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Everytime I read one of these stories, it's always someone without kids. This guy has an economics degree. He has the luxury of going back. If he had children,
by sanoli 13y ago
Everytime I read one of these stories, it's always someone without kids. This guy has an economics degree. He has the luxury of going back. If he had children, and they had to live like this, could he still do it, and would it be good for the children?(honest question) It's also always someone not in their 60s, when they start needing more medical attention, more access to medicine, etc.
- rwallace 13y agoNo junk food, no television, no Facebook, opportunity to learn practical skills, exposure to mild pathogens in the first five years of life to help the immune system develop properly; most aspects of the lifestyle would be good for children. Of course, you would still want to make an exception to the lifestyle to get the children the usual set of vaccines; nothing puts a damper on a healthy childhood like dying of whooping cough. All things in moderation, including moderation.
- sanoli 13y agoMaybe. But like I said, I never read about someone with kids doing this. What you describe can be found in very rural areas, but it's still different from what this guy is doing.
- rwallace 13y agoStrikes me as fairly similar to the Amish? I get the impression they avail themselves of a few benefits of modern civilization like that subset of medicine that actually saves significant numbers of lives, while eschewing most of the glitter; are there significant differences that I'm missing?
- sanoli 13y agoI think there are. This guy, and the people on the similar stories that are sometimes poste here on HN, are going it alone, or as a very small group of people, in the single digits at most. He's not joining a large, homogeneous, stable, long standing community. It's very different. Being born in an Amish community would be very different from being born as this guy's baby.
- rwallace 13y agoTrue. It wasn't clear to me from the article just how much community support this guy has, but if the answer is almost none, that would certainly be a problem, and not only for raising children. If you're going it alone in that sort of environment, imagine the consequences of something as simple as coming down with the flu.
- lcedp 13y agoFor those of children who will survive you mean. (unless you would regularly commute to the nearest medical facilities).