6 ms·

I know. I think it just shocked me. I would like to live in a world where childhood is universally the time in everyone's life for play and education.

netsharc 4y ago
I mean, won't kids in your imaginary world have chores? Learning to cook or clean is also education (the alternative would be: ever heard of the anecdote of young adults who go to college and don't know how to do laundry?). Sadly for this remote part of Afghanistan in the next few years, practical education is probably going to be more useful compared to book education. And maybe I'm just romanticizing the concept, but I imagine the kids would be mostly running around playing on the hotel grounds, and once in a while a bunch of travellers would show up, and the hotel caretaker would then yell for the kids to help prepare tea or food for them.
- speakfreely 4y ago
  OP lives in a fantasy world where every culture should be bulldozed to make way for endless middle class cul-de-sacs and McMansions. It's perfectly normal in most of the world for children to be involved in family businesses or even working to help support the family, rather than living in some entitled bubble where they're the center of everything.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    You could have made your point more effectively without the insults and the sleights.
  - shrimp_emoji 4y ago
    Hey, that's where I live!
  - jryle70 4y ago
    How do you know they are all family and not child labor working to help their families? After all child labor isn't a foreign concept in Afghanistan: https://www.npr.org/2022/12/31/1143143252/afghanistan-taliban-coal-mining-child-labor https://www.npr.org/2022/12/31/1143143252/afghanistan-taliba... I find it strange that child labor invokes such a strong feeling in any article about EV, being associated with cobalt mining, yet it receives such a glove treatment in this discussion.
    - netsharc 4y ago
      Since I joined in on this thread, my "glove treatment" might be romanticizing it, but "helping out" in a quiet hotel/guest house in the mountains is surely a lot more kid-compatible than a coalmine. The top commenter's comment that the article glossed over the fact that kids were made to work in such a place feels overblown. Hey maybe the reality of this hotel work is a bit harsher, but since the reporter didn't shine a light on it, I'd assume she also judged the same way. If the article was about a coal mine and the NYT just glossed over the fact of child labor, then I would agree with such a comment; an article glossing over child labor in a coal mine would be shitty. Edit to add: I like your angle about "It must be an anti-EV brigade!" though, keep on investigating, you're on to a conspiracy! /s
BlackFly 4y ago
Throughout human history, children were seen as supportive to the labor of the parents. I recall reading articles recently that were pointing out that this cultural change in attitude towards children may be what is driving declining birthrates: children have changed from assisting in life (in a limited capacity) to being a liability like an expensive pet. A child will not help out in an office job like a child can help in a family run corner store, restaurant or farm. Certainly I mowed the lawn, washed dishes, cooked, weeded gardens, fed livestock and pets, painted the house, and many more chores. I am not sure I was a net positive even with all that. My parents certainly didn't exploit me, and my parents had worked a lot harder on their parents farms without it being exploitive. Childhood is universally a time of newness and innocence. There is no need to shelter children from the reality of this world and I think society does a huge disservice by trying to maintain ignorance (while characterizing it as innocence) in children and then suddenly laments how irresponsible they are at 18.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  There's that and there is the simple fact that children are now expected to live so there isn't as much need for 'redundancy' to put it bluntly. Up to my grandparents generation it wasn't rare at all to lose one or more children.
davidw 4y ago
From my understanding, recently, "getting enough food" has been the biggest worry for children in Afghanistan, not whether they're doing some work or not.
f6v 4y ago
I was selling fruits to tourists at about 9 or 10 during summers. Tought me a lot. Not to make an argument from my personal anecdotes, but not all “child labor” is bad.

netsharc 4y ago

I mean, won't kids in your imaginary world have chores? Learning to cook or clean is also education (the alternative would be: ever heard of the anecdote of young adults who go to college and don't know how to do laundry?). Sadly for this remote part of Afghanistan in the next few years, practical education is probably going to be more useful compared to book education. And maybe I'm just romanticizing the concept, but I imagine the kids would be mostly running around playing on the hotel grounds, and once in a while a bunch of travellers would show up, and the hotel caretaker would then yell for the kids to help prepare tea or food for them.

speakfreely 4y ago
OP lives in a fantasy world where every culture should be bulldozed to make way for endless middle class cul-de-sacs and McMansions. It's perfectly normal in most of the world for children to be involved in family businesses or even working to help support the family, rather than living in some entitled bubble where they're the center of everything.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  You could have made your point more effectively without the insults and the sleights.
- shrimp_emoji 4y ago
  Hey, that's where I live!
- jryle70 4y ago
  How do you know they are all family and not child labor working to help their families? After all child labor isn't a foreign concept in Afghanistan: https://www.npr.org/2022/12/31/1143143252/afghanistan-taliban-coal-mining-child-labor https://www.npr.org/2022/12/31/1143143252/afghanistan-taliba... I find it strange that child labor invokes such a strong feeling in any article about EV, being associated with cobalt mining, yet it receives such a glove treatment in this discussion.
  - netsharc 4y ago
    Since I joined in on this thread, my "glove treatment" might be romanticizing it, but "helping out" in a quiet hotel/guest house in the mountains is surely a lot more kid-compatible than a coalmine. The top commenter's comment that the article glossed over the fact that kids were made to work in such a place feels overblown. Hey maybe the reality of this hotel work is a bit harsher, but since the reporter didn't shine a light on it, I'd assume she also judged the same way. If the article was about a coal mine and the NYT just glossed over the fact of child labor, then I would agree with such a comment; an article glossing over child labor in a coal mine would be shitty. Edit to add: I like your angle about "It must be an anti-EV brigade!" though, keep on investigating, you're on to a conspiracy! /s

BlackFly 4y ago

Throughout human history, children were seen as supportive to the labor of the parents. I recall reading articles recently that were pointing out that this cultural change in attitude towards children may be what is driving declining birthrates: children have changed from assisting in life (in a limited capacity) to being a liability like an expensive pet. A child will not help out in an office job like a child can help in a family run corner store, restaurant or farm. Certainly I mowed the lawn, washed dishes, cooked, weeded gardens, fed livestock and pets, painted the house, and many more chores. I am not sure I was a net positive even with all that. My parents certainly didn't exploit me, and my parents had worked a lot harder on their parents farms without it being exploitive. Childhood is universally a time of newness and innocence. There is no need to shelter children from the reality of this world and I think society does a huge disservice by trying to maintain ignorance (while characterizing it as innocence) in children and then suddenly laments how irresponsible they are at 18.

jacquesm 4y ago
There's that and there is the simple fact that children are now expected to live so there isn't as much need for 'redundancy' to put it bluntly. Up to my grandparents generation it wasn't rare at all to lose one or more children.

davidw 4y ago

From my understanding, recently, "getting enough food" has been the biggest worry for children in Afghanistan, not whether they're doing some work or not.

f6v 4y ago

I was selling fruits to tourists at about 9 or 10 during summers. Tought me a lot. Not to make an argument from my personal anecdotes, but not all “child labor” is bad.