I didn’t think you could make this shit up, honestly

My sister works as a contractor and has run-ins with private schools occasionally and whatever you’ve heard about these parents, it’s worse than you can possibly imagine. I never would’ve thought someone would be so proud of the fact that they treat their children like pawns and clearly something to check off on a life list or some bullshit.

I am struggling to wrap my mind around it. In the year 2023, it is common to ask two dating people when they plan to get married and have kids. Which alone wouldn’t be a bad thing, but these questions are so fucking ominous now that I have this knowledge. Fuuuuuuuck me

  • axont [she/her, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    63
    ·
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    My parents had a scheme when I was a kid to raise me into wealth, but they believed in the whole “get good grades and you’ll be rich.” So they tried for a while, taught me multiplication tables when I was like 4, taught me world history and stuff. I could read and write way before I started school. I could even use a computer, which was a rare skill for even adults back then. I did become fairly advanced by the time I was 6 and the school district offered to let me test out of grades 3 and 4. (Parents didn’t like that idea since they said I wouldn’t be able to network as well if I skipped grades)

    Problem is my parents were racist, unprepared, and not too bright themselves, so their lessons didn’t last much further than 3rd grade. They exhausted what they knew, so my grades dropped fast because of anxiety and pressure. Also I’m not actually smart or motivated

    The attempt to get my grades higher always centered around them. They wanted me to become rich to buy them a house and nice cars. They wanted me to be on TV so I could praise them in front of crowds. Elon Musk wasn’t famous yet, but they wanted me to be him in every possible way, including the racist parts. That’s what they would always describe, they wanted me to be a business scientist rocket engineer, except not an idiot fraud like Musk. I think part of this scheme was motivated by how my parents were the poorest of all their siblings. I was from the “poor” branch of the family, so it must have been embarrassing for them to show up to family gatherings and our uncle is showing off his new boat, or our aunt has a new diamond necklace. Then my parents are there driving the same truck they had in high school

    Nowadays we don’t talk much. Their plan failed and also I’m a communist

    • BurgerPunk [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      34
      ·
      7 months ago

      “get good grades and you’ll be rich.”

      Yeah, a lot of energy gets poured into that pipe dream. Sorry you went through all that heart-sickle

      the “poor” branch of the family

      I know exactly what you’re talking about and I’ve always found it so wild that we are that atomized that peoole don’t even help their families and just accept this as natural. I know why it is, and i know yhe US is and has been that atomized for a long time. Intellectually i get it, but i can never get it emotionally. It’ll never make sense to me

      • Graphite22 [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        16
        ·
        edit-2
        6 months ago

        I know exactly what you’re talking about and I’ve always found it so wild that we are that atomized that peoole don’t even help their families and just accept this as natural. I know why it is, and i know yhe US is and has been that atomized for a long time. Intellectually i get it, but i can never get it emotionally. It’ll never make sense to me

        My dad’s side of the family comes from above average wealth. They own property all over the west coast, house or two -in- San Francisco, multiple cares, river boat property+boat and so much more. Like legitimate wealth and plenty of it. I never understood how I could go visit my wealthy Grandma in Georgia yet we always had to deal with having no clothes/ broken shoes and a scrap of dignity. How could anyone look at our family and just say “yea that’s normal”? Even as a kid, I could see my dad already broke down and debased his dignity to stay alive and keep the family floating along. It stings because looking back even now, I hate that side of the family even more. They convinced my dad he deserved it.

  • nothx [any]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    62
    ·
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    As a newly married person, being asked if we’re trying to have kids is fucking weird to us.

    “Congratulations! So are you nutting raw?”

    Little do they know, my balls don’t work anymore lmao.

    But yeah, the general public at large is very much just following a script and checking off boxes on the life bingo card.

    • DragonBallZinn [he/him]@hexbear.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      6 months ago

      I’m not sure if Marx wrote about this, but this is another huge contradiction in capitalism. The idea of how important these checkboxes are, but they are also gatekept by speculators so they become little more than a sign of wealth. It costs 10s of thousands of dollars just to actually give birth to a kid. Homes have become an investment vehicle so there is an incentive in keeping housing as expensive as possible: society picked housing to be a way to make money rather than a shelter, so it’s that much harder to check off the checkboxes. Getting a job? Well employers are now very picky because they would rather just pile more work onto their pre-existing employees than hire anyone new. In their eyes, that’s leaving money on the table. They all think their google so they have like six rounds of interviews to let you know that they only want unicorn candidates. What’s that? They told you no? Well then you’re clearly intentionally leeching off the system by being unable to impress these petty tyrants.

  • Hohsia [he/him]@hexbear.netOP
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    35
    ·
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    I don’t want my intentions to be misconstrued. I am not at all anti-child. I am very much anti-have a kid for the sake of producing a nuclear family and neglecting your children. Is that not the epitome of patriarchal conservatism?

    Should have also added that this post stemmed from a mother (kids in private school) who said she was going to send her kids to a babysitter for the holidays so she and her husband could have peace

  • Stoatmilk [he/him]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    35
    ·
    7 months ago

    You sometimes see strange people online call others “genetic dead ends” as an insult, and it always strikes me that these people have a view of life itself that is so completely alien to me.

