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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   33523 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 24, 2023

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If you consider children to be actual people with rights, then you reject the fundamental right of the parent to mold them into whatever they please.

Forget trans, every cultural standard that removes agency from children is up for review for exclusion from the eschaton.

Parents as the only role model and as an absolute force in a child's life is a single point of failure, at best it's a benevolent dictatorship and at worst its tyranny.

Precisely. If children can consent to change their gender, they should also be allowed to have sex with adults. Gender, such as the concept was invented, has a very close relationship with intercourse, like a car has a close relationship with the engine. If you were sold a car without an engine, you might well throw your hands up in the air and swear in indignation.

I take the position that children can't meaningfully consent to change gender and shouldn't be having sex with adults. Yet I sense that's where we're headed next.

I take the position that children can't meaningfully consent to change gender

But they can meaningfully consent to having one?

You must have interesting trolley problem outputs.

Listen. Sex with kids is bad because it traumatizes and wrecks them. It's not that complicated. Bad things are bad.

We care about consent in adults so much because we've seen the consequences of people not using it. It's the same thing, those people are traumatized and wrecked. Bad things are bad. It's not that complicated.

If you want to argue that early transition traumatizes and wrecks people-

I can appreciate that argument. I might not agree but I recognize it as an argument rooted in a sensible definition of the Good and the Bad.

Though, there are also people who swear by the early transition they went through and became FAANG programmers or whatever. (namely my in-group). And I am always going to be on the side of those people being able to have done what they did. Because everything turned out great for them and they were clearly not traumatized and wrecked by transition. The only thing they tend to be working through is the time their parents sent them to gay deconversion camp, or some other mistreatment by anti-trans normative society. Which I will fight against because it is traumatizing and wrecking people.

Consent is about locus of control. If you think parents can rob teenagers of that locus and not risk doing the same sort of damage...

I don't think you understand why rape is bad.

Surely throughout human history there are some child-adult sexual relationships which went well for both parties? Say they did have a respectful, gentle, loving relationship.

But generally, sex between adults and children is harmful to the child, they don't really know what they're getting into, don't understand the long-term consequences. It might go well or it might go very badly. Because we can't judge beforehand whether the parties are mature, sensible and so on, we blanket-ban a huge swathe of child-adult sexual relationships on the basis that the vast majority are predatory and bad. That there might be some such relationships that end well is not a sufficient argument for them to be legal.

But they can meaningfully consent to having one?

Tattoos are illegal for children to get in many jurisdictions - yet nobody goes full Event Horizon and says children can't consent to having skin. Many consider that the increased autonomy isn't worth the danger of making choices that will be later regretted.

And what about Chesterton's Fence - not changing complex biological equilibria we don't really understand.

Chesterton's Fence is a fine heuristic but at the same time, your species will never learn to fight bulls if it always respects fences.

Children are not full people with full rights. Far from it.

In fact if you really want to characterize their status they are natural slaves. They're easily manipulated fools who are a danger to themselves and others.

Which is why any realistic conception of rights can't afford them full personhood and autonomy, and has to defer proportions of it to their protectors.

If you truly believe children should be empowered to make all important personal decisions for themselves, without interference, then how would you argue against pedophilia? Or are prohibitions of pedophilia likewise to be excluded from the eschaton, whatever that means?

The only reason “parents have control over their children” isn’t in the Bill of Rights is that it was inconceivable that someone would doubt it, like doubting whether people have the right to oxygen. This is a fundamental biological right. Children are and ought to be the Property of their parents until the age of, I don’t know, at least 14. They are theirs, not the State, and definitely not the Twitter Gender Peoples’

This seems like a slightly inflammatory claim, so here's some evidence that at least some other people hold it.

But when are we to say that this parental trustee jurisdiction over children shall come to an end? Surely any particular age (21,18, or whatever) can only be completely arbitrary. The clue to the solution of this thorny question lies in the parental property rights in their home. For the child has his full rights of self-ownership when he demonstrates that he has them in nature—in short, when he leaves or "runs away" from home. Regardless of his age, we must grant to every child the absolute right to run away and to find new foster parents who will voluntarily adopt him, or to try to exist on his own. Parents may try to persuade the runaway child to return, but it is totally impermissible enslavement and an aggression upon his right of self-ownership for them to use force to compel him to return. The absolute right to run away is the child's ultimate expression of his right of self-ownership, regardless of age.

