Title: Intro to the post.

Every now and then a thought strikes me, it can be a deep thought or a shallow one (mostly unimportant and shallow) and I will consider discussing it here. However if I feel it is too insignificant I will not bother. Which is why I have taken a lot of these little "ponderings" and made this thread into one big pool of thoughts rather than making many small and spammy threads. But even combining my thoughts into one post my guess is that this will be a brief read.

Title: Respecting minors as you would advlts.

The first thing that I'm going to get at that I've been wondering about is if we should show minors in the two digit ages more respect as we first encounter them. I have always been aware of this stigma that is shown towards kids around the ages of 11 - 17 (mostly 13 - 15) where society will shun them based on stereotypes given to that age. Now obviously there is some truth to said stereotypes, at that age kids go through a lot of hormonal and thust personality changes and it can be hard to predict just what kind of response to expect from someone in that age group, and often you will be dealing with the typhical teenager with an overblown ego and an attitude that says "piss off" but every now and then you will come across the early bloomer who is past his peers in maturity or the late bloomer who hardly acts different from the last few years.

I myself consider myself to be the kid who grew up ahead of his time (yes I know, before I go anywhere further I feel the need to mention that most everyone feels that way, after all who would like to think of himself as being immature ? but let me explain...), I used to be very closely knit to the kids in my school and what went for them went for me too, rather much of a group mentality going on there. However as with most groups of children one of the more popular passtimes was playing sports and I for one ended up being unable to participate in any more sports very early on in my teenage years due to a problem with my knees. This eventually led to me spending less and less time with others and more and more time staying inside, reading, browsing the internet and playing co-op VS AI online games which often tend to have zero tolerance for stupidity as teams must function properly as a whole to take on challenges the game designers have created with teamwork in mind.

I quickly found myself becoming somewhat of an outcast from my peers but at the same time a kid my age would be an outcast from the advlts of our society. A good number of guilds (and other such factions) in games would be 18+ and admitting to a low age would be somewhat of a risky thing to do if you desired to be taken seriously by anyone who did not know you already. I remember when I was 13 I had been playing the game World of Warcraft extensively and I had mate it up to the rank of a so called "officer" in a guild. Officers in a guild have access to a specific guild channel in WoW where officers can have private discussions without the rest of the guild seeing. Anyway I had been taking care not to tell my age to anyone without being asked first, and I had not been asked up to that point, when the discussion on the officer channel turned into one about confirmations (the ritual sort) and I slipped and said that I'd be having a civil confirmation when I turned 14 at which point the chat exploded with people making comments along the lines of "serioulsy ? you're under 14 ?" and "you're a kid ? I never knew that". I found it rather discomforting that it would have to be such a big deal but at that point I was already in that group so to speak so my age had little effect on how my stay there progressed from there on. But I do sometimes wonder if I had even been let in at all in the first place if I had told them my age when I first joined.

And stigma around age is not only existent on the internet where people are more free to express their opinions. Have you ever seen a line of people at a register where there are a lot of advlts and one kid. And the cashier will greet every single advlt a good morning and tell them off with a nice day at the end of the exchange, but then suddenly fall silent when its the kids turn unless the kid is under that age ? From the time where you can speak your first words people in positions of service will smile at you and greet you, while admittedly a bit differently from advlts, but the curtesy is still there. Then you reach your teenage years and all of a sudden it's "what do you want ?" and nothing else. Lastly you break out of that particular age period and suddenly people are smiling and greeting you again.

So we have the typical teenagers who create this stigma by acting like rebels against all sense and generally are the reason "12/13 year old" is even used as an insult. But then there are also the ones who don't seem to go into that period at all for some reason and will at worst act like ignorant "advlts" and at best simply be quite mature for their age and be the sort that you can strike up a conversation with much like any advlt you know. But despite the odds being stacked in favor of the stereotypical teenager should our first reaction to people at that age be that they can be mature individuals if given the chance, or should the law of averages be upheld and the assumption be made from the start that the person of that age group is not worth your time ? Is it "innocent until proven guilty" or "guilty until proven innocent" ? Or in other words "mature until proven immature" or "immature until proven mature ?".

I myself would lean towards "mature until proven immature" if only to give said few individuals the chance to show me if they are worth the attention or not.

Title: People not moving out because of their family needing them.

Now the next thing is families that unintentionally leech of one member of the family, and then in particular one of the children but not the parents. I've seen examples where a couple would have a child around the age of 40 and be well 60 years old by the time said child is 20, but instead of moving out to make their own fortune they would stay and aid their parents if needed, be it by helping to pay bills or to take care of someone who is having issues with health, and it does not have to be related to age and in some cases the reason a person would stay is not even a parent but rather a sibling with physical or mental problems that would require their aid to get by on a daily basis when no one else would be around to take care of them.

Would you say it was selfish for people in such positions to just pack up their things and leave their family to their problems or is it rather anyones right to just say "I'm going to make my own fortune" and should there be no expectations made to them to sacrifice parts of their best years for their family. Obviously it is anyones right by law to go wherever they wish once they hit advlthood and most such situations are quite complex but if you only go down to the crux of it then would it be wrong or not wrong to simply leave their problems behind them and work on their own fortune ? And if you were on one side of the scenario or the other how would you percieve it. For example if you were taking care of a large farm and suddenly your physical condition no longer allows you to take care of it all on your own, but you have a 18 years old son or a daugther and you know that in maybe 5 years time you would be healthy enough to take over again. Do you expect your kid to stay from the age of 18 - 23 to help you or do you cut down on your farm to a size that you can manage by yourself ? And if you are the 18 year old individual with your own aspirations and ambitions. Do you just shrug and leave or stay so the farm can be kept as large as usual for the next 5 years ?

Title: Gender perceptions, can boys do what girls can do ?

Next little thing that has flown through my mind during endless hours of mindlessly working is if we do not spend enough time on making gender perceptions equal for males too. It's widely accepted for women to have short hair but in a lot of places it is in no way okay for a man to have long hair. One moment during work that brought a smile to my face was the irony of when a small girl (perhaps 5 or 6) loudly stated to me that boys do not have long hair while she was wearing a football uniform with short spiky hair and a football in her hands, basically as tomboyish a girl as you could ever find. And the first reaction most people will have to My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic fans that are male is a negative one, but if a girl watches shows that have previously been percieved as boy shows only there will be next to no reaction at all. And increasingly girls keep creeping into so called "male culture" while boys have not nearly been doing the same to the same extent, no little fault to themselves of course, few will discourage a boy from doing girly things as much as another boy of the same age.

Look at this cute little video of a little girl discussing marketing with her father. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=-CU040Hqbas

About ten seconds in there is this transcription "cus girls want superheroes and the boys want superheroes, and the girls want pink stuff and the girls... and the boys want... and the boys don't want pink stuff!" the father goes on to nudge her asking if boys don't also want pink stuff and eventually the girl goes and comes to the conclusion that both can want both. But the initial thing that seems to pop up with not only this girl but most girls and also most little boys is "girls can like both girl and boy stuff, boys can only like boy stuff". I find it funny that there even are things labled as "girl stuff" and "boy stuff". Obviously there are still some psychological differences between girls and boys but they should not be put onto pedestal but rather things should be ordered together and the preferences of either gender will fall naturally at one side or the other while deciding on which item to pick. We shouldn't lead a girl through a pink isle full of dolls and ponies and we shouldn't lead a boy through a blue isle full of robots and cars. We should lead them through the same isle, it can be whatever color, even pink or blue, and they should all at least have the chance to pick what really appeals to them. I still think it will be more likely for a boy to take certain toys and a girl to take others, but we would see a heck of a lot more diversity in personality if it was done that way.

