Parents role in a situation

[Wozza]

Wozza:

This I missed.

It is exactly ‘our rules or else’. It is ‘our rules or else…you leave the family home’.

You seem to want to paint your views in nice pastel colours. Those who don’t hold such rigid views see it differently.

I think you just have to be raised to realize that the world doesn’t revolve around you, including the world of your parents. If you want to make the decisions for your household, start your own household.

Why is this so hard? It would not have occurred to me to make this kind of demands on other adults, including my parents or any of my other relatives.

Misrepresentation again. It’s not the daughter making demands. You are again going your very best to paint this in the best light possible. But it’s you that would be making the demands - change your ways, or else - leave the home.

And it’s apparently not hard at all. You appear to find it very easy indeed.

 

[PetraG]

Misrepresentation again. It’s not the daughter making demands. You are again going your very best to paint this in the best light possible. But it’s you that would be making the demands - change your ways, or else - leave the home.

And it’s apparently not hard at all. You appear to find it very easy indeed.

Well, luckily my kids and I have each other and your kids and you have each other.
Both families understand each other and we’re all good.
As for the OP, well, she can work her situation out with her parents. I hope she doesn’t give up on them, whatever happens.

 

[Wozza]

You do not see it as acceptable, and you are trying to change our minds, because you have presented your opinion numerous times in this thread.

Very wrong indeed. I have not the slightest interest in changing anyone’s mind. The opinions I put forward are simply those I hold.

 

[Jen7]

From what I’ve read, the brain does not reach maturity until about the age of 25. So until then, young people are indeed more likely to do impetuous things.

I have heard that before too. Mostly in the context of ultra-conservative parents not allowing their [legally adult] children to move out or get a drivers license until 20+ years old because “their brain is still immature.”

I am not sure what I think of it. I hope my kids mature sufficiently before age 20 or 25 that they can financially not need me (or at least not need me for money and housing and education payments) & a scenario like the OP’s won’t even come up.

 

[Wozza]

Wozza:

Misrepresentation again. It’s not the daughter making demands. You are again going your very best to paint this in the best light possible. But it’s you that would be making the demands - change your ways, or else - leave the home.

And it’s apparently not hard at all. You appear to find it very easy indeed.

Well, luckily my kids and I have each other and your kids and you have each other.
Both families understand each other and we’re all good.
As for the OP, well, she can work her situation out with her parents. I hope she doesn’t give up on them, whatever happens.

I think we could leave it there. But in passing, my daughter and the grandkids are on the deck as I type this. We’re all waiting for her husband to arrive before we have dinner. A happier and more well adjusted family you’d be hard pressed to find anywhere.

Before she and J got married we had no problem in him sleeping over at our place. I dread to think what the situation would be if we’d have told her to leave home rather than accept her decisions in this matter. I doubt if my grand daughter would be pestering me to finish this post so I could play with her.

Live by rigid rules and you may well find yourself contemplating the outcomes on your own.

 

[Thorolfr]

If their roommate was fighting dogs or had some other “adult decision” that the other roommates found repugnant, it would matter.

The OP has mentioned premarital sex which I have a hard time seeing as being in any way equivalent to some of the other examples given. As a gay man, all the sex I’ve ever had for most of my adult life has been sex outside of marriage, and I don’t think that I’m at all similar to a drug addict or a member of the KKK or someone who is cruel to animals by having them fight each other. These comparisons that people have made don’t make any sense to me.

 

[Annie]

I’ll have to remember that line.

 

[Annie]

I don’t think that I’m at all similar to a drug addict or a member of the KKK or someone who is cruel to animals by having them fight each other. These comparisons that people have made don’t make any sense to me.

My examples were simply to show that other parents might have different standards, to show that maybe there is simply a disagreement on the parents’ problem being with sex, or whether there was disagreement about parents’ taking such a stand on any issue.

 

[PetraG]

The OP has mentioned premarital sex which I have a hard time seeing as being in any way equivalent to some of the other examples given. As a gay man, all the sex I’ve ever had for most of my adult life has been sex outside of marriage, and I don’t think that I’m at all similar to a drug addict or a member of the KKK or someone who is cruel to animals by having them fight each other. These comparisons that people have made don’t make any sense to me.

I’m trying to find something that some people in history have thought is fine but you actually think is a mortal sin. Help me out, here.

 

[Jen7]

I’m trying to find something that some people in history have thought is fine but you actually think is a mortal sin. Help me out, here.

Right. She’s not saying it’s comparable in anyway beyond perhaps the repugnance we’d feel towards a child sneaking out to participate in the Kkk. Well… that may be how THESE PARENTS feel about premarital sex. It might be how other parents would feel about drugs… or other parents about something else entirely. Just fill in the blank with anything you would feel sick if your child was doing outside the home.

 

[Thorolfr]

I dread to think what the situation would be if we’d have told her to leave home rather than accept her decisions in this matter. I doubt if my grand daughter would be pestering me to finish this post so I could play with her.

Live by rigid rules and you may well find yourself contemplating the outcomes on your own.