That is interesting. I suppose that it boils down to "can you essentially emancipate yourself" which is kind of admirable in practice. There are some that have extremely strong convictions that they're straight up willing to die over. I am not sure how many trans kids have that strong of convictions; if they do, that is to be respected.

I would imagine far more people hold an “earth is flat” view than agree with Rothbard here. In every developed human society, children are seen as the property of their parents, who may guide and discipline them before they become independent, just like mammals guide and discipline their young (and don’t let them go off and run away whenever they want). Removing rights of parents in raising their children is going against mammalian nature, like forbidding pair-bonding or sex or walking. I was pointing out that from the perspective of those who created the idea of rights to begin with, it would be an inconceivable view; therefore, you can’t argue from rights as traditionally understood, as a proxy appeal to authority/tradition which simply does not apply (“rights” compels us only because of the authority and tradition of the concept, and not because we are applying an oversimplification to contexts where it doesn’t apply).

I think you might be in more of a bubble than you realize. It's a regular talking point in progressive-leaning political forums to claim horrified that conservatives treat their children like property. It's surprising to me to see people like you in this thread literally saying as much in so many words.

Removing rights of parents in raising their children is going against mammalian nature, like forbidding pair-bonding...

well, we are well on our way to make pair bonding as mythical as the American Dream is right now. They (The Progressive Front) are consistent, I will give them that.

What age? 2? 7? 13?

Parents as the only role model and as an absolute force in a child's life is a single point of failure

Single point of failure, are you sure you meant this? It sounds like if there is any failure in the arrangement it is unevenly massively distributed amongst billions of different parents. Rather it sounds antifragile fail-safe against a variety of centralization schemes attempting to improve the human condition.

When you remove parents from the upbringing of children, or at least remove their authority, you likely end up with some state apparatus, perhaps public schooling, which as we see in America there is the potential there for them to transition into groomatories by enterprising trans/trans humanist actors championing, of course what else, “human rights”. This is the single point of failure, not the variety of family life.

Except that Texas will take your kids away and charge you with child abuse if you let them take puberty blockers rather than allow that variety of family life to flourish. As far as I know most U.S. states have some proceedings to take away your child if you abuse them, and is there anyone who is such a believer in parental rights that they would allow a pedophile widower to retain custody of a 12-year-old after impregnating her? It's not really a meta-dispute about centralized state authority vs. anti-fragile family life, it's an object-level dispute over whether puberty blockers and/or hormones constitute child abuse. Texas thinks it does and will take your child away to be raised by bureaucrats, Minnesota thinks it doesn't and will refuse to enforce Texas's rulings stripping a parent of custody if their kid is in Minnesota.

People in this thread are then very concerned that Minnesota's claim of emergency temporary jurisdiction over child custody proceedings means they will also emancipate runaways. So far has shown themselves to be an expert on Minnesota custody laws and explained whether jurisdiction over a custody proceeding also means jurisdiction to hear a termination of parental rights by a minor, and/or whether refusing to allow a child to receive gender-affirming care would be grounds for termination of parental rights in the absence of other abuse.

Except that Texas will take your kids away and charge you with child abuse if you let them take puberty blockers rather than allow that variety of family life to flourish.

"Allow that variety of family life to flourish" in this instance parses to this reader much like "Allow that variety of MRSA to flourish"

and is there anyone who is such a believer in parental rights that they would allow a pedophile widower to retain custody of a 12-year-old after impregnating her?

When they did genetic studies of people in Britain they found that one person was the product of father daughter incest. But, they kept it secret, because, of course, the people involved were Pakistani.

Let's not forget too the minority grooming/rape Gangs that were abetted for years too. No child is sacred, only the ideology.

Forget trans, every cultural standard that removes agency from children is up for review for exclusion from the eschaton.

How much agency?

As for your last sentence, it doesn't follow from the first two.

Agency should be maximized insofar as it does not contradict possibility and sustainability.

Limits on the possible and sustainable should be attacked aggressively insofar as technological and social progress can eliminate them.

They should be treated as enemies of all humanity that require slaying, like Death or Cancer.

As for your last sentence

"Parents as the only role model and as an absolute force in a child's life is a single point of failure, at best it's a benevolent dictatorship and at worst its tyranny."?