If you have a kid or in theory had a kid, would you let it run rampant around a toy store or would you lead it towards where you imagine its areas of interest would lie, and if it picked a toy that went against its gender stereotype would you worry about the kid being teased by its peers and if it was how would you react to it ?

Title: Meat, cute animal friends and children.

Now for another topic also half related to children (they and their psychology has been quite a facinating subject for me to ponder lately I guess) is how we are nudged to eat certain things and not others and how that translates into advlthood. One of the biggest facepalm moments I have ever had was when I was visiting my friend and his little sister was watching "Charlette's web", I sat down with her and she turned to me and said "the evil farmer is trying to eat the pig", to which I just shrugged, a statement I would expect from a child, but then ten minutes later her mom called her to dinner. They were having porkchops. And my friends sister jumped in glee and told me porkchops were her favorite food.

Before I go any further keep in mind I will be playing a devil's advocate in a lot of places in the next paragraph, so it is not 100% a clear representation of my own personal believes.

Now to be fair, that is common enough, we have hundreds of chickens, pigs, cows and sheep playing the part of heroes in stories rather than dumb animals for consumption yet we live in a culture that eats millions of these animals on at least a weekly if not daily basis. But then comes the thing I truly wonder about. Is it not really just the same with a lot of animals ? Lately the sale of pony meat has shot up in Iceland, as a MLP:FiM fan I should be aghast but I realize those creatures are quite different IRL and that it's fair to have the option to eat them. Then there are types of whales, often claimed to be largely intelligent but still the same claim could be said for some of the more popular animals in our diets. And lastly the holy grail of it all, cats and dogs. I can already guess a good quarter of you had some vagely racist thoughts about dirty Chinese street vendors such as those you would see in the movies that create such stereotypes, where there is a butcher with a big bloody clever and a stack of cages full of whimpering dogs and cats making heart breaking meows. But when it comes down to it they are still animals only marginally more intelligent than sheep or pigs, yet because they are cute and have been used as our pets we say "they are our friends" and it has become taboo in modern culture to use them for the same purposes as other animals. But can you imagine a different sort of global society ? One where it's the sheep we consider cute and it's sheep that we say are "our friends" ? Or even some existing ones where there are gray lines about if bunnies are "friends" or "food" ? What is your opinion on such cultural restrictions and when it comes to animals on a more of a gray scale such as whales do you encourage or discourage children from eating them ? I realize this particular discussion may get a little too political if it gets out of hand so let's try to keep this particular discussion as rough as possible, nothing too finely detailed or anything.

Title: A chain effect of morals.

Now on brigther notes what I wanted to discuss here is if you think the world can ever be inhabited by nothing but people of unquestionable morals and kind nature. It's no lie that with every century crime and war casualties decrease in percentages on average and quality of life increases. But there have always been people who we would describe as bad or evil, yet no one is truly just "born bad", our personalities are largely determined by the influence of other humans around us. There are people who inspire us to be kind or wicket and we can inspire others in the same way, so would it be reasonable to assume it to be possible for there to be an infinite cycle of people inspiring others in the right way at some point in life ? What I mean is that there are people who would never do anything against another person and there are those that would inspire others to be like that, but then there is the question if the integrity of such people can be broken by those that would usually influence others to be less than honorable ? And if it is possible for a chain effect of good people influencing each other to be like they are then could the same not be for bad people where the chain could cause everyone to be dishonorable ?

But then there is the matter of moral gray areas, what is moral and honorable anyway ? Well I guess most all of us think "we" are the ones who know best about that, so two people could easily be doing something they percieve as good while they percieve each other as evil. But then there are concepts such as "killing others", "lying to others for personal gain or to decrease their own quality of life", "stealing from others" and so forth that can easily be viewed in a black and white spectrum rather than through a gray moral compass. Or perhaps my views are not gray enough ? Do you personally think there are such things as "pure evil" and "pure good" ? Concepts with no other side to them and if so do you think everyone else could be convinced to see your point of view given enough time, be it in a hundred, thousand or even a million years ? And do you ever doubt your own moral compass or do you have a very strong stance on your own personal morals ?

To give my own personal opinion on this one I think it's fully possible to teach everyone compassion and care for their fellow humans despite the differences in people created by the numerous different "factions" if you will that we put ourselves in as long as it is taught to us before we grow old and rigid in our views.

Title: Diversity.

Now let's discuss diversity! Yes, diversity in all things, food and media, scenery and temperature, simply in everything. Are you the kind of person who feels diversity is the spice of life or do you think that if life is good you don't need to put spice on it ? Or perhaps life is good because you spice it up! I could go in endless cycles with this. One thing I notice a lot working as a cashier is that people who tend to buy diverse tend to do it in all things and people who tend to buy the same of one sort also do it for another. Like two people may buy 6 packs of noodles and 3 cartons of juice. One of them buys two packs of chicken noodles, two packs of beef noodles and two packs of vegetables noodles, one carton of orange juice, one of apple juice and one of pear juice. Then the other person may buy 6 packs of chicken noodles and three cartons of orange juice. That is putting it simply though but it is very common for me to be able to guess if there will be a diverse varity of choice in the rest of the products that come my way on the register by looking at the first few items and seeing if the person is buying only a few of a lot of sorts or a lot of a few sorts.

I myself tend to be very simple, I always order the same toppings on my pizza, I nearly always buy the same soda and most of the games I play are very alike being RPG's and strategy games with only one or two racing or FPS games thrown in here and there. It is very clear to me what I like the most and while I give everything at least one try before I put it aside I keep to what I like the most and am quite happy that way. But then I have friends who couldn't stand doing the same theme of something again and again so they will only do some one thing for a while before turning to the next thing. But how is it for you ? Would you rather listen to the same 100 quality songs on repeat and shuffle for hours or would you rather listen to a thousand songs half of which are only mediocre but not top quality. And do you put a lot of one topping you like really much on your pizza or does your pizza look like a X-mas tree with ten different toppings but only a little bit of each ? Or does it perhaps depend very largely on what concept, item or food is in question at any given time ? And do you think it's a large indicator of personality if someone is the kind who leans towards diversity or not ?

Title: Judging people.

And on that note when it comes to judging character do you tend to judge people based on outwards apperances or do you act truely neutral towards everyone to begin with ? When you think about it is how we appear on the outside in terms of clothing and such not a mirror of our character, or just of our personal taste in looks and fashion alone ? I myself tend to wear the same kind of clothes because I find them more comfortable than other clothing, but the colors I usually go with could be taken as an indicator of personality as I tend to pick dull colors since I don't feel something like bright yellow or red would fit someone with the kind of calm demeanor I tend to give off in real life which partly because I tend not to have an easy time talking over others so I come off as a good listener even if I'm just waiting to speak (which granted does involve me waiting for them to finish which involves listening to what is being said). And then I have long hair which I only have because I physically feel it fits me better. So there are already 3 different reasons for outwards apperances, comfort, expressing ones personality and ones taste in looks or fashion. So I'd say outwards looks can not fully be trusted as an indicator of the person beneath said appearences.

And about that person beneath the appearences there is the question "who are you ?". Is your personality molded by the experiences of your life as you grow older and older or are you able to decide who you aspire to be and then make yourself that person. I have a friend who has had problems with getting a job because of his distaste in being mistreated in any way at all. So when he would apply to a job and the interviewer would make him wait for over an hour to start despite him having shown up on time he would express his distaste and thus not get the job as it is generally not a good idea to be agressive to someone when applying for a job. But when asked if he couldn't just keep his calm on and just deal with it he would respond "I would but I'm just like this and I can't do anything about that", but would it not be possible to adapt yourself to the situation. To be someone meek when needed, to be someone ferocious when needed, to be someone caring when needed ? Very much like just roleplaying, except you're applying it to real life situation rather than in-game situations. Or is it a part of who we are to either be, or not be, able to sway your personality around as needed.

