being able to explain each move to the child, nor is the child always willing to listen when they’re all worked up from misbehaving.
5) Part of learning is observing and experiencing action and consequence. Like anything else, you need to go bit-by-bit. Would you hand an eight-year-old a trigonometry worksheet and expect him to complete it perfectly? Of course not, because he hasn’t reached that level in math yet. So why would you expect a kid that age to work out life-problems like an adult, when he hasn’t reached that level of knowledge in human relations? The parent’s authority and guidance is like the K-through-twelve of life. It’s the foundation that allows kids to build on that experience and form their own identities and ideas into adulthood.
Now that I’ve said my piece, I’m gonna’ step back a bit to not get into a whole post-war. If you want to debate/rebut or get a response, my e-mail is tagged somewhere near my name.
…At least I think it is? It’s on my site anyway.
Raising your voice at someone is more acceptable than hitting them, yes? If you see no difference between those two, I’m going to suggest you re-read whatever child psychology book you’ve read, or make sure to read one that’s been written since 1990.
I have no children of my own, nor do I intend to have (biologically at least), and my arguments on child rearing are based purely on psychology and biology.
Humans, like all monkeys and apes, are born with an innate sense of morals and fair play, but humans also come with a huge amount of cultural rules and taboos that need to be observed to get along with others, and these must be taught to the child.
An indifferent parents who doesn’t punish wrong actions and reward good actions, is only raising a child who will grow up to care about themselves only. Being completely self-centered can be dangerous to those around such persons, since they won’t care anything about your well-being.
Cultural taboos should be ignored, and “fitting in” isn’t a goal. Unless it’s illegal because of the taboos (which would be informing the child of the law), it’s largely irrelevant.
By teaching your child to adhere to taboos you’re also teaching them to ostracize people who don’t, usually. That’s some intellectual diversity you’re supporting there…
Cultural taboos? Ok, let’s have a few. Remember, these are all cultural taboos, though they may or may not be part of laws in some parts of the world.
1. Don’t wipe your arse and then eat with the same hand without washing it first. It’s a cultural taboo, though based on what we know about hygiene.
2. Wear clothes in public. That’s another one that we don’t really think of, but which is also cultural only, if weather would otherwise permit nakedness.
3. You can’t physically attack/maim/kill a stranger, just because you felt like it. Basically if you cared nothing for other people, what would stop you from doing anything you like? (Until police got involved.)
And since child abuse was one of the topics, how about 4. You don’t have sex with children. That’s also cultural, and not one that’s followed in all cultures.
Do I need to go on or can we agree that certain cultural taboos are based on common sense and real life issues. Basically speaking, your rights stop where the other person’s rights start.
Aita one question for you, since I’m curious, what do you do when yoru child rejects your explanation and proceeds to demand, at ever increasing volume, whatever it is that you don’t want to give them?
For example: 5 year old Timmy grabs a candy bar as we go through the check out line at the grocery store “Mom, can I have this?” Mom says “No, Timmy, we can’t afford to buy candy today. Please put it back.” Timmy (being 5 and not understanding finances) starts begging, while clinging to the candy bar.
By your reasoning, Mom should continue to stand there and hold up the line, while explaining to an uninterested child that there isn’t enough money in the budget for candy today. Or mom should put back the healthy food she picked out and buy the candy. Right? Or am I missing an option?
My choice in such situations (and raising 2 boys, there have been many) is to raise my voice enough to be heard through the kids’ noise, say “NO,” remove the candy from their little hands, and tell the child “We will discuss this more in the car.” IMO there IS a benefit to raised voices at times, and to children knowing that there are some choices they get to make but others that will be made for them. My kids learned that when asking turns to begging/whining, mom gets annoyed and they don’t get what they want. If they are old enough to listen, and aren’t throwing screaming tantrums, then they will get explanations once there is time for them. That is not and will not always be immediately. It’s helpful to have children who respect that “No” is “No” because parents said it. I do value explaining the “Why” behind the “No” but understanding the “why” is not a requirement for cooperation from my boys.
Why is Timmy, already 5, unable to comprehend finances? Why was the budget not explained prior?
…Aaand that comment right there convinced me that you are trolling.
Next, please!!
Yeah… any chance Dave could ban that user? I’m sorry now that I tried to argue sensibly with them.
Yep, Reo, I think you’re right. No point talking further with someone who only wants to antagonize everybody. At least I got a good laugh from the budget comment, though!
You and I do not share the same interpretation of what she is saying. This therefore means that you and I are destined to disagree.