Yes, perhaps that belongs in a separate post. I intended that to stand on its own, it follows from the definition of benevolent dictatorship and the phrase "Parents as the only role model and as an absolute force".

Agency should be maximized insofar as it does not contradict possibility and sustainability.

I'm not sure about an imperative based around three vague abstractions whose pursuit is apparently in tension. That seems to leave a lot of power for those with the role of doing the interpreting, and of enforcing the eventual intepretation in policy.

Agency should be maximized insofar as it does not contradict possibility and sustainability.

Limits on the possible and sustainable should be attacked aggressively insofar as technological and social progress can eliminate them.

But if the result of this is the possible sterilization of the subject, and we consider that we are in population decline with a bellow replacement level Reproductive rate, how is that in any way, shape or form sustainable?

If you consider children to be actual people with rights, then you reject the fundamental right of the parent to mold them into whatever they please.

I find that framing disingenuous. If you take away the children from their parents, because you don't like the way they're raising them, you're not respecting the child's rights and actual personhood, you're merely transferring the right to mold them on to a bunch of bureaucrats.

It's funny how the "nature vs. nurture" stuff flips political valence when gay/trans issues come along. The right is skeptical of the state's ability to improve test scores and career outcomes for women and (non-asian) minorities but thinks the state is quite capable of convincing people to cut off their own genitals. The left thinks that representation and role models are hugely important in convincing women and minorities to enter male-dominated career paths, but can't possibly influence kids gender or sexual identity.

The right is skeptical of the state's ability to improve test scores and career outcomes for women and (non-asian) minorities but thinks the state is quite capable of convincing people to cut off their own genitals.

I think there's a fundamental difference in that career outcomes are measured over the entire population, whereas "making people trans" only affects a (more suggestible) subgroup of the target group.

The government can convince some people, particularly confused teenagers, to transition, and there are also surely some women who respond to a women-in-tech program.

The government can not convince everyone to cut off their genitals, and equally not convince women as a group to make life choices indistinguishable from men as a group.

To be fair, I don't think progressives are all that wrong about the influence of media broadly speaking, and I don't begrudge them wanting to provide representation for minorities. My issue was with replacing/cucking established characters, and making the story suck.

Well we have no examples state educational interventions correcting IQs and test scores and have numerous examples of at least allowing a certain social contagion to convince (some small number of) people to cut off their genitals. But most trans-trenders don't bother with that.

But what you're saying is over-simplistic. There are plenty of easily conceivable models that could consider things like IQ, ambition, height, disagreeability, openness or a number of other traits including potentially the curiosity to want to toy with the idea of genital mutilation to be highly inherited and yet the expression of those to be highly regulated by environment. If every modern trans would have been trans-curious in other cultural environments but gone on to mostly grow out of it and live happy lives that doesn't mean that the modern environment where they're rushed onto puberty blockers is strictly better. In fact that proclivity may have had some advantage only in environments where it wouldn't be indulged.

Obviously if it is indulged it will likely breed itself out of existence.

The right is skeptical of the state's ability to improve test scores and career outcomes for women and (non-asian) minorities but thinks the state is quite capable of convincing people to cut off their own genitals.

Is this not just the empirical reality we observe? Black test scores remain low despite decades of effort and millions of dollars thrown at the problem, but the incidence rate of people cutting off their own genitals has skyrocketed in the last 10 years.

Yes, and you can explain that as either a) the government is really bad at getting black kids to study and really good at convincing them to chop off their genitals or b) the state isn't actually very influential over either and culture/genetics is the driving force in both cases.

It feels like we took a wrong turn somewhere.

First I don't see why you introduced a distinction between state and culture. The single flat nature vs nurture distinction you started with is fine.

Second I don't understand why you're discounting the idea that some things are driven primarily by nature, and others are driven primarily by nurture. Different things can be different, it doesn't have to be all one or the other.

When something doesn't change for a long time despite lots of effort to change it, that's evidence that biological factors are at work. When something changes very rapidly, that's evidence that social factors are at work. Seems pretty straightforward to me.

I think in both cases there's a mix of nature and nurture going on, but the scale can lean more heavily towards one side or the other in different cases.

Or the government isn't magic. They can only perform the possible.

Getting black kids to want to perform better, possible.

Getting kids to want to cut their dicks off, possible.

Getting black kids to actually perform better, not possible.

This is borderline consensus building, and well over the line of needing to bring evidence in proportion to the inflammatoriness of your claim. Don't post like this, please.