So do you think everyone is capable of making themselves be whoever they need to be or are some people simply rigid in their behaviours ?

Title: Influencing children and how much old folk keep up with younger generations.

Now back to the children (sorry if this is not very consistent, those are just random thought that I'm scribbling down one after another) it's no lie that we are highly suspectable to influence as kids and that often we end up with similar moral believes to our parents and peers from our childhood. So of course every parent will try his or her best to raise a kid properly but if you think they are doing something wrong do you feel that it is your place to try and influence the child with your own moral believes or should the authority of the parents be respected in all other than the most extreme cases considering how gray most people find morals to be. In some cases there is even no right or wrong, just two wrongs in different ways or two right views in different ways. So should it just be left to the parents to raise their kids or do you think it's okay to challenge their views through their child ? Or perhaps it is only appropriate to teach children this same moral grayness with no biase towards one view or the other allowing them to take their own stance when they feel they are ready to pick what they think is right ? I personally tend to butt in on the views of my own little brother going against some of the things he has learned from our parents but then again my own older brothers did very much of the same for me and I tend to think their influence has been beneficial rather than not for my own personality.

Also on children every few years or so the course material kids have to take in school gets harder and the teachers become better and more efficient so the difference in what a kid knows when leaving school now is quite different from what it was 30 years ago for example. And every year technology evolves and it tends to be the children who keep up with it the best. So you could say that each new generation trumps the old, however these days seem to be quite unique in the ease of access to knowledge brough to us by the internet. There is nothing you can't learn about quite quickly on the internet if not in detail then at least roughly so that you get the concept behind it. And the current generations of people who frequent the internet are by now far too accustomed to searching for new information on the internet to have any excuse to fall behind their younger community members. So do you think the trend of kids and young advlts being the ones who adapt the fastest to new technology will die down and become a thing of the past or will it continue simply because most advlts tend to have less free time due to work hours. Or am I perhaps putting too much powder in my own personal experiences and have the older folk in your community always held up quite nicely ? Does your grandfather perhaps code in his free time or does your grandma keep up with current school curriculum by studying it online ? (I know my own don't )

Title: Artists and how their work reflects their personalities.

Lastly in this short little post of thoughts is how much the work of artists reflect their personalities in real life. We often hear people utter sentences like "people are not like that in real life" when they see or read about a character being particularly brave, smart or honorable. But then again someone had to write the character, someone had to think in the manner the character is supposed to think. So do you think authors who may write deeply about humble caring characters may be the same in real life or could they be complete jerks in reality ? If for example a writer would write about someone rising to fame who would still pay as much attention to the common folk despite rising in ranks on the social ladder then do you think those same authors would do the same if they became rich and famous ? How much is the work of artists worth as a mirror to their personality anyway ?

Title: End of post.

So that has been some of the stuff on my mind lately. Not the most exciting read ever but at least I put it into one post rather than many posts thanks for reading anyway and leave your thoughts and comments if you feel like you have anything to say about any of the subjects.

Yes, I would influence my children and dictate toys they buy based on gender.

Thinking of answers made my headache even worse.

Gender perceptions, can boys do whatyou girls can do ?

I would influence him to get more boyish toys because I know how cruel kids can be at that age. Although If he truely wanted a girl's toy though I guess I would relent after a while I think, but I would try to keep that toy in house and not let that toy go outside.

Diversity:

I'm the same as you, I always get the same thing when I'm going any of my favorite restaurants or going shopping for food. Sometimes though I do get a little something different once I get tried of my usual, but after that I go right back to my usual. This also applies to games and music as well.

Meat, cute animal friends and children:

I wouldn't eat my pets though at times I've wondered what dogs or cats would taste like. Would I disencourage children from eating whales? Only if they were my children.

Respecting minors as you would advlts.:

I try to treat everyone with respect although if they are rude however I would still treat them with respect but at the end of the conversation I would make a little snide comment about their attitude.

Hope you don't mind if I cherry pick things to respond to.
I'd agree with the basic sentiment behind this. In 2011 there was some talk in the news about the inclusion of so-called "mosquito" sound devices at shops in the district. (namely, some shops installed these devices and were facing legal challenges) Not only did teenagers complain about the harassment these devices created for them, but some advlts also complained (because they could still hear the high frequency sound). I think that our society has really taken mistrust of teenagers to far when we develop tech specifically for the purpose of harassing certain segments of the citizenry. While teenagers obviously have a certain level of immaturity about them, they are no more a malcontent then the criminal advlt or the naively malevolent child.
I'd say it's never selfish for a young advlt to strike out on their own, even if their parents are infirm. The Parents are not the responsibility of the child, and our economic health depends upon our children becoming fully actualized members of society. If the parent cannot care for themselves, then society may distribute this burden through social and governmental institutions.

There is definitely a double standard among the genders in our society, with men being looked down upon for pursuits that are considered womanly. Also, male victims of sixual abuse, spousal abuse, and other forms of abuse are often not taken seriously or reluctant to come forward due to the misconceptions our society has about the two sixes.

Anyway, for your specific inquiry, I would be concerned about any potential children of mine being teased for going against gender sterotypes, simply because kids are cruel and it's reasonable to expect some teasing for any sort of thing. However, I would probably be amicable to them buying toys that went against common gender roles. Though if I had a daughter, I would discourage any likings for pink in her young mind, simply because the abuse of pink is abhorrent to my asethetic sensibilities.

As for long hair on boys, I wouldn't care if any hypothetical son of mine had hair going to his feet. So long as the boy can see and keep his hair clean, I have no complaint.

One of the hallmarks of a good artist is the ability to write charcters who are not carbon clones of themselves (because that would be boring), but just about any work will show evidence of the artist's nature, since the artist cannot channel, as if by possession, the mind of another when working. To give an example:

I had to write a play for a college dramatic writing class, and ended up doing a murder story in which a performance of the Oresteia turns bloody when the chorus tries to murder the actors. Several things that were either my interests or things I had been exposed to can be directly identified as influencing my work.

1. I took a class on greek & roman drama, which included reading the Oresteia.

2. I'm a bondage enthusiast, and thus I ended up making one of the couples in my play practitioners of bdsn. (how anachronistic!)

3. I had read Plato's Symposium for a philosophy class, and made the characters have relationships loosely structured on the idea of Greek pederasty. (I also set the play in a generic ancient greek town)

4. A good slaughter is always fun.

While none of the characters was a carbon copy of me (in fact, I dare say they little in common with me on a personality level), 2 was certainly a reflection of my personal interests, 4 a reflection of what I like in media, and 1 and 3 are reflections of media I had recently been exposed to.

So, to TL;DR that, while a good writer may write characters that are not clones of themselves, the interests, proclivities, and beliefs of the author may reflect themselves in the characters, the setting, the basic plot, or the story's aesop.

Title: Respecting minors as you would advlts.
I don't see why anyone should respect anyone for their age, old or young. I show respect to those that have earned it through various actions, the people younger than me - for the most part - don't don't deserve the time of day. Now this might just come across as "Oh every generation says that about the younger ones" but really it is the case here, they all act like spoiled brats, run around like they're mini gangsters and have no respect for anyone or thing. There is plenty of examples of how they don't deserve respect and why I don't show them it when they're first encountered. Likewise with advlts, everyone gets the same level of respect around me until they've earned more, if a said advlt was no better than a child I will treat them like a child regardless of their position: parent, teacher, work colleague, mentors. All in the same boat. I had a falling out with a friend a while back about respect and "rights" but without going into it, he believed respect should be given to him by everyone because he is gay and apparently deserves it, when truely no one deserves respect. Like everything else it must be earned.
Basically, no one deserves respect from the get go.