My job as a parent is to teach my children right and wrong. Teach them why. When they are old enough to make their own decisions they have the background to make intelligent ones.
Children are not born with the ability to make their own decisions. We need to teach them HOW to do so. They are not born with the ability to understand everything going on in the world. It is our job to introduce the world to them so they know how to deal with it.
To do less than that is failing as a parent.
Awwwww… Poor Todd and poor Selkie. They’ll discover soon enough these moments happen once in a while between parents and children. Life will move on. Been going that way a lot with my 3.5 year old (terrible twos my foot). Parenting is a grand adventure and learning experience in accepting your humaness and discovering new methods of controlling your temper so you can remain the adult. 🙂
BTW, Dave, are you a parent? If not, you will be an awesome one. 🙂
I love the frame with the red with white nagging words. That is *exactly* how it feels right when you have a bad moment. Pretty darn hard on those of us who have had abusive childhoods as we are always second-guessing ourselves.
But the fact is kids can push buttons—especially our own kids. It happens to begin with for anyone you are very close to (in a way this means that Selkie and Todd are entering a new wonderful stage of their family memberhood). It’s not that that kids don’t know better, it’s that they have a harder time controlling their impulses and slip into rude behavior easier (IOW, they “forget” easier).
I’d like to be a parent one day, but right now, no.
It’s the hardest, and most fulfilling, job you will ever have.
Sorry, I missed a line.
It’s the hardest and most fulfilling job you will ever have. I highly recommend it.
i love the shading in this one, I am not sure how to explain it but somehow it has more “feeling” in it, like when you tone down lights and use candles instead. it’s softer even though I’d say the shadows are more noticable. also the facial expressions on this one are totally awesome espescially in panel 3 and 6, they convey very well what they feel at that exact point of time. Even though panel 5 is so adorable I just wanna cry, she looks like Puss in Boots :3
It’s funny how yelling goes by family. In my family, when we’re angry/upset, we yell. It isn’t considered more than an expression of your feelings. And it’s pretty safe that way, cause everyone knows what it’s for. But for example one of my brothers’ girlfriend comes from a family where both parents are deaf (she and her siblings hear just fine), and she has an absolute melt-down at raised voices. Since she’s now an integral part of the family (engagement is on planning stages), me and my mom sat her down once and explained how yelling works in our family, so she doesn’t freak out at it happening when she’s around. 🙂
Although I like the look of the shadows, I feel like it makes the mood of the comic look a little too dark…
Calliope?
I don’t suppose the letters UU mean anything significant to you…
Unseen University? From Discworld books? 😛
Perhaps they do!
Tch, Selkie, he warned you more than once…that’s heading into “lose your cartoons for a week” territory in my family.
To be fair Todd could have taken the time to talk to Selkie and explain why this is important first.
He does seem sorry though so he realizes raising his voice was wrong, not a big deal if he apologizes.
Nice job on the shading. Makes it pop just a little more, almost a 3D effect.
Poor Todd and poor Selkie. Seems like that’s the first time he’s raised his voice to her. Don’t worry Selkie, your dad still loves you.
There’s nothing wrong with getting angry with your kid. Sometimes it’s necessary to do it. Man, my little brother would tune me out when I tried to tell him to stop doing something that was wrong so a lot of the time I’d have to yell at him to get him to even acknowledge me. Same thing with my little sister, except she’s far worse. My parents never properly disciplined my brother and sister, so they turned into spoiled little brats who cried and threw a fit (Even hitting other people.) if they didn’t get their way. Not disciplining a child is the worst thing you can do for them.
I’m not sure how to explain it, but I feel like Todd is going to learn how to really parent from this point forward. Sometimes it feels like Todd is trying to be a friend to his daughter more than a parent. Maybe I’m off on this, but to me sometimes he seems more older brotherly than fatherly. This is coming from someone with no kids and many brothers, though, so it could just be me that feels this way. He’s doing great for just becoming a dad. It’s just that I hope he can get more of a fatherly feel as he gains parenting experience.
I’m not fond of parents who try to ‘befriend’ their child. My mom did that with my sister and now they smoke weed together and pop pills because she wants to be the ‘cool’ mom who doesn’t teach their child right from wrong and what good morals are.
What are “good” morals to you, then?
Don’t kill people. Don’t do things that can harm yourself or others. Pretty clear cut things like that.
I mean of course there are exceptions to everything, depending on the situation at hand.
