4 ms·

> Example: children are about the future, friendships are not commitments, parents are a compass, spouse is life insurance. (I am simplifying to make a point.)

by xracy 3y ago

> Example: children are about the future, friendships are not commitments, parents are a compass, spouse is life insurance. (I am simplifying to make a point.) If you're simplifying you're missing the point of this. But I suspect you're not just simplifying to make a point, but this is actually what you believe. Maybe you've never had a really close friendship that you've felt obligated to keep alive. That requires work to fix something about it. It's absolutely a commitment. You can make any level of commitment to anyone. It's not a sexual commitment, but for example how many people have you wronged if you sleep with a friend's spouse? It's not just your own spouse. You've also wronged your friend in that. And I can tell you, if you have children, that the fallout from that likely means you've wronged your children. The same act functionally affects all of those people in a similarly meaningful way. That makes them all reasonably commitments in the same way that you see marriage as a commitment. There are pieces of a friendship that you are agreeing to or the friendship will end. That makes it a much weaker contract, but also means it requires a lot more work to keep alive. Parents/family are the opposite of that. Because the contract of parenthood/family is so strong, it's a lot less work to keep that bond well. But you can absolutely fuck it up and cut people loose.

nashashmi 3y ago
> felt obligated to keep alive Back to the point made before, relationships are being defined as feelings like feeling obligated to keep it alive. You are kind of bottling the definition of relationships to just "feelings" and ignoring relationships formed with explicit terms, like marriages are made. Some relationships are defined by blood and some by a contract (like a marriage contract) and others by history. Some relationships are friendly. Some relationships are self-serving and when the needs are met or if they change, the relationship disappears. Virtually all non-blood relationships are bound by an implicit "trade". If the trade ceases, the relationship disappears. The rest of the points you made are lost on me. I don't know which direction you are going in. It might be etiquette and courtesy, which are governing principles of respect. And respect is also a form of trade.
- xracy 3y ago
  Yeah, first off there's nothing special about "blood" relationships. It's just the people you grew up around, so you're more partial to those people, because time in = time out. My siblings and I aren't close because we're related. The proof of that is my parents and I aren't close. They rely too much on thinking they don't have to show up for the relationship because "they created/raised me." My siblings, friends and romantic relationships know I could end the relationship if I'm unhappy with it. They are all the same, and all invested in it. They don't think they deserve anything special from me. They know they have to earn it. I don't feel obligation to keep these relationships alive. I just do because I've gotten good things out of them in the past. If you think there's something special about the contract of marriage... I gotta tell you, that divorce is a thing. There is no difference between any of these. I can join or leave any of these relationships as I like, and I do for the same reasons. Maybe not the exact same reasons, but the same general reasons of "I'm getting less out than I am putting in".
  - nashashmi 3y ago
    Depending on the laws of the state you live in, divorce is not exactly a thing you can pick off a shelf. Sorry that your world is so deeply broken where blood relationships don’t mean anything to you. Family is family and that matters more than friendships. Even if you find greater acceptance in other social circles, family is always going to be different. Joining and leaving relationships isn’t the only kind of relationship that exist. Some are bonds that you cannot break. Some are contracts that you enter into. And some are transient and fleeting, like you described. Virtually all relationships are a trade. No trade means no relationship.
    - xracy 3y ago
      1. Yeah, so? Different people live in different states. That doesn't make my point about divorce less valid. 2. Who said my world is so deeply broken? That feels like an unnecessary assessment to force your worldview to match why my outlook is so different from yours. Frankly it's a little rude. I have meaningful familial bonds. They aren't inherently different from friendships just because they're family. I am closer to my siblings because we all understand that there is nothing more special about our bond than what we have already put into our relationship (which is a lot). I have less of a relationship with my parents because they don't understand this. I live a pretty happy and good life as I see it, partially because I've learned this. 3. Every bond is breakable, it's just that the more you put into it, the harder it is to break (or more extreme the action that would break it). 4. I don't know what you mean by all relationships are a trade, but it's the most similar thing I see to my other assessments except that you have a strange carveout for points 1-3.

by xracy 3y ago

nashashmi 3y ago

> felt obligated to keep alive Back to the point made before, relationships are being defined as feelings like feeling obligated to keep it alive. You are kind of bottling the definition of relationships to just "feelings" and ignoring relationships formed with explicit terms, like marriages are made. Some relationships are defined by blood and some by a contract (like a marriage contract) and others by history. Some relationships are friendly. Some relationships are self-serving and when the needs are met or if they change, the relationship disappears. Virtually all non-blood relationships are bound by an implicit "trade". If the trade ceases, the relationship disappears. The rest of the points you made are lost on me. I don't know which direction you are going in. It might be etiquette and courtesy, which are governing principles of respect. And respect is also a form of trade.

xracy 3y ago
Yeah, first off there's nothing special about "blood" relationships. It's just the people you grew up around, so you're more partial to those people, because time in = time out. My siblings and I aren't close because we're related. The proof of that is my parents and I aren't close. They rely too much on thinking they don't have to show up for the relationship because "they created/raised me." My siblings, friends and romantic relationships know I could end the relationship if I'm unhappy with it. They are all the same, and all invested in it. They don't think they deserve anything special from me. They know they have to earn it. I don't feel obligation to keep these relationships alive. I just do because I've gotten good things out of them in the past. If you think there's something special about the contract of marriage... I gotta tell you, that divorce is a thing. There is no difference between any of these. I can join or leave any of these relationships as I like, and I do for the same reasons. Maybe not the exact same reasons, but the same general reasons of "I'm getting less out than I am putting in".
- nashashmi 3y ago
  Depending on the laws of the state you live in, divorce is not exactly a thing you can pick off a shelf. Sorry that your world is so deeply broken where blood relationships don’t mean anything to you. Family is family and that matters more than friendships. Even if you find greater acceptance in other social circles, family is always going to be different. Joining and leaving relationships isn’t the only kind of relationship that exist. Some are bonds that you cannot break. Some are contracts that you enter into. And some are transient and fleeting, like you described. Virtually all relationships are a trade. No trade means no relationship.
  - xracy 3y ago
    1. Yeah, so? Different people live in different states. That doesn't make my point about divorce less valid. 2. Who said my world is so deeply broken? That feels like an unnecessary assessment to force your worldview to match why my outlook is so different from yours. Frankly it's a little rude. I have meaningful familial bonds. They aren't inherently different from friendships just because they're family. I am closer to my siblings because we all understand that there is nothing more special about our bond than what we have already put into our relationship (which is a lot). I have less of a relationship with my parents because they don't understand this. I live a pretty happy and good life as I see it, partially because I've learned this. 3. Every bond is breakable, it's just that the more you put into it, the harder it is to break (or more extreme the action that would break it). 4. I don't know what you mean by all relationships are a trade, but it's the most similar thing I see to my other assessments except that you have a strange carveout for points 1-3.