Title: People not moving out because of their family needing them.
I can move out just now, my parents can kick me out just now. But I won't and they won't. I won't move out (yet) because I don't believe I have the money or financial support (I do not want a mortgage for the rest of my life) so I choose to stay in my parents house, leeching off them if you like until I build my bank. At the same time they may not want me out of the house because I have the most money and I am their support when it comes to paying bills and for food.
Basically I rely on my parents as much as the rely on me. Not always the case for others but it is here.

Title: Gender perceptions, can boys do what girls can do ?
Girls can do everything boys can, to an extent and vice versa.
The long hair thing while it shouldn't really matter, it is heavily categorized as a female feature. I don't know about other but long hair to me is somewhat sixy on girls and it is usually always clean and well taken care of, whereas on the guys with long hair (I mean proper long, sholder length and beyond) it is usually really thin and greasey which just makes that person look a mess.

[If you in theory had a kid, would you let it run rampant around a toy store or would you lead it towards where you imagine its areas of interest would lie, and if it picked a toy that went against its gender stereotype would you worry about the kid being teased by its peers and if it was how would you react to it ?]
It can run around whatever part of the store s/he wants and look at what s/he wants but I would eventually lead it to the toys suited to that gender. If the child was a he and he picked up a princess I would put it back and move on, why? Because it's a girls toy and the friends (imagining) could potentially make fun of him for liking girlie things, which can send mixed signals as for peers I could deal with them myself on the issue, tbh I'd see the peers laughing at me more than the child which is easier to deal with.
I know this boy who from a young age played relentlessly with barbies and princesses, he would never play football or even action man with us, so this kid was left to his own devices over the years with his only friends being girls, the boys appearance became more and more feminine (Make up, long hair, tanning! etc), he should no interest in befriending males and no love interest in the girls. Turns out a few years back the boy came out as gay, now this is the point I would want to avoid happening to one of my children, though I won't go out of the way to prevent it incase of counter actions. Let the child grow and develop naturally with a few hints and nudges in the preferred direction.

Title: Meat, cute animal friends and children.
Everything is food, every living creature with meat is up for being eaten.
I don't see what the concern is with this one except the shows portraying sheep/chickens as heroes when they aren't even intelligent by animal standards. Though the child watching a cartoon will not see the dilemma with eating meat and seeing said animal as a cuddly hero on TV until they are much older and past the point of caring for the show because they realise it is just a show.
Cultures differ in everything religion, behaviour diet etc. To go to foreign countries and expect them to eat and believe what you believe is foolish, because to the Chinese those dogs/cats might be plagues on their society so to reduce the numbers they eat them, which then becomes a delicacy because they actually taste good, but to us because they are domestic animals we see this as wrong.
If the roles were reversed: Sheep/Dog and Dog/Sheep. Indeed we would feel the exact same it's just how it goes, the Chinese probably think we're strange for eating cows or sheep too.

Title: A chain effect of morals.
One man's evil is another man's good. Hitler for example, many percieve this man to be pure evil for his racist views and the actions he took, some on the other hand percieve him as a genius who rebuild a battered Germany into a superpower and had one of the greatest tactical minds ever.
Another example of differences in peception is, from yesterday: Me, my brother and sister were watching a film (Troy) and it got to a point were a prince had slit Achilles' cousin's throat, now no one batted an eyelid at this, but when the prince stood over him, as he chooked on his own blood, and stabbed him my sister went "That's sad!" and thought this prince was some sort evil, to which me and my brother saw it as a good deed, a sort of mercy killing, as it gave the cousin a quick death rather than slowly choking on their own blood.

Title: Judging people.
I tend to judge people when I first contact them, whether over the computer or in person, but I don't exactly fully judge them. Like I make up a part of that person that may or may not exist just to please myself, whether this acts for me to further befriend them or outright avoid them depends on their actions during the conversation/event. Like one of my best friends I judged as a little gay emo kid, and he judged me as an ignorant aggressive ned, later down the line we became friends because of our class rotation and being placed next to each other. The way we judged each other was completely wrong and we actually shared a lot in common, hence best friends, but this would never have happened if we weren't force to sit beside each other.
Since leaving school and not being in contact with people my age I try not to judge others so quickly and inaccurately but I will always make assumptions and try to play with these and build on them to form some sort of friendship or atleast an understanding of the person.

** What a long OP, longest I've seen, well done
I would answer better but it's soo long and takes up too much time

I gonna read that after school.

Thanks for answers and don't worry about cherry picking. This thread was created with a lot of different discussions and I wasn't expecting everyone to discuss everything, only what they felt like discussing In hindsight though looking at how few responses it gets perhaps taking a lot of issues with little worth as discussion material and cramming them together doesn't really mix into anything worth discussing as a whole.

Oh and Papafern, your answers were pretty good, and you wrote like more than 1300 words so I don't feel you wrote too little at all.

You guys have all pretty much agreed on that for the sake of your children you should help them pick toys so that they won't be picked on. But what if it's not something extreme like a doll for a boy or a toy gun for a girl. Like T.V. shows. We have girls watching Batman and Transformers. What about little boys and for the sake of example My Little Pony: Friendhship is Magic (it's kinda sad I keep having to fall back on this one example... we need more cool girl shows around) for the boys ?

Very good thread, I love discussing questions like these. I've been browsing this thread multiple times, and I guess I could have a little input here aswell. I would love to answer them all, but I will stick to the question(s) I feel I can answer the best.

A chain effect of morals.

I think this is a very fascinating topic. I am very sure that a chain effect of morals is possible, but I also believe that is heavily restricted. My beliefs is that it is nearly impossible to force a moral that is considered good in one society, to another society where other ethics and morals are accepted. When I went to highschool I went to a philosophy class and moral philosophy was a common topic, the question would be if I still am capable of using what I learned back then now..

There are many factors that determines what kinds of morals that is accepted in a society; Ethics, cultural values and religion for instance.

Let's mention a sensitive topic, for example female genital mutilation (or female circumcision if you like). This is a common practise in some countries, and where they do it it is consider good, but how do we perceive it? Most of us would say that this is a horrible practise, and that no one should be allowed to do this, it is often done outside of hospitals and without anaesthisia at a very small age. I think most people would consider this to a be an almost evil act, but still it is accepted where they take place. The same could be said about many other controversial and "evil" doings that is considered inhuman in our society, but I'm not going to go into this.

I think that due to the vast amount of differences between the cultures and societies, it is pretty much impossible to have common moral value where everyone would agree that a certain action is a good deed. Surely we could all grow up and share our good nature to influence other people, but there would still be people who would look down on you from somewhere else on earth and call you a bad person. There is no ultimate moral in my opinion, because moral is relative.

Diversity.

I tend to be very simple aswell when it comes to this. There are certain times where I feel adventourus and tries different stuff (I love trying new things), but when I find something I like I usually stick to it. I've been drinking the diet version of Pepsi for ages, and even though I occasionally drink another brand of soda, juice, coffee, tea, beer etc I always have the same old diet Pepsi Max as my standard soda. The same thing goes with anything else aswell, be it food or anything else.

I think Diversity says something about your personality to some degree, as you mention you can easily guess what the customer has bought once you've seen the first products he/she brings. I think some of the "adventurous customers" may portrait the other customer as more "boring" and bland, due to their own nature of having more spice in their life, but I wouldn't say judging somebody based on what they buy is a good idea. I never think judging someone by their preferences is a good idea in general.

I don't necessarily think that spice is the way of life, I enjoy life alot without any spice, but sometimes spice would be a good idea. I like buying new games, try new food, listen to new music and learning new stuff about things I don't know much about. I do think that everyone should be open to try something new, and if the reason someone sticks to something is because they didn't dare trying something new then that is a bad thing.

