Rocky

Really? Who exactly do you think might possibly "get their hands off of your kids" by making any such declarations on GSC, or this thread? That doesn't make sense to me.

On my sixty-eighth birthday, I decided to give my young adult children some advice. I am not a frequent advice giver but soon I was able to write down 68 bits. To my surprise, I had more to say than I thought. So for the next several years I wrote down a batch of advice on my birthday, and shared it with my family and friends. They wanted more. I kept going until I had about 450 bits of advice I wished I’d known when I was younger. I am primarily channeling the wisdom of the ages. I am offering advice I have heard from others, or timeless knowledge repeated from the past, or a modern aphorism that matched my own experience. I doubt any of it is truly original, although I have tried to put everything in my own words. I think of these bits as seeds because each one of them could easily be expanded into a long essay. Indeed, I have spent most of my time writing by compressing these substantial lessons into as compact and tweetable forms as possible. You are encouraged to expand these seeds as you read to fill your own situation. If you find these proverbs align with your experience, share them with someone younger than yourself. —Kevin Kelly, Pacifica, California, 2023 Kelly, Kevin. Excellent Advice for Living (pp. 1-2). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. OTOH, if you DON'T find any such value, by all means, ignore them. What exactly do (each or any of) you expect to accomplish by bickering with me or with the thoughts of Kevin Kelly?

Well, which comes first, the chicken or the egg? I'm not sure there's a linear answer to your question. However, if your child feels emotionally secure in your home/family (which I view as a sense of belonging in that family), do you believe that will aid or compliment development of emotional maturity and strength and inner peace? Perhaps it's not a straight line from one to the other, as there likely are other complex factors that may help or hinder such development?

Oh really? At what point will you consider playing well with others?

Perhaps it's not (an effective meme). Are you reading trying to figure out my intended meaning? Or are you not? For example, Bolshevik's responses reflect his brazenly obvious effort to derail the thread and make it into political hogwash. How? Instead of asking for clarification, he makes declarations. "It is..." rather than "did you mean?" Btw, to make a distinction btwn twi and what the author of the book seems to have been trying to communicate, “Our family does X.” is NOT equal to "Our family IS _____." Since each (most?) of us here has parented small children, ask yourself whether you told your toddler they were bad or whether what they were doing (at a moment you wanted to change their behavior) was unacceptable.

I appreciate what you're saying. I agree with your explanation and understanding of "us vs them." It's not "enthno" centric, as I understand it. https://www.wordnik.com/words/ethno- prefix Meaning race (in the sense of classification of human beings). That's a totally different concept from teaching and training children to grow into emotionally intelligent and mature individuals, and therefore less susceptible to cults. IMO.

Nonsense. Just stop. Nobody said you were entitled to define my intended message.

Please just stop.

Belonging is an emotional, not (as I included it on this thread) a political concept.

Again, brazenly political.

That's "nice." However, that is brazenly political.

You might believe it to be bunk, idk. But if you believe it had been "shown to be bunk" I'd be interested in seeing where and how that was stated. Perhaps you were thinking of Daniel Goleman? Emotional Intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ. Social Intelligence: the New Science of Human Relationships This one was published in 2006. There has been a good bit of research on the subject in the 17 years since then.

Emotional maturity, the strength at issue here, is about inner peace and strength. In contrast, those who champion and cling to the distinctiveness of (only) their own families, IMO, dramatically lack emotional maturity (and intelligence).

Oh, okay. Still not what I was getting at.

No. Perhaps you're thinking tribalism? I'm thinking and trying to communicate something entirely different. The closest anyone has responded to my intended meaning is the video clip Nathan shared early on. If we, as parents, raise emotionally mature and sound children, they'll be accepting of others and NOT NEED to find group identity in cults. Geez, this really doesn't seem so difficult to me. But I've been studying the concept for decades. Clearly, I didn't properly assess my audiences ability to think outside of the cult mindset.

That would probably be a failure of curiosity on your part, and apparently not clearly communicating my point on my part.

Now you're doing it?

Are you trying to say that YOU (Bolshevik) understood it to mean ... ? You seem to be slipping into what MIKE used to do a lot. You don't get to decide what I intended to mean. You DO get to tell me/us what you understood it to mean and then to ask if your understanding was/is correct.

Well, hopefully not any longer.

Well, I see your position as a failure of imagination and curiosity.

IF your child(ren), as young adults, have developed a strong sense of self-worth and belonging, will they be less vulnerable to the likes of Victor Wierwille or Loy C Martindale? I would hope so.

Don't let failures of imagination set you up for catastrophe. Btw, that's not the first time I've viewed that video clip. I think it's wonderful. Thanks for asking/commenting in ways that help clarify. THE point, with the meme to which you responded, is to set your children up for personal emotional and social intelligence. To not do so might be well illustrated by the verse in Ephesians 4 about being tossed about with every wind of doctrine. You DO want to help your kiddo(s) grow up with strong and healthy emotional and social resources, right?