It wasn't my intent to suggest that everyone already agrees. I wouldn't have thought this claim was particularly inflamitory. What sort of evidence would you like to see that government is only able to perform the possible?

Primaprimaprima response to Ecgtheow that

Black test scores remain low despite decades of effort and millions of dollars thrown at the problem, but the incidence rate of people cutting off their own genitals has skyrocketed...

Is an accurate description of our concensus reality.

Ecgtheow response (a can be true, I'm not sure I'd call it government but I dont think the semantics are important here. For (b the state's influence, not sure I'd call it the state, is substantial but grounded in the possible. Genetics / heritability rule outcomes, while TPTB can influence / move desirability / attempts.

In the same way I'm confident there are interventions that would increase attempts at the SAT, ACT, ASVAB, etc., but those interventions are unlikely to drive attainment for those attempts.

This allows genetics / HBD to be the driving force for attainment / success, while explaining the outcomes we see in other areas (genital chopping).

You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. With the right marketing and community (intervention) you can induce people to try. With the application of science and technology and a rubric that helps recontextualize what a 'silk purse' is. Perhaps some nuspeak to paper over the obvious defeciencies. Some under this program would produce an ersatz nuspeak 'silk purse'. Chineese silk producers are unmoved.

I think it's possible. It just requires indoctrinating them into the culture which The Experts (TM) currently consider "white supremacist". And this is not something that will be done, especially as making black kids perform better would mean also making them and their kid middle class, with middle class voting patterns. And who needs that trouble? Certainly not people who are now in power in places where there are a lot of black kids. They already have the votes locked in, thankyouverymuch, and they don't need to mess with a working system.

indoctrinating them into the culture which The Experts (TM) currently consider "white supremacist".

Wasn't that the plan through the the mid - late 90's? Then it was called academic excellence, or fundamental education something, something.

The cohort of non-responders was too dark and the culture of academic excellence was identified as white supremacist as the performance of the cohort of responders was too light or asian.

That there's a ready made voting block of is a bonus. That TPTB have not been as successful pushing globohomo here is a little interesting. But this is a cohort of non-responders.

I don't know that the "high-low coalition vs. the middle" concept applies to your assertion, though. Surely the counterargument is that black people and families will be loyal to the party whose policies gave their children better opportunities, i.e. delivering tangible progress?

I don't know. I suppose if I was an East Coast machine politician who was never in any real danger of losing to an R candidate, I like to think I'd have enough electoral free reign to do what I thought would objectively improve things for my constituents.

Surely the counterargument is that black people and families will be loyal to the party whose policies gave their children better opportunities, i.e. delivering tangible progress?

Delivering an "opportunity" is not the same thing as delivering "tangible progress." An "opportunity" can be failed, and if you actually buy into the fairness of the opportunity, the failing actually is an insult - you weren't good enough to measure up! The person who gave you the opportunity only gave you an insult! Screw opportunity; you have a grievance - you don't deserve an opportunity to be told "haha you suck", you deserve the actual prize!

I submit that this is a far better match for what we're seeing with regard to, e.g. increasingly-explicit hiring quotas, racially-based benefits and payments programs, medical preferences, and the corresponding attacks on and decline in color-blind casting, merit-based examinations, grading, honors programs, etc.

Surely the counterargument is that black people and families will be loyal to the party whose policies gave their children better opportunities, i.e. delivering tangible progress?

It's hard to reason about current parties while assuming they would behave in a way that current parties would never do. If Democrats would implement "western culture" values, they wouldn't be Democrats anymore - at least not the Democrats we have known for 2 or 3 generations. Would prospective black middle class stay with them then? Who knows, that's a huge unknown. But it is known that black permanent welfare class reliably votes for current Democrats, so why risk it? It's not like they'd get tired of being permanent welfare class and revolt - if they were capable of figuring this out, that'd happen decades ago. Right now they are all in on state-sanctioned racism as a way out of the hole. Which would work about as great as projects worked as a solution for housing problem.

I'd have enough electoral free reign to do what I thought would objectively improve things for my constituents.

You could. Or you could do things that ensure your party is in power for another generation and you personally and everybody you choose to become multimillionaires and generally get near-royalty status, including being virtually untouchable to law enforcement (if you keep within certain - very wide - bounds and do not get into a fight with a more powerful royalty). Sure, there might be saints among them, but even if those pop out, people surrounding them would explain to them quickly what are the costs of rocking the boat.