As for when it comes to pizza, I love pizza and when my family for example decides to buy 2-3 different pizzas I usually try them all atleast once, but I usually end up eating 3-5 pieces of one and only 1 of each from the other ones.

Judging people.

This is a interesting one. I tend to have a mixed view when it comes to judging people. I think what you wear is a indicator to some degree, but I never judge someone solely on what they wear, unless they dress themselves in something that resembles their political stance, religion, ideology etc.. I do tend to judge some people, for instance young kids, people who do not keep themselves clean and tidy, people behaving childish in public and overweight people buying junkfood. I know judging people until proven otherwise is a bad thing, but sadly people tend to judge people all the time.

One thing I do not think is acceptable at all is judging someone by their ethnicity and similiar things like that. When I see people look down on someone or judge them negatively because of that it boils inside my head, things like that have no place in todays society in my opinion. It makes me furious.

When it comes to "changing" personality based on situation I have different opinions on this aswell. I expect people to behave differently (in a positive way) in formal situation and situations like that, I think that is standard courtesy. There are however other situations where I think it is bad. I have a friend who I've basically grown up with, and I know him through and through. The "issue" with him however is that he acts like a 14 year old when he is in company with younger persons at parties etc. It's like he is trying to give himself a image that is accepted by the younger people, and he is almost obsessed with trying to be as much like them as possible (spray tanning, posing like a 14 year old girl on pictures, dressing up in his own "swag" and basically transforming his whole personality). I know that this isn't the real person he is, and it annoys me when he does so. He is a very cool guy and he is good at behaving towards different types of persons, but what I mentioned earlier is especially bothering me. He is faking it, and he has even admitted it, and I think getting friends by simply pretending to be someone you're not is a horrible thing to do. I hope he grows out of this soon.

I think that's it for now, but I'd love to discuss other topics if you want to, or I'll possible edit in some other of the OP topics if I feel like it

Well, speaking from experience(I'm 13) I like my mates in my class, but they really are dumb.
They go around thinking they are the big cheese because they "Meet" loads of "Birds"

I'd rather wait until I was 14-16 until having my first kiss instead of going out with some 12 year old who I don't even like.

They also go around thinking they are amazing, I get a few slagging's here and there which usually ends with me putting them in their place.
One of the other things that annoys me...they do not care about grammar at all so they usually type in "Texting Language"

Lyk dis u no wat i mean?


I usually lie about my age on forums like this one, so when I state my opinion I won't get reply's like:
"HUR DUR UR 13 UR OPININ IS INVALID XD "


EDIT:Although, I do some immature things while with my mates, and did very dumb things like smoking a certain plant, but overall? I'd like to think as myself as a mature person.

Ha! No way?! You sure had me fooled, then. Man, this has really thrown me. I don't know whether to believe you or not

I'm going to try and give my views on a few of these.
Meat/ children:
I hardly eat meat now. I hardly ate meat when I was a child too, I wasn't a huge fan of the taste, and I still don't care for it. I eat fish, and sometimes chicken to keep up my protein, but a meat-based dish would not be my first choice. Also, there was an incident when I was 5 years old involving a house party with my mum's friends all getting drunk. One of them asked me if I'd like to see some pigs, and as it was a house in the countryside, I said yes, thinking I'd see some pigs in the field. Oh no. Instead I was led outside where I saw a full pig roasting on a barbecue, its glassy eyes gazing straight at me, with all its feet still attached and an apple in its mouth. Seriously scarred me for life. 15 years on and I've still not touched any pork, or a single sausage. Argh. I get the shivers just thinking about it.

But I'm getting off topic. My view on this, even if the parent is a vegetarian, is to feed your child all kinds of meat until they decide for themselves whether they want to continue. It's not right for a parent to force their beliefs on their child, especially not where things like food are concerned. I'll stop there in case it gets too risky.

Diversity:
I hate to admit it, but I'm really not that diverse in my food choices. I always have the same topping on pizza- cheese and tomato. (Can you see me having a meat pizza after the pig incident?!) I drink the same brand of orange juice, eat the same bread, biscuits etc. This is mainly because I'm a bit cheap (and a student) so do my weekly shop at ALDI where there is pretty much only one brand of everything. Even when stopping by the corner shop for a drink or something I'll have a particular brand I'm looking for, but that's more to do with the background of the companies than anything else. I shan't go into that here since it might get a bit controversial and political, but I'll just say I will not buy anything associated with Nestle.


As for the age thing, I guess I'm past the point where people treat me negatively for it. I haven't had that for a long time, or maybe I've been putting it down to a rude cashier rather than anything to do with my age. I can see how it's annoying though. My advice for anyone suffering that would be to prove them wrong. Show that you're a polite and considerate youth. Emphasise your pleases and thankyous. Help people who require assistance (an old lady getting on a bus with a heavy bag, for example.) Makes you look good, and embarrasses the person who treated you badly.

Good thread!

On the subject of gender and toys: I'm with the theory that generally "female" characteristics and pursuits (and the role women have tended to play in society) have been seen as inferior to their "male" counterparts. So when a young girl adopts characteristics or hobbies that would traditionally be defined as "male" it's almost a step up. But if boys do something similar it's a step down, hence more negative names than "tomboy" and more negative attitudes. There's a reason being called a girl in the playground was an insult for boys, but the same can't be said for being called a boy for a girl (unless we get into homophobic slurs, which I think is a run - on from this).
I think it's horrible for both sixes really, although I do think it becomes more obvious for boys at an earlier age, seeing as they are supposed to be dominant - big boys don't cry, man up, you throw like a girl, you big girls' blouse etc, whereas I think it's much more of a passive thing for girls (I remember at one point there was a lot of annoyance about the "early science" aisles at toy shops - the blue aisle had chemistry sets, telescopes, microscopes, mini volcanoes, ant farms etc. and the pink aisle had mini cookers and grow-your-own crystals).

On diversity: In terms of poducts I tend to stick to what I know and like, because I don't like the idea of wasting money on something that I find isn't to my taste. I do like trying new things in cooking, but it's a treat rather than the norm. I do like to try new experiences now, although that's a new thing that came with confidence (I'm going skiing or snowboarding - haven't decided yet - next weekend, which should be fun!). In these terms I think diversity is good, but could also be considered a luxury. I can't afford to do new things every weekend.

On art, artists and personalities: I think you can only separate the artist from the art so much, although whether they mean to project what they write (and how others judge/anolyse/perceive it) is a whole different matter. For example, I think Look Back in Anger was a great play, but not for the reasons that the writer thought it was. John Osborne was quite annoyed at the reaction one of his characters elicited from the audience at a few shows, because he assumed everyone would hate her like he did.
If it's about me personally separating the art from the artist, I'm kind of split. I can read and enjoy a book written by someone who either did of believed certain things which I find are abhorrent if they lived a long time ago because I do make excuses for them based on the time and culture in which they lived, but I can't view someone like Roman Polanski in the same light, great film maker though he may be.

Well I'm at the other end of the scale - I'm over 70.


Title: Respecting minors as you would advlts.

Children are the most important people on the planet and they are our future. Once you have a child there is nothing more important than "being" with that child from birth.
The first few months are crucial to the child's learning ability.
Children should be able to read basic words and sentences by two and write short essays and by three.
By four they should be able to read books up to or beyond the USA grade 5 level. But if not then as soon as possible.

I found that it's really easy to teach kids by beginning a subject with them and then 'bribing' them to continue on their own.
example: I found an old 1901 french school book for grade one or two french. I sat down with my 8 year and we 'learned 'the first lesson together with lots of laughing and joking and saying the words out loud together.
Then after the first lesson chapter I slammed the book shut and said to him If you read the rest of the book I'll give you five dollars (personally I wouldn't have read it for a hundred) he took the challenge and finished the entire book in two weeks and got so hyped about french he read every book written in french he could find and become completely bi-lingual when he was 10... and by the way he forgot all about the five bucks.



