4 ms·
You're in a (probably upper middle class) bubble. Think about all the bad/rude/shitty/sick/criminal/awful/miserable people you've interacted with in your life o
by astura 2y ago
You're in a (probably upper middle class) bubble. Think about all the bad/rude/shitty/sick/criminal/awful/miserable people you've interacted with in your life or read about online/on TV. Odds are, those people have kids because most people have kids. Odds also are their public behavior is their best behavior and their private behavior is much worse. Bad people are actually MORE likely to have children and have more children because they don't care about the welfare of their children and having children increases your social standing in life.
I am someone who has truly horrible people as parents; they abused me physically and mentally/emotionally, neglected my needs, broke me down, told me they hated me and wished I was never born, and told me I ruined their life for existing. Nothing I ever did or said was "right," I was always criticized. There was also severe mental illness, domestic violence, criminal activity, and substance abuse going on my entire childhood. It's not hyperbole to describe my childhood as 18 years of torture. I've been diagnosed with PTSD due to my childhood experiences.
I talk about it openly online with stranges, I talk about it with my various mental health providers over the years. However, most of my friends don't really know the full extent of the terror I experienced and I'll never talk about it with stranges or just acquaintances.
It doesn't really come up in conversation very often and it's kinda hard to talk about in person. It's hard enough telling my therapists about it. It's also just really embarrassing and I have to REALLY trust you before talking about it IRL.
We have an extremely pronatalist society and nobody really casually wants to hear about the victims that produces. It's not socially acceptable outside an extremely close relationship.
I don't feel the same typing about it semi-anonymously online. I also REALLY feel that I need to correct the cultural idea that "all parents are inherently good."
- jart 2y agoYou might not realize this on a conscious level, but the reason you're reluctant to tell your friends about your parents is because they'll assume you're a bad person too, due to how you inherited their codebase. If my parents were abusive, I'd want to hide that fact, similar to how I'd want to hide a past felony conviction for abuse. Because I believe people can change and deserve the opportunity to rise above their circumstances and make themselves into something better than where they came from. Having that opportunity is more important than the emotional catharsis of oversharing, wouldn't you agree?
- astura 2y agoI appreciate your input, but I don't think that's accurate for me.
- exe34 2y agoWe'd have to do a point by point comparison to know for sure if you had it worse than me (I'm leaning towards yes), but otherwise all of this is very familiar! In particular, > Odds also are their public behavior is their best behavior and their private behavior is much worse. They had very clear rules about how we (bro and I) weren't supposed to talk to other people about our home life, and they went full personality cult propaganda on how amazing they were as parents, and how other people wouldn't understand. And yes, they were shitty to service workers, anyone socially below them really. And they were worse at home.
- astura 2y ago>We'd have to do a point by point comparison to know for sure if you had it worse than me (I'm leaning towards yes), but otherwise all of this is very familiar! It's not a contest; all child abuse is a tragedy.