That's fair. I don't think children should be "taken away". I think children should be free to go where they want to and systems should be configured such that roaming children remain supported.

Since this is not what is actually happening in the top post- it's fair to say I disagree with present implementation.

But I do absolutely think- what most parents who are afraid of transgender role models are afraid of- is their kids making the choice.

I claim the resistance to my ideal would consist of mostly the same people for mostly the same reasons.

Child liberation is opposed mainly by people who want the power to ensure that their children become the upstanding ideal of their culture, and are uninterested in any compromise that would free their children to pursue becoming the upstanding ideal of a different culture. See "Groomer" rhetoric.

Child liberation is opposed mainly by people who want the power to ensure that their children become the upstanding ideal of their culture, and are uninterested in any compromise that would free their children to pursue becoming the upstanding ideal of a different culture.

“Every generation, civilization is invaded by barbarians - we call them 'children'.” - Hannah Arendt

Child liberation is opposed mainly by people who want the power to ensure that their children become the upstanding ideal of their culture, and are uninterested in any compromise that would free their children to pursue becoming the upstanding ideal of a different culture. See "Groomer" rhetoric.

Yes_Chad.jpg

With the added caveat that "child liberation" is a mirage. Unless you're dropping them off at the jungle to be raised by wolves, you're not liberating them from anything, you're raising them in different values that they have no choice over.

What kind of jungle has wolves?

This kind, I guess...

The kind where lions sleep?

The kind in the imagination and work of Rudyard Kipling.

I guess there actually are wolves in India -- it says they avoid "wet, dense forests" though. (which I guess doesn't mean that they never go in the jungle):

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2022.814966/full

That's fair. I don't think children should be "taken away". I think children should be free to go where they want to and systems should be configured such that roaming children remain supported.

And if they all end up on Pinocchio’s Pleasure Island, is that a good thing?

That is a hell of a bad thing. However, if kids have a realistic view of how likely something like that is...and they decide that winding up there in the pursuit of their desired life choices is preferable to not being able to pursue something like transition...

I mean, it's a kind of mutually assured destruction. Someone that sits down and decides that they would rather wind up in this kind of hellhole than not transition is one hell of a determined motherfucker and as such deserves respect.

Are you of the opinion that children are just as capable of mental analysis as Adults but just in a small form factor?

No. I am of the opinion that when it comes to individual issues children can be surprisingly capable, although they often fail to consider the big picture. When they examine long-term consequences the analysis often lacks nuance and depth, and may miss certain important issues entirely. However, it is often surprising what children - what people in general - achieve when [they believe] their life or bodily sovereignty is at stake.

I know a couple of children who more or less invoked MAD when they were quite young - ten or eleven. In one case this was extremely deliberate and carefully planned. The kid called a family meeting and discussed the terms of their conflict about a week after it started. In both cases it left them with lifelong side effects that they weren't able to predict at the time but which most mature adults would be able to foresee. That being said. They were fairly impressive in their resourcefulness, determination, and resolve; that is to be admired. This is a sort of power that is not given but taken by the simple and desperate expedient of being willing to suffer terribly, or even to die, for the strength of your personal or philosophical convictions. Only the very determined, or the very scared, or the very maladjusted will go this far in attempting this, and make no mistake about it - it is a terrible thing, sometimes. It alters relationships and changes people for life.

To say nothing of the kids that invoke MAD and wind up with one side overplaying their hand. This being said: I still believe that it takes an exceptional level of willpower or determination to risk the abyss. It turns what might have been bullshit power struggles of a generation ago about wearing your hair short or even dating the same sex into genuine straight-up goddamn existential battles that are far likelier to have deleterious lifelong consequences. But in the end it is ultimately a battle of human will against human will, and I've seen some damned strong-willed kids...at that point it is very much a naked power struggle, everything else be damned. Who has the power? Who is genuinely okay with being buried, rather than not getting what they are after?

I may be rambling. But I am of the opinion that if your child is old enough and wants something badly enough to be okay being maimed or raped or killed over it - and they're unwilling or unable to desist - that needs to be respected even if you deeply disagree with it, perhaps especially if you deeply disagree with it. It's kind of...invoking a state of war or at least some kind of extraordinary circumstance where the usual rules do not apply in the same way, or apply only in the sense that they are part of the power struggle.