I have always talked to kids as if they were as old as me and treated all children as my friends and taught them by doing.
I've always brought children into topics such as politics and history from babyhood on.

My first born could read and understand finance, had serious views on world politics and their leaders. and had a good understanding of human behavior BEFORE he started school.
When he was four I took him to a mall store and bought him new clothes pants, shirt, shoes, socks, underwear and a coat. I gave him a fifty dollar bill (rare back then) and told him to go thru the checkout.
I stood way back and watched.
He put the things on the counter and gave the clerk the money. She was freaked and looked around abit looking for a parent. Finally she gave my son the change and watched in amazement as he counted the change against the receit. He then left the store and I watched as the clerk ran to another clerk and pointed and waved her arms about.
We both had a good laugh outside the store and for a while we pranked other places. He spent ages once explaing to a microwave oven salesman how they worked.... and could chitchat to stereo sales people knowing more than they did.

He was totally freaked after his first few days at school because they had nothing to offer him education wise. They somehow expected him to fingerpaint, cut out dolls and act like he was a two year old.
My wife and I were brought into the school and verbally punished for his knowledge - they told us we were bad parents and that he should be beginning with his ABCs and not reading the Wall Street Journal and Time magazine at age 5.

On their advice we tried to take away his books but to no avail his Time magazine subscription was bought with own hard earned money.

Eventually when they realized just how useful he was in teaching other children they let him do just that making teachers job a lot easier.
I enrolled him in a accounting seminar once when he was about nine. There were about 15 men and women there and two lecturers. When we walked in they first said he couldn't stay then one of the teachers said okay but he has to sit at the back and she gave him a pad and paper to 'draw' on. Before the class was over he was explaining to everyone how computers would be revolutionizing accounting and took them thru' the principles of accounting using computers over the next few years.( This was in 1979)

I found a teacher when he was about 10 who could privately teach him Latin. He also began learning German at that age. He was already fairly fluent in French.
I bought him one of the very first digital watches made - a Casio with red led digits but he was not allowed to wear it because of school rules as it had a calculator on it - calculators were totally forbidden then (seventies) in school.
I bought him the first computer kit ever available to the public - an Altair - for $1500. (I was earning about 800 a month then. Everyone said I was a nut for spending money on such 'rubbish' as my neighbor put it.
When he was 11 he taught advlts bookkeeping and how to do income taxes for wages. Oh yes I believe firmly that kids should earn their way in life as early as possible - I see nothing wrong with kids working.


I kept him away from sports until high school where he played basketball and coached the kids nobody liked.
I bought him a Rubiks Cube which he finished within a few minutes saying how obvious it was. (I still can't do it)

In high school he taught the teachers how to use computers (1980s) and taught his 'secrets' of learning to dozens of kids that were ignored by teachers because the teachers couldn't deal with "the dumb punks'.
Teachers resented computers because children could understand computers and programming that they had no idea about and unable to learn (it's impossible to teach a teacher)

He had a terrific sense of humor and loved to watch light bulbs pop as he explained things to other people.

He had already learned college level physics and binary programming plus several other computer languages.
He could name almost all the internal parts of human anatomy by their Latin names.

He was definitely a bookworm, but you would never had applied the word geek to him as he was very out going and had a terrific sense of humor and time for everyone. He 'left' home at my encouragement when he was 17 for a university across the country.

His learning was unstoppable, He dropped out of university after one year as he was bored and wanted advanced knowledge of computer networking but there was no-one that seemed to know more than he already knew... He couldn't believe He was paying THEM the fees to help get the university 'connected'.

His very first Job at 18 paid him a starting salary of $120,000 he quit that job after a year and traveled Europe, working at Canary Wharf in London's new financial district setting up and programming the financial computers used in world banking.
For a year he traveled back and forth from London to New York every 2nd weekend via the Concord supersonic jet (3.5 hrs at 56,000 ft) just to visit his girl friend.
They then spent two years traveling around South America where they both became fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.
They are happily married now with two teen daughters, he retired at 40 to enjoy his family and takes them around the world for their education.

The only religion I taught him was to believe in Santa Claus (he still does).
We all lived on a farm, had no inside plumbing (outhouse at 40 below!) and had goats for milk, rabbits for meat and chickens for eggs and grew fruit and veggies, consequently he has never had a cavity or needed a dentist.

I write all this because I think babies have empty brains the size of the Empire State building just waiting to be filled and the horrible thing is that many parents and educators think of children as stupid little pets - babies that need pampering, babysitting and given toys and fluffy bears for xmas and want to fill the kids head with same fluff as in the teddy bear.

Todays parents prefer to drug their children into submission if they appear to be marching to the tune of a different drummer daydreaming is frowned upon and being different socially is almost forbidden, encouraging their playmates to bully them because they wear the 'wrong' clothes or don't play football or have freckles or pimples or don't wear the right makeup - the list of things that a child is supposed learn to become an advlt has grown into multi-billion dollar drug industry that trains children to stay on drugs all their lives.

Got a sniffle? Have a drug.
Sore throat? have drug.
Pimple? have a drug.
want to screw without consiquences? Have a drug.
Can't sit still in a boring class? have a drug.
Fall asleep in class? have a drug.
Don't want to play with the other kids? have a drug.
Won't listen to a moronic teacher? have a drug.

Which I disagree with entirely.
I believe that if a child is not smarter than his parents by the time he/she is 11 then the kid is doomed to be a replica of his parents ignorance.
Parental control is not allowed legally and is being replaced with... you guessed it, more drugs...
While drugged parents are forced into a guilt ridden well of despair rushing from magazine articals written by college grads who have never raised a child to Tv's Dr Phil to 'tell' them how to be parents.

Children hardly stand a chance today and are raised for the sole purpose of earning massive incomes for corporations and working their asses off all their lives just to get by in this heartless, rotten society created from greed to feed
the greedy. There is not ONE politician who actually cares humanely for others. Re-election and payments from big biz is their ONLY concern.
It matters not a wit where their quest for money and power leads them.
They know anytime things get really out of hand they can hide in their cement fortresses guarded by thugs and pass laws to imprison anyone who gets in their way and 'armed to the teeth stormtroopers' to keep the 'riffraff' out of their useless lives.


And whats my background to have this amazing insight into kids?

I left school at 14 years old and never had any 'official' learning since.
I can't do algebra nor speak a second language.
I was a European war baby in the forties and a cool rock'n'roller in the fifties and a drugged out USA hippie in the sixties.
A Canadian farmer in the seventies and a computer teacher in the eighties.
An early BBS developer and PC store owner during the nineties.
A web designer in the early 2000s and am now retired and live as frugally as possible on $800 a month by choice and I don't drive, travel, own a TV or go to restaurants.

My parents (9 kids-me baby) were happily married for over 60 years. They were both 14 years old and working when they married. Dad never earned more than $50 a month. Mum worked and made about $15.

I am totally disgusted with parents who vote for politicians that spend billions to kill and maim thousands of people around the world and yet completely ignore their own children's worth.

I have very little respect for religious groups that teach kids to believe in ghosts and bogey men and that they should put faith in a mystical being that they cannot see, hear or touch but that completely guides their life from a lofty hidden place full of the spirits of dead people, Who float around with nothing to do but praise god forever.
There is only ONE person in the world that you should teach a child to believe in and that's themslves (other than Santa Claus - of course).
The ONLY truth you will ever know is your own truth - everyone else's truth is make-believe and only applies to them.
Super heroes are inventors and thinkers.

Title: People not moving out because of their family needing them.

I missed my kids terribly but always told them tales of my travels and the wonders of the world and they couldn't wait to get out and experience life on their own.

Title: Gender perceptions, can boys do what girls can do ?