I’m sure that I’ve made many mistakes in the almost 60 years of my life, but I’ve always had the unconditional love and support of my parents and have been close to them all of my life. I know many other people, however, some in my own family, who had much more rigid and demanding parents and in most cases they became alienated from their parents. Some haven’t talked to their parents in more than 20 or 30 years which makes me feel sad for them and for their parents, too.

 

[Annie]

I have known people whose parents were not rigid, but they are still estranged because of some other aspect of the parents’ behavior.

I also know people whose parents were as you call it rigid, but who get along fine with their children.

You probably know a lot of people who are estranged from their parents in relation, one way or another, to homosexuality, since you are probably acquainted with more homosexuals than average.

 

[Wozza]

Thorolfr:

The OP has mentioned premarital sex which I have a hard time seeing as being in any way equivalent to some of the other examples given. As a gay man, all the sex I’ve ever had for most of my adult life has been sex outside of marriage, and I don’t think that I’m at all similar to a drug addict or a member of the KKK or someone who is cruel to animals by having them fight each other. These comparisons that people have made don’t make any sense to me.

I’m trying to find something that some people in history have thought is fine but you actually think is a mortal sin. Help me out, here.

Numbers 31: 17-18.

 

[Thorolfr]

Numbers 31: 17-18.

Or how about Leviticus 25: 44-46:

44 As for the male and female slaves whom you may have, it is from the nations around you that you may acquire male and female slaves. 45 You may also acquire them from among the aliens residing with you, and from their families that are with you, who have been born in your land; and they may be your property. 46 You may keep them as a possession for your children after you, for them to inherit as property.

 

[VanitasVanitatum]

At a certain point the child doesn’t have the right to live at their home. Really it’s between the parents.

 

[PetraG]

Numbers 31: 17-18.

Leviticus 25: 44-46:

Provided it doesn’t actually take place on your property, the only mortal sins you can think of that you’d find unacceptable for a member of your household to engage in are murder and human trafficking?

Just…wow. Well, it’s your house, your rules.

And you think that an adult child is entitled to expect that? That parents who fail to furnish that deserve to expect “a fast track to estrangement. The only way you’ll see the grandkids is on Instagram.”

Good grief. Just…good grief. And we’re the extremists, because we’re so extreme as to suggest that adults who want to dictate their own house rules really ought to form their own household? Unbelievable.

 

[Annie]

I’ve always had the unconditional love and support of my parents

Maybe some people’s ideas about this issue stem from the idea of unconditional love or their conception of it.

I would always love my children, so from that point of view, my love for them would be unconditional, but that does not mean I would not chastise them in their minority nor fraternally correct them or more in their majority. I would not accept one of my children’s committing adultery, for example, and I would at least talk with them about it and I would not let them bring their lover to my house.

But if I thought that unconditional love meant their never having to say they were sorry or receive some sharp words or negative consequences for doing something wrong, well, I could see why they would not understand what we are saying.

@PetraG

 

[Thorolfr]

Thorolfr:

I’ve always had the unconditional love and support of my parents

Maybe some people’s ideas about this issue stem from the idea of unconditional love or their conception of it.

I would always love my children, so from that point of view, my love for them would be unconditional, but that does not mean I would not chastise them in their minority nor fraternally correct them or more in their majority. I would not accept one of my children’s committing adultery, for example, and I would at least talk with them about it and I would not let them bring their lover to my house.

But if I thought that unconditional love meant their never having to say they were sorry or receive some sharp words or negative consequences for doing something wrong, well, I could see why they would not understand what we are saying.

@PetraG

It’s possible for a parent and child or a man/woman and their spouse to have a disagreement without it permanently compromising the love and affection that they have for each other. But past a certain point, then it becomes much more difficult.

I know some gay men whose parents will not allow them to bring their partners to the parents’ home or to family gatherings. The result, in many cases, is that these men will never go to their parents’ home and never go to family gatherings if they have to go alone without their partner. I would think that it would be difficult to maintain love and affection between parent and child in a situation like that. Fortunately, my parents were never like that and have always welcomed the people who were most important to me into their home and to family gatherings.

Likewise, if a straight man or woman had a significant other of long standing to whom they weren’t married and they were never allowed to bring them to their parents’ home, I would think that that would eventually put quite a strain on the child/parent relationship.

 

[Wozza]

Wozza:

Numbers 31: 17-18.

Leviticus 25: 44-46:

Provided it doesn’t actually take place on your property, the only mortal sins you can think of that you’d find unacceptable for a member of your household to engage in are murder and human trafficking?

You only asked for one. Do you want more? And you never said anything about family being involved or households either.

The answers you get can only be in response the questions you ask. To save you scrolling up, here’s what you asked for (and received two responses):

‘I’m trying to find something that some people in history have thought is fine but you actually think is a mortal sin.’

Genocide and slavery seem to fit the bill.

 

[PennyinCanada]

I think what’s forgotten here is that the 18 yr old is making a decision, with knowledge, that is upsetting her parents.

She is not saying, you know, I’m out with my friends, I have a pretty good life here, I’m not going to do the sleep overs. It’s not worth having them upset.

That conversation is not happening. Too bad. Why isn’t it?
As for having sex, she can still have sex and be home before midnight. So what is with the power struggle? The sleepovers are really rubbing their noses in it, isn’t it? Call a spade a spade.