I mean, I don’t really care that they smoke weed together, nearly everyone I know smokes the stuff. I do care that they pop pills or crush them up and drink them with alcohol together to get a fix. Pretty sure that’s a big wrong right there. I mean, if she wants to kill herself, by all means, go for it. Her life and what not, but she shouldn’t taint her kid in the process. Though, my sister was bound to end up that way, living and being raised by that woman.
Which is why I’m glad I was raised by my grandmother. She taught me right from wrong and what good values are. Sure, some of her stuff I didn’t necessarily agree with, but she never beat me and she was never high as a kite or drunk off her ass. Plus I was always given a place to live, had food and clothing and was raised in a mostly positive environment. Not everything was perfect, but hell, no place is. At least I grew up well and I’m not a bigot or something.
My grandmother taught me to treat other people the way I’d want to be treated and to love and forgive people even if they’re shitty and mean. She also taught me to be generally nice to everyone and that my actions effect others so I should think about the things I intend to do before I do them. She also taught me that I shouldn’t have sex at a young age, nor should I drink or do drugs at a young age, but was free to do so once I was older and not under her roof. (Though she wouldn’t necessarily ever agree with me doing drugs. I think she’d be alright with weed though. I don’t do drugs either way so whatever.)
My sister on the other hand was raised to do whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted at whatever age she wanted. She grew up with no limitations in her life. She was allowed to get a boyfriend at 8 years old. Slept around with guys when she was 10. Got branded a whore in her school and was allowed to drop out of school because she ‘didn’t like it’ and was allowed to smoke, drink and do drugs at a very young age.
Raising your child as a ‘free spirit’ without any ‘rules or discipline’ to ‘limit their creative mind’ just makes for a rebellious screw up. Besides, that’s a horrible environment without any sense of stability. Kids need stability to be alright. Otherwise they get all screwed up and run wild if they’re left to their own devices with no sense of guidance.
I’ve been reading the parenting debates comments silently in the background for the most part, but I had to comment on something here.
From what you’ve described, I feel bad for your sister. “She was allowed to get a boyfriend at 8 years old. Slept around with guys when she was 10.”
That is just a terrible thing to let happen to your kid, I don’t care who you are. 🙁
Oh of course I feel bad for her. The thing is, when my grandmother offered to let her live with us; she did at first. Then she got annoyed because of all the rules. She wasn’t allowed to sleep around, she wasn’t allowed to have a boyfriend, she wasn’t allowed to stay out until 1 a.m. with people double her age. She got angry. She spread lies and said my grandmother beat her and treated her badly and eventually went back to her mother and did all of the things she wanted.
Of course I feel bad for her. I still do. I blame her mother entirely for what happened to her, but she had a chance to live a good life and refused it because of the ‘rules’ she didn’t want to live by.
So yeah, I feel like not monitoring what your children can and cannot do is bad parenting. Treating your child like your ‘bro’ or your ‘friend’ is horrible parenting. Parents are parents and friends are friends. Parents teach their children right and wrong and they can decide later on in life if they want to abide by their parents morals and rules.
If teaching your child not to hit others, not to disrespect adults, not to bad mouth people, and not to do drugs and sleep around is bad parenting, well then I’m going to be a horrible parent and I’ll be proud to be one. :l
So then, Aita. You are in favor of showing children how to become drug addicts in lieu of actually being a parent? I can only assume that, since you ignored everything else she said.
Good to know.
Also, I don’t know about you, but if my kid wanted to attend a party with no parental supervision whatsoever and they were young and inexperienced or irresponsible, you can be sure I wouldn’t let them go just because they want to. I’m not going to send little Becky or whatever I name my kid, somewhere just because they want it and they think it’s good for them because they think they know what’s best for them. Just like I wouldn’t let my kid sleep around and get knocked up or riddled with STDs just because they want to do it.
Course, I guess your means of parenting is different. I’m sure your kid would survive for a good 5 minutes since you’d let them jam a fork into a light socket because you felt like it was their right to do so and it’s not necessarily they ‘wrong’ thing to do, am I right?
I mean, that’s perfectly alright. You can raise your kids any way you want to. 😀
I am enjoying the shading hue you are testing, it is a subtle difference, but everything looks more 3D in a way. It just pops really well. Selkie’s sad eyes are adorable also!
This strip has brought a heavy atmosphere over and a great change. I love the shading here, and the expressions are well built. It’s amazing how Dave’s art keeps on improving! Anyway… I do hope some fanart can cheer someone up… Drawing Selkie has become a great therapy! So cute! So adorable! So fishy!