Girls are definitely different and to ignore the difference is fatal. My girl was taught typical womanly things - medicine, animal husbandry, caring for the elderly, looking after her man and supporting him, taking care of children, teaching arts and useful crafts to the kids and keeping the family in good shape emotionally. That's what women excel at when given a chance.
That does not in any way limit them to slogging around the kitchen barefoot and pregnant all their lives - my wife never worked away from home until the kids left home and then only to 'fill' the gap that was left in her heart.

Yes boys and girls can be raised to any gender description but why? The world needs both to exist and parents need to narrow their abilities not spread them so thin they have no real use.


One parent has to provide housing and food, the other to take care of it all. When either parent tries to do both the kids lose out. Fathers and mothers have unique gender knowledge and insights that the other will never be able to

impart regardless of what modern day media BS tells you.

As you can readily see this trying to make us genderless has resulted in a country full of plastic surgery, facelifts, botox lips and everyone frightened of each other and dieters who are told they are ugly.
Men feel impotent and women feel empty and left out.
Everyone is afraid to look over 25 and many women feel they are finished at 30. Pychiatrists, marriage consulors and media have replaced grandfathers and grandmothers and the elderly are pushed aside and unwanted.

Children are encourage to be 'gay' or/and loose with their bodies and encouraged to think they must be the same instead of being different.

We let the media continally tell the parents that hispanics are illegal, blacks are lazy, jews are greedy and whites are racist, arabs are terrorists and America is the greatest place on Earth.

The parents in turn pass this on to the kids while pretending they aren't racist but they live in fear of their neighbors.
Infants are now taught in kindergarten that advlts want to molest them and to stay away from strangers and not to trust advlts. A bunch of granddads were talking a while back and they all were afraid of being left alone with their

grandchildren, afraid to hug and kiss them unless mom or dad was watching.
Teachers can lose their jobs now for patting a kid on the head or hugging a crying child.

Children are an inconvenience to their parents as each parent goes their separate ways and most marriages now end in divorce because no one knows what to do anymore and are sixually confused as to what 'role' they are supposed to play.

Kids should never be encouraged to be 'fashionable'. Girls should not be encourage to want to be brides and waste money on a splashy wedding - When my daughter got married after 5 years of living with her man, I spent only three hundred dollars for the wedding meal but gave them 12,000 for a holiday in Cuba.
Even today (my kids are all over 40) they don't eat candy, pop or chips.
They neither smoke, drink or do drugs -prescription or street.
They don't spend money on anything that is for show or to impress others instead they give what they can to assist the homeless especially homeless or ignored kids.
They have a great sense of humor and are atheist by choice.
It took me a while to get over the ear ring bit that both my daughter and middle son got as teens, fortunately they don't have tattoos.

Title: Meat, cute animal friends and children.
We always enjoyed eating the Easter bunnies throughout the year.


Raised on homegrown foods - no pigs or cows. Only chicken, rabbits, ducks, turkeys and fresh fish.
My kids loved the animals and became good friends with them. My daughter's job was to raise little chicks to be egg layers and food roosters. She cared for them and learned a lot about taking care of them if they got hurt.
By the time she was eight she was proficient at sewing up gaping wounds if an animal somehow got badly injured and knew what herbs would ease pain. She knew what was inside the animal because she helped my wife in cleaning them and preparing them for our meals while my eldest boy pointed the various veins and crap inside the intended meal by their latin names and purpose..

I murdered the animals at least 100 yards from the farm while making sure the doomed animal (or the rest of the farm animals) did not know what I was doing... Fear causes adrenalin to flow through an animal and ruins the fresh taste of meat. The other animals and fowl sense it and become restless and afraid and consequently more difficult to keep.

Altho' we all like goats milk, the one time we had goatmeat we all hated the taste so goats were kept strictly for milk and money (we had over a hundred). We had dogs in the yard for friendship and to keep the goats in line and keep foxes out of the chicken house.
We had cats in the barn to eat the mice and rats, we never had ponies, horses or caged birds.

My kids don't eat beef or pork - not because of the animal's sake but because of the deadly cancer causing 'additives' in the meat. Occasionally a neighbor would give us some homegrown beef. Which makes an excellent Sunday meal once in a while.

They don't eat candy or store bought cookies and never drink soda or eat those strange chemical products like chips or cheesies - why? When they were really young I once used them as a disciplinary thing - "if you don't tidy your room you'll have to eat store bought candies and drink pop'.

My eldest son already knew what was happening to prepared foods and how the purpose of food production had changed from trying to feed people to creating a sick society that had to rely on misleading, if not downright lying, advertising, chemical poison houses like Monsanto or Dow and drug companies and medical insurance to get thru' life.

I taught my kids to always play the devil's advocate and never agree with anyone and always take the side of the weakest argument.
My kids can convince Christians to doubt their faith and atheists to wonder if there really is a god.

My middle son that we deprived of technical knowhow for the arts. Is extremely literate, was a d and d dungeon master by age 7 to a group of advlts. We encouraged him to role play people he did not like and challenge all forms of authority. He read every book on fantasy and magic he could findand read the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings by age 8. He looked after the garden and has respect for nature. He spent after school hours caring for disabled seniors and later got arrested for protesting the forestry clear cutting the last of the rain forests of North America.

I'm amazed by the great responses I've been getting to this thread. It's always nice to know there are people who appreciate lengthy discussions on subjects even if they are not the most important or political discussions around.

@ Erginho:
- On "A chain effect of morals":

I have to agree that moral is relative especially when you get into details with it. But if you keep it on a broad scale does the same apply as easily ? For example you mentioned female circumcision. Clearly for some people it is considered good considering there are advlts who practice this on others with it in mind that they are doing them a favor. But on another level permanent changes to ones body done without your consent or knowledge is something I'd say everyone except for a very rare depraved few would find to be an evil. After all who would think "it is okay for someone to change my body without my permission" ? Putting it on a broader sense where you would teach the ethic of "forcing changes onto the body of someone else is evil" rather than "circumcision is evil". But then I suppose I'm getting too detailed on the question itself to a point where counter arguments could easily be made. But what I am getting at is that with a change in the methods of teaching ethics wouldn't that allow morals to be put in a less relative sense ?

- On "Judging people":

I think the example you made with your friend brings an interesting perspective to the discussion. I don't really lament people changing their attitude a little bit to suit the situation, but when it's done to the extreme I absolutely hate it. To take an example when I'm just playing board games with my friends at their house I act a little bit calmer, we are focusing on a game and no one likes to listen to someone cracking jokes when he's reading the rules of the game to himself or the others. When I attend tournaments in Magic: The Gathering I'm a little more outspoken, I'm there to play a game with people who I'm not all that familiar with and being open and cheerful is going to go a lot further than acting calm and reclusive like I most always do. Basically acting in a way that makes people feel like they can talk to me without worrying I'll just keep silent and glare daggers at them in turn. When I'm at work I act as I would expect from a cashier at a supermarket. I don't slouch and I don't wait for anyone else to initiate a conversation with me, I do it on my own as I greet the customers a good day. When I'm on the internet I'm the most "me" as you would call it, speech through text allows for a lot more straight to the point conversations and you need only be as formal as you are comfortable with. And that is the reason I think many of us will prefer to converse with each other through text on the internet than through voice even when the option is available to them.

For example me and the other bronies on this forum are making a large deal out of meeting up and chatting this Saturday at 19:00 GMT as we watch the new episode. There is simply something in our human nature that makes us feel less comfortable the more we face the people we are addressing, probably being something to do with our complex societal nature and our need to fit within its structure. Of course I wouldn't let it affect my opinion of anyone if for example they don't speak English very fluently, I have all the proof I need about the capabilities of those on these forums to use the language in hundreds of threads and posts made by them. But that doesn't mean I won't have this gut wrenching feeling every time I mess up on a word (I can write English just fine but I svck at speaking it, I just can't form certain sounds properly). No one wants to give anyone anything to judge them by which is why the less confrontation we have as we converse the more comfortable we are.