Game theory is a motherfucker. Anyone who wants can pull out a live hand grenade, though this takes a lot of willpower and is almost always inadvisable.

The way to deal with this is long before your 14-year-old has decided that they are trans, that they will pursue medical treatment by any means necessary, and that they consider it a straight up life and death struggle. You may be able to win that battle by force or threat of force, to be honest. But if they don't get the memes that if they're gender-nonconforming, they're trans...or if they're not good at performing gender roles, they're trans...they are a hell of a lot less likely to wind up playing Mutually Assured Destruction: Trans Edition.

This sounds much more epic and reasonable until you realize kids will regularly get into this level of game of chicken over liker Katy Perry tickets and the weaker willed parents will cave. You really really don't want to set standards that encourage brinksmanship like this.

I may not have been sufficiently clear earlier:

I do not endorse MAD; I am merely describing a dynamic that anyone that is determined and desperate enough can access. Even if the child wins this struggle, it is likely to be a Pyrrhic victory in many ways and may leave lifelong scars. To say nothing of the dead and maimed people that will be the result of one side or the other overplaying their hand. I've heard it said that war is a dirty, nasty business, and while this isn't Vietnam, it's still a bit nasty and ugly. I hope that most kids will realize this...and that most parents will find ways to make it clear that irreparably altering your relationship with your parents isn't worth Katy Perry tickets.

I mean. In some instances of MAD you need to have plausible deniability. What's Sarah going to do if she doesn't get Katy Perry tickets? Jump off a cliff? If you're a middle-class parent, you just reply that if she's for real, she needs psychiatric care, and she's going to go for a vacation in the grippy sock hotel. Which, coincidentally, is expensive and is going to leave them unable to afford concert tickets. That is fairly likely to work...especially if she's told about all the horrible things that sometimes happen in psych wards, or the side effects of antipsychotics. For this to work you need the credible threat of mutual annihilation.

until you realize kids will regularly get into this level of game of chicken over liker Katy Perry tickets and the weaker willed parents will cave

And this is the exact reason why parents get really frustrated when it comes to dealing with young adult teenaged children. (That said, the condition of being "weaker willed" is a sinking waterline with respect to children developing a stronger will over time- the inflection point is popularly around 14, but parents [being too close to the problem] tend to overestimate it.)

if your child is old enough

What range or limit are you thinking about here? 14 and up, less or more?

The way to deal with this is long before your 14-year-old has decided that they are trans, ...

How do you grok this with cases in which the children were groomed secretly by their teachers and they spring this up suddenly to the parents?

What range or limit are you thinking about here? 14 and up, less or more?

In practice, about ten. As young as that sounds - and as horrible as that sounds (and is!) that is about when kids in extremis are able to satisfy the condition "Wants something badly enough to be okay being maimed or raped or killed over it - and unwilling or unable to desist. And competent enough to be able to pose a significant, sustained threat to themselves or other people.

How do you grok this with cases in which the children were groomed secretly by their teachers and they spring this up suddenly to the parents?

You might have the occasional malicious or predatory or just plain criminally ignorant teacher pulling this. I suspect that the teachers doing this are well-intentioned but basically swallowed certain kinds of bait hucked by political ax-grinders and quacks in the medical establishment. We both agree that current memes around this trans shit are fucked. If it was treated as the goddamn medical condition it is, we might not be having this problem...if it was a more intense and life-altering version of the decision on whether or not to send Johnny to the neurosurgeon because he herniated a disc playing football as a freshman in high school.

But: how many of these kids who are essentially following a fashion trend are willing to look terrible suffering and even death right in the goddamn face and say "Yes. I would rather this, than desist. Here I stand; I can do no other." and then actually fucking follow through with it? Like. For MAD to work, you have to have a credible threat of mutual annihilation. I suppose that certain kinds of peer pressure and belonging might get people to do that - but that IMHO usually happens to teenagers, not middle-schoolers.

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Child liberation is opposed mainly by people who want the power to ensure that their children become the upstanding ideal of their culture

I proudly own this label, and I ask you why it’s bad. Our society does not do enough to make sure children become an upstanding ideal of normiedom. Instead we leave them to decide what they want to do, which is usually something stupid but glamorous like ‘become an influencer’ and then when they grow up put energy into helping them become normies in the back end when a bunch of them have already screwed the pooch.