    • star_wraith [he/him]@hexbear.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      29
      ·
      edit-2
      7 months ago

      Some sciencey person told me once that after a couple or three generations, there’s nothing discernible of “you” left in your descendants. All these weirdos who think they’re fucking Charlemagne and building a fAmiLY LeGaCy or something don’t get that whether you have kids or not, when you’re gone you’re gone.

      • OrionsMask [he/him,any]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        31
        ·
        edit-2
        7 months ago

        Not only that, but think about how little the average person knows or cares about their great great grandparents. That’s going to be everyone in a few generations. Familial legacy is a lie.

      • Ho_Chi_Chungus [she/her]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        17
        ·
        7 months ago

        Some sciencey person told me once that after a couple or three generations, there’s nothing discernible of “you” left in your descendants

        11th century nobility in shambles rn

      • GreenTeaRedFlag [any]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        14
        ·
        7 months ago

        That shit always pisses me off. Like when people go “oh I don’t have kids but my sister does. So my genes live on” bro my genes are in some of the worst people i have met they are not the part of me I want to live on.

      • CrimsonSage@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        7
        ·
        6 months ago

        Yeah by 3 generations or so they are pretty well mixed. Like yeah there are some stable chromosomal regions that get transferred in chunks, which is why you often see family traits, but the idea that your genes as a totality somehow maintain cohesion is just silly.

      • wahwahwah [none/use name]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        28
        ·
        7 months ago

        It’s a sad cycle: grow up in dysfunctional family, escape only to be confronted with crushing loneliness, have a kid who grows up in dysfunctional family…

    • Hohsia [he/him]@hexbear.netOP
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      14
      ·
      7 months ago

      Yeah that’s super valid

      The types of people I was referring to in this post were those who have kids to secure the white race and educate children in private schools that treat them like shit and go home to be treated like shit—the types of people who see women only having utility in a traditional patriarchal sense.

      This is just as much an anti-charter schools argument as anything else, honestly. Needless to say though, shit is looking grim for the future of amerikkka

  • Frogmanfromlake [none/use name]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    29
    ·
    7 months ago

    Private School parents are some of the worst people imaginable and they all work in the most ghoulish fields. Went to a private school and majority of these kids would talk about how their parents went out to golf after work and not come home until late at night. I’m not privileged either. I only got in on an athletic scholarship after a scout saw me running and wanted me for his team.

    The questions as to whether or not my partner and I will be having kids have grown worse since we got engaged. My country is very conservative and being past 25 unmarried without kids will lead people to think something’s wrong with you.

  • thisonethatone [he/him]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    26
    ·
    7 months ago

    Yeah they do, my “”“”“mother”“”“” was one.

    She viewed children as pets and property. We were there to serve her financially and emotionally, and she had friends who viewed their children the same way.

  • 2Password2Remember [he/him]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    25
    ·
    7 months ago

    reading this thread has made me feel much more confident i’d be a good parent. lotta ppl out there having kids who absolutely are not emotionally mature enough for it lol

    Death to America

  • machinya [it/its, fae/faer]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    24
    ·
    7 months ago

    wow, just a portion? we are surrounded by them and it’s fucking disgusting

    “what do you mean by ‘you should treat your child as a human and not force them to do exactly what you want without caring about their opinions’?” can summarize most of the conversations we have had with people like this

    • CTHlurker [he/him]@hexbear.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      14
      ·
      6 months ago

      Have been singing Rossa Palestina and L’International to both my kids for the past 2 years. My daughter has even begun singing along to it. Also for some reason she enjoys the German version quite a lot, which I don’t understand at all but hey im-doing-my-part

    • spectre [he/him]@hexbear.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      6 months ago

      This, but unironically. If you’re a first worlder “champagne socialist” who is here for the memes, the bare minimum you can do is raise kids with basic socialist values who are gonna take up the fight after we are gone.

      DINK/“child free” is liberalism. Willingly having children is a privilege in most places, but it absolutely should be wielded by those who have it.

      • oktherebuddy@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        9
        ·
        edit-2
        6 months ago

        he/him ass opinion. Using your body to carry a pregnancy to term has a higher death & complications rate than getting a laparoscopic nephrectomy to donate your kidney to a stranger and save their life. Why aren’t you volunteering your body to do that, which is much more undeniably a comradely act than having a kid?

        • spectre [he/him]@hexbear.net
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          6 months ago

          You can have children without biologically reproducing, although these do tend to come with their own ethical baggage.

          Also this comment is targeted toward people in the first world with the means and privilege to support a family with relative ease, which implicitly includes the access to modern obsetric and other healthcare. More importantly, see above.

          • oktherebuddy@hexbear.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            5
            ·
            6 months ago

            The figures remain the same even with modern obstetric care. Women I speak with are generally scared about going through pregnancy, reasonably.

            • spectre [he/him]@hexbear.net
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              6 months ago

              That’s not my experience with other women that I speak with, and I’d like to see a claim that the figures don’t change correlated with wealth

    • Hohsia [he/him]@hexbear.netOP
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      16
      ·
      7 months ago

      There are sooooooooo many more than I thought. Or who knows, maybe they’re just fucking loud

      But private school is such a red flag

  • boiledfrog [he/him, undecided]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    15
    ·
    7 months ago

    Yeah I’ve seen people like that, at least 2 in my family too. I could talk shit about my parents parenting all day, but at least they recognized me as a person and not some property.