Now I've spoken about peoples true "them" and how they act in public, but the core I wish to get at is this. The less you act like you act when you feel the most comfortable the worse it is. We all change our attitudes a little bit depending on the situation but when you transform your personality like you describe your friend doing then I think it is justifiable to judge them on that. Like it's no secret on these forums that I like MLP:FiM, yet it is something that most would feel uncomfortable admitting to people in real life. But if I was asked by anyone if I liked that show and I said "no" then I would feel like a fake. Of course there would be situations where one would really not like to admit something about themselves to certain individuals, and I've even met that dilemma myself when I've wondered "Should I perhaps take that brush-able pony toy down before [insert person I look up to or like] comes to visit ?" but ultimately it has always stayed as it would just be denying my own character to take it down just so I won't have to deal with the judgement (what we all dislike in social confrontations) of others. But then, who would they be to judge me based on hastily made first impressions of what items I keep around, or how I look ?

@ Talos:

I'm not going to lie, your avatar really does make me cringe and it reminds me of the current middle school culture where it seems to be popular to take things normally perceived as beautiful and then make them ugly. But then I look at past generations and even my own and I realize I'd truly be in the wrong there if I used that as any basis to form an opinion about someones age. (But really, I normally like MLP avatars but yours is an exception)

Now that I'm done criticizing you how about I praise you some ? Because I also think in your own way you stand out from for example my own little brother who is about the same age as you are. I would never expect him to read a through a novel (I bought him the comic book version of the Hobbit rather than the normal version this X-mas precisely because he's never read a real novel in his life from start to finish) and I would never expect him to have the patience to play TES games. But that's because I have tried him on both accounts, I tried loaning him the Hobbit and he gave up on reading it, and I tried getting him into Morrowind and Oblivion but he kept coming to me for aid rather than taking on the problems the games threw at him by himself. Especially with Morrowind though, he could play some Oblivion on his own but eventually he lost track of it and interest.

So two people at the same age can be very different, and in fact I could expand on my first point and think on if we should even perceive the advlts of our culture to be mature or not at a first glance. But that is where the law of averages kicks in again and as you mentioned you have a class full of immature people in it and so did I when I was your age, and now when I'm older and I've been to college there are idiots but on average people are mature and nice to be around when studying. But I wouldn't let that discourage you from mentioning your age on places such as these forums so I say rock on and if people want to judge you for your age alone but not by how you present yourself to them on a personal level then they themselves might need to reconsider their views.

@ Lady-Mara:
- On "Meat & Children":

I greatly respect your stand on this. When someone is not so big on something like meat but would still present it to their kids and let them decide their own course without any bias from their own perspective then that shows character. I have met many people who did not like meat for one reason or another and often I feel like their stand is not just but in your case I feel it is. Many people who don't like meat will even go out of their way to make others feel bad about eating meat, for example four years back I was going on a trip during the summer with my workmates where there were two overseers who kinda acted as guardians for the group of 15 year old kids as this job was given to students on behalf of the board of education and the city as a way to introduce high school kids to working environments before they left school. Anyway on with the story I was on a trip at the end of the work course and as it was a camping trip we ended up grilling our dinner. Now most of the kids just had hot dogs and the vegetarian overseer had her own veggie hot dogs made out of some sort of tofu or something of the sort. I however as a fan of fine meat (especially pork funnily enough, guess we are like black and white when it comes to pork) I brought three slices of pork meat to put on the grill, now the other overseer who had nothing against meat was in charge of grilling everything the kids brought them so naturally he took my meat and put it on taking his sweet time to open the package and putting them on, all the time while the veggie overseer was watching silently. But only after he had put them on and started to grill the meat she spoke up "my veggie dogs are not going on there now, the grill is far too contaminated" and she said it in this spiteful tone looking at me like I had done her some great injustice. And it was pretty apparent the other overseer was used to her acting like that as he just let out a deep sigh and pointed out he had put it on the grill and that she had plenty of time to raise her concerns before he put them on.

That is the kind of person I'm used to dealing with when it comes to not liking meat, but that's not someone like you who doesn't like it for valid and real reasons, that is someone who just does it for show and for the drama. Which is unfortunately the majority of people I come across who don't like meat so I always like it when I come across someone like you that has more integrity of honesty than that.

@ Chineapplepunk:

The view that boys liking girly stuff being a step down is indeed a view of society that has become deep rooted but needs to be abolished. I think we as a collective need to raise the point that boys can like girly stuff too more often. This is even touched upon in the show MLP:FiM where one of the few main male lead roles, Spike the dragon, is given the chance to attend as "gala" with the other ponies. At first he rejects the idea claiming "to want nothing to do with this girly gala gunk" but towards the end of the episode he is shown to secretly desire to go with them, but he only admits it when he's not with them. Basically it's supposed to show how a boy will pretend not to like girly things but only to make himself seem manlier around others, yet they may simply just not have the courage to go against the norm and admit that they can also find fun in what girls find fun this theme even goes on in a later episode where they do go to the aforementioned gala he shows reluctance to go in some scenes yet giggles with glee once he is there.

@ Jinix the Elder:

I greatly enjoyed reading your post and I really do have to agree with you on most of your views, not on all of them mind you but most of them. One thing I did feel however as I read it was as if I was reading some sort of a comic book boasting the impossible. Some of the claims you make about the capabilities of children really seem to be impossible especially given what I've read about the growth of the human brain and its capabilities to understand complex concepts in its first years. But perhaps it only seems impossible to me because we don't challenge our youth enough in general making the average mental capabilities of children seem lower than they truly are. I'm only lightly learned on the subject so I can't make any big claims here after all, I will admit that much since I'm sitting here being so skeptical. (I do wonder if you find that sort of skepticism to be good or bad though, when big claims are made is it not only natural to feel a little skeptical about them at first at least until you have more knowledge or experience with the subject of your skepticism ?)

However running on the assumption that I am being too doubtful for my own good. What do you consider the advantage your children had over others ? You seem reasonable enough and you humbly state that you yourself have not had the same sort of education as for example your children. So is it just good parental intuition that would lead you to have such success with raising your kids or are they simply very bright and gifted individuals on their own or is there perhaps something else that you would consider the key to their success ?

You also touch on the vices of modern society. The things we eat and the way we act. But would you not say that it is a viable choice of life to indulge yourself in some of them despite the knowledge that they may harm you. For example candy and soda, it seems to be the normality in your family to not eat those, but would you say that you shun them ? For example if someone were to make the claim "I know soda is bad for my body but I like how it tastes so I drink it anyway." Then would your initial response be to look down upon that viewpoint or to accept that as a valid way of life ? Also on the subject of gender roles, for the sake of argument let's say there always has to be one breadwinner and one home keeper. However two people get into a relationship and both of them have jobs where they can work from home so in theory the only tasks the female of the relationship would have to take upon herself after having a baby would be those tasks that only she is biologically suited to do such as briastfeeding and only for the very first part of the live of that baby. Then would it not be viable for the woman to be the breadwinner and the man to be the caretaker of the baby in general and of the house ? But perhaps I am twisting the scenario a little bit too much in the favor of my own argument here.

In any case I'm sorry if I've been nitpicking a bit too much on your views just to argue but as I mentioned I've agreed with the majority of what you've written and simply writing "yes I agree" would not make for that much of an interesting conversation in my opinion.


Again to everyone I thank you for your opinions and in particular I'm fond of seeing the lengthier posts here. Not often that you see so few replies to a topic yet so much to read in every single reply.