There is Seal Selkie to flop around the fanart page! http://fav.me/d5lmkz3
Keep up the great work Dave, don’t forget… I’ll be lurking in the shadowssssssss… drawing neverending fanart and not showing it to you!
You think I didn’t see this, but I got you! 😀 SO CUTE.
Just a bit of artistic critique,your faces don’t seem to be very constant. Todd’s face looks different in almost every panel he’s in. I know it’s something that’s pretty darn hard to get over, but considering all of the amazing artistic evolution we’ve seen with this strip so far, I’m confident you’ll get over it fairly quick. It’s just a suggestion of what to work on next. 🙂
I know you’ve said outright that you tried to make Todd look less ‘boyish’, but maybe you overdid it. He looks like he went from ’25-year-old man’ to ’45-year-old drill instructor’ overnight.
Even tho I’m only 16 I can do the dad stare. Its pretty easy when you and your parents basically raze your older brother’s stepchild by yourselves. And yes I think that kids need boundaries and that kids need to at times be spanked not hard just enough that they wont want to do that again. Not in this case tho the dad stare would’ve worked very well
The sooner she realizes that a whole bunch of whining leads to no good the sooner she’ll learn better bargaining tactics, as well as reading peoples’ moods better. In moderation, yelling at kids is an excellent teaching tool. Teaches them exactly where the line is that they shouldn’t cross, and it doesn’t hurt ’em.
Just remember to use it sparingly, because if they learn that you yell all the time they’ll stop paying attention to when you yell.
sorry had to post this as a reply,cant figure out how to just leave a comment(possible webpage issue..)
I love your comic Dave,you’re doing a FANTASTIC job,in terms of art and story,and your content is always moving emotionally and intellectually. This comic is one of the few bright spots in my life and I adore reading it, please dont stop writing it anytime soon,and try to ignore the little comment trolls that show up from time to time. I know they’ll never apologize for their atrocious behavior so I will, dont let people like that discourage you and dont let them make you hate reading comments either. I’ll be honest,people like that make me DESPISE reading through comments and make me nervous about leaving them. But I wanted you to know how much I adore your comic =hugs for awesome Dave= keep on being awesome =3
Orrrrr maybe I’m not really trolling? Maybe I think discouraging immature behavior (a ten year old acting like a five year old, etc.) is a good thing?
Actually here’s the deal: I happen to know two twenty-somethings who are friends with my younger brother. They go to him all the time for advice, often when they’ve caused some kind of social disaster because they’re completely clueless. We’re talking things like “Should I go and meet my old boyfriend, you know the one who beat me up those times, all alone by myself.” or “Oh man, I need to go buy that game again because I traded it in and bought it again and traded it back in and I don’t have it right now.”
I exaggerate the phrasing out of the need for brevity, but those are real examples of situations their complete cluelessness has caused. And I blame their parents, because more than anything else that they have in common, none of the parents ever disciplined them. And now they’re out in the world and they’re completely unprepared to deal with the simplest matters, let alone really important things.
So yeah, I believe that sometimes you need to yell at kids FOR THEIR OWN GOOD. Not all the time. Not inconsistently. Not when they’re too young to understand. Not when they don’t need it. Not when accidents happen. NEVER out of anger. But if you never yell at them, you are ruining their potential, because they’ll assume that nothing they ever do deserves being yelled at.
Honestly, as a parent myself, I agree with you. Whining is very frustrating but children – even adults – do it. My sister has three and tends to yell (single mother) more than anything and her kids have more or less stopped listening to her.
It’s unfortunate but lots of kids are raised differently in those situations. It also doesn’t mean she’s a *bad* parent, but raising your voice with three whining children – instead of one older one like Todd, also an adopted child – doesn’t do any good.
So ignoring the random banter back and forth from up above (I’ll try to catch you on League later and talk about it. it seems very interesting actually), I quite adore the new shading technique, Dave. Looks great, as as someone said above (I can’t remember who) it DOES make it look very 3D and pops out at you.
Also you’ve heard from experience I’m sure that *you know who* has done this to me on several occasions. “Mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy” -_-
I like the new shading technique. It gives the characters dimension and improves the perspective.
Can’t wait to see how the T.A. handles explaining the situation.
I just noticed, Amanda is Todd’s child, right?
Amanda, Todd.
… I think I’ve ruined this comic forever for me.