So why, exactly, is it bad to want children to turn out like their parents but better?

I appreciate the candor.

But you missed the other half.

Child liberation is opposed mainly by people who want the power to ensure that their children become the upstanding ideal of their culture, and are uninterested in any compromise that would free their children to pursue becoming the upstanding ideal of a different culture.

So why is it bad for them to become the upstanding ideal of a different culture? I agree that it is bad when a child fails to find any viable niche, which is what your argument describes, but why should every child be crammed into their parents' niche? Last I checked, most of us here value horizontal and vertical societal mobility. Forcing children to be their parents but better is... inhuman. Ant-like.

Seeds within a child should be nurtured. However, if you raise a child with ulterior motives, you are compelled to quash seeds that do not conform. This damages the child and perpetuates a culture of painfully breaking people into a mold. You are losing efficiency by cramming round pegs into square holes. This is an argument against modern conventional schooling as well, you may be more familiar with it in that context.

Longterm- I proudly hold the goal of seeding every ecological niche with human/transhuman intelligence.

Crushing children's exploration of new cultural niches is antithetical to this prospect. Instead legitimizing and teaching the fear of the Other and the New. It robs children of their innocence and teaches them fear.

So why is it bad for them to become the upstanding ideal of a different culture?

Because the basic foundation of society the willingness of people to sacrifice their own pleasures to invest in futures they will not personally benefit from. If generations are not tied together and current generations do not have the right to shape what comes next, people will not invest in the future at all. They'll go off and have "fur babies" instead of kids, and let their communities collapse into chaos in pursuit of their own personal virtue-signalling and status.

The idea that we all have special seeds within us that need to be expressed in the world is decadent romanticism. This belief system is one of the current failure modes of society because it fundamentally misunderstands what a self is. We participate in our ongoing development in embodied relation with the world and others.

In terms of human development it doesn't make sense to posit someone born into one family system and culture as if they were born into another.

This doesn't preclude development that honor's the child's unique characteristics and preferences to give them sovereignty and agency. Or for cultures to adapt and change.

Any parent with any sense knows that while they have a special unique child, they are also responsible for shaping that child's development while their brain is forming. This duty of development means a parent often needs to overrule the childs own view of the world, ie in limiting this or that food, technology, being wary of strangers, trying to advocate options that don't limit in education etc.

Unfortunately people, families and cultures come with a lot of baggage, but there is no utopian shortcut. Transhuman ideas and decadent romanticism have fed into the current trans contagion and are causing irreversible harms.

So why is it bad for them to become the upstanding ideal of a different culture?

Because they mostly don't.

Children need real, living role models that they interact with every day to absorb enough of a functional culture to smoothly take it up themselves. Right now, society is absolutely full of fake role models, cardboard cutouts of fictional cultures that attempt to lure children into their clutches to be used in some way, whether somewhat banally as brand dedicated consumers or more maliciously.

Children are impressionable. They lack good judgment and, especially, have no real concept of the long term until they are already quite mature, ie., until they have already been raised within one culture. There is a reason we don't just leave cigarettes or alcohol or sexual activity to the good judgment and curious nature of children: They will make bad, often harmful mistakes much more often than they will learn valuable life lessons and become the wiser for it.

The worst part? The children themselves are the only ones with the right incentives to raise themselves right. Because their judgment is impaired, we are left with the second best choice, those whose incentives are aligned with the child's the second most: The parents. Society has no skin in the game for any particular child and anonymous or large scale social institutions most of all. No parent is perfect and always has all their child's best interests in mind at all times, everywhere, but they're going to be significantly better than a teacher who only has that child for one class for one year, where they are but one of dozens of others. They're certainly better than any bureaucrat for whom the child is one of a faceless multitude.

In the past, face-to-face local society provided an additional set of adults whose caring and long term exposure to the child offered a non-exclusive alternative to the child's parents, but that culture is dead and the modern replacements are not up to the job.

The alternative to children being broken into a mold by their parents isn't those children freely and independently choosing their own destiny, it's those children being broken into a mold by the first social trend, infohazard, or two-bit groomer they come across. Would that be true of all of them? Of course not, but we don't make policy for outliers, we make it for the average, and it is better for society that a few weirdos like us are given less agency than we could potentially handle for a few years as teenagers then letting all the kids roam free and be manipulated by bad actors into pursuing harmful goals.

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