I find it interesting that the majority of people assume Selkie is actually trying to stop them from missing her cartoons. I’m sure that’s part of it, but I see it more that she’s used to staying quiet as a defense mechanism. To her, letting the homework thing go isn’t only a good idea, it’s her immediate reaction because she’s used to jokes being played on her. I had a lot of bullies as a kid and I remember getting very use to mean jokes being played on me.
And if you notice, she doesn’t mention cartoons in this page. She says, “I don’t want to be here.” She’s desperate to get out because she doesn’t want to make trouble … because in the past making trouble just gets her more resentment.
So this comment thread has, well, blown up. There are a lot of conversations going on here where, quite simply, I don’t really know WHAT to say or add to it. But I wanted to pop in and let everyone know (if you did not already assume this XD) that I am reading each comment personally as they come in.
I never know which comic I post is going to spark a landslide of conversation like this. Amazes me each time. 🙂
I probably shouldn’t detail this, because it embarrasses my parents when I bring it up, but I was spanked as a kid when I either got out of line (and I mean, taking a baseball bat to the television) or when I refuse to obey a direct imperative (such as the time I was grounded from reading the comic’s page, then snuck it to the living room and read them anyway while my mom was cooking).
Even though spanking was only used on me as a corrective tool… I hated it. I hated it intensely and to the point where I am still, as a grown adult, slightly resentful of the act. I love my parents very much and have a great relationship with them. But a small part of me resents having my butt lashed, all the same.
I am not a parent myself, despite what the comic may suggest about me (although I’d like to be one day), but I do hope that when I am a parent, I can make correcting bad behavior work without breaking out the wooden spoon. XD
Amen. I wanted to thank you for touching on such a fraught subject. Discipline is always a touchy thing. I think you’re handling it beautifully. Again, thank you.
My parents made us sit in a corner, confiscated toys, didn’t let us go on playdates, etc. I’ve been physically punished exactly 2 times total by them, once per parent, and those were enough to teach me the lines you can’t cross – the snapping line of the parent.
So I say from my experiences that infrequent use of physical punishment works for discipline in teaching the child what line you can’t cross without serious consequences, but spanking someone for any little thing, that I don’t agree with.
From my own folks, I hear that I was spanked as a child. That said, I have no memories of it. I’m told it happened twice, but my Dad could only recollect the cause of the one incident, and believe me, I earned that one.
Most of my punishments were labour related. Now that I’m an adult, my Dad likes to joke that he doesn’t get random days off from the yard work anymore.
The worst labour I remember came after I took the car without permission to a party in high school. Had to help my uncle fence his land; believe me, you only need to do that once.
Overall, though, my punishments were few and far between; it didn’t take long for them to become unnecessary. What I took from all that is a good parent doesn’t need to be a tyrant. Just a firm and consistent stance.
My parents usually took away my books or my library card when I misbehaved. It worked embarrassingly well, but I did get physically punished a few times by my parents. It was more of a knee-jerk reaction to something I’d done than anything else, (i.e. catching and playing with a brown recluse, trying to look inside the neighbor’s beehive after being told not to, etc).
Discipline and parenting are so tricky, but I’ve been having a lot of fun seeing how you handle all of it in the comic. Thank you for writing and drawing it.
I got spanked when I was very, very young. Like, in diapers young. So I couldn’t even feel it since the diaper took the brunt of it lol honestly, the noise itself was the thing that bothered me. As I got older, I just got things taken away or scolded with a lecture. Probably wouldn’t spank my own kids unless they crossed a serious line. Even though, only as a last resort. I’m not morally against spanking, I just think there’s not much point to it since small children tend to do whatever it is they did before the spanking shortly after and older children can just be talked to, to understand what they did was wrong.
I mean, I guess not ALL kids can be talked too, but yeah. I had to resort to slapping my brother once because he went bonkers and started to hit me in his fit of rage and talking to him (Which eventually escalated into yelling.) failed to get his attention. He completely tuned me out. So I slapped him. That got his attention and he stopped his fit instantly. Of course then he told on me, but at least he stopped throwing a fit and hitting me.
Frankly I am enjoying the discussions almost as much as the comic.
Disciplining Selkie will have its own unique challenges, as she may have slightly superior physical abilities, venom, claws and fangs.
Then again a snowball fight with her may be more tramatic than for a regular kid.
I honestly really love the comic and everything so far and the art style, but one thing that keeps bothering me a little is the proportion of some things like the length of the arms. I guess this is only my opinion and other than that, I wanted to say I love your comic so far.