It Takes A Village
Apr. 4th, 2023 03:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lee_futureSome days I just feel extra autistic.
What do I mean by that? It just feels like I'm some other species, like social assumptions/expectations don't land and I'm furiously taking notes, having feelings about things, and taking more notes.
Thoughts in no particular order, possibly bullshit, but just stream of consciousness about this.
For instance, the expectation that "it takes a village to raise a child" has been a really interesting deep dive this week.
Intellectually, this tends to be a statement used when people in books were looking for a reason to either cluck their tongues at children's behavior or find justification for disciplining them when their parents were not. Occasionally in fiction it is used as a sigh towards Olden Times, when grandparents and family lived on the same property and took turns on responsibility for child care.
But that's not how things worked, even back then. Grandmother may have lived in the same home, or aunts lived close, sure; but aged parents were there expecting to be taken care of as well. "Child care" in many of my friends in that situation was simply having an adult home, not actively supervising the children or providing moral guidance. Mothers were expected to care for their children under five themselves, or parentify older children to do so for them. Older children were expected to be seen not heard, or punished therefore. In our case, "it takes a village" meant when my aunt was overwhelmed with her three other children as well as her child undergoing cancer treatments, she dropped them off with my mother and they lived with us for a while. Yes, family was there, but only in extenuating circumstances. Some other families have grandparents that provide part time or full time child-care, but there is also quite the conversation and resentment on their end that they didn't sign up for raising a second set of kids. In small towns, "it takes a village" was simply everyone knowing your parents, and calling them when you weren't where you were supposed to be. I still remember my best friend getting a furious call on her cell phone when we were ditching because a family friend saw her and I go into the coffee shop during school hours. "It takes a village" provides more oversight, but did not dilute the responsibility of parenting. In this day and age, it is actually kind of frightening, as expectations of helicopter parenting may lead a simular situation to be reported to CPS instead of the family.
Switch over to the Instagram/Parenting forums. "It takes a Village" seems to be instead be grieving the complete lack of support systems that were expected to manifest after child birth, but did not. Mothers constantly post how parenting is so much more work than they thought, and that if only family life were not so nuclear family focused, everything would be easier. There is constant reddit article after article confused and angry about how when folks have children, their friends do not step up and help them with child care or seem particularly interested in babysitting/spending time with the children one on one to let the parents rest (providing the "village" time and financial support). Today I got to overhear a stranger's loud, aggrieved conversation as I picked up my coffee about how infuriating it was that a list of family members and ex-friends had either only seen their toddler X times in the past two years and hadn't provided gifts X and Y, or support Z, and thus they were no longer considered friends. It was really interesting to hear the transitive property of "I love my child and thus everyone who loves me should also love and want to spend time with my child as a benchmark of how they feel about me."
Of course, adding more adults to a functioning social system does make it easier to raise children, no doubt. See poly triads or communes where everyone signs on to do so, and then concurrently receive legal rights to access and support the children they commit to putting time and resources and love towards. Rights coming with responsibilities. I think the difference here is that in most cases, especially in overculture, most folks don't actively sign on for responsibilities, and receive no rights in return.
In Instagram/Without Children forums, there is the annoyance that in choosing to be polite and not actively excluding folks from bringing their children to a social event rather than getting a sitter, or even trying to include parents by choosing child friendly sites like playgrounds/toddler gyms, parents are still getting angry that the childfree folk want to spend time with the adult parent rather than run around with the toddler. The idea that you cannot separate the parent from the child for two hours for a social function without somehow rejecting the adult-parent and casting yourself as the villain seems entrenched.
So wild. This village being so heavily nostalgia'd about doesn't ever seem to have existed. Parenting is hard work, absolutely. But I also can see friends/family who did not sign up for it not getting actively involved and not feeling any guilt about that. Fifty years ago having children wasn't a choice for most; today it is, and it is expected that folks (barring circumstances) have the resources to do so if they do so choose.What mostly generates undertones of surprise is just how righteous everyone acts from all these angles. Indignation that they are expected to help/won't help/won't help in the way idealized. Pushing and pulling and attempts at narrating ideal ways of connection and support when rarely the narrator even bothers to see things from the other angles. Exhausting, fascinating, usually with none of the above discussing desires, extrapolations, or really anything with any of the others involved beyond labels of "rudeness/selfishness" all around.
What do I mean by that? It just feels like I'm some other species, like social assumptions/expectations don't land and I'm furiously taking notes, having feelings about things, and taking more notes.
Thoughts in no particular order, possibly bullshit, but just stream of consciousness about this.
For instance, the expectation that "it takes a village to raise a child" has been a really interesting deep dive this week.
Intellectually, this tends to be a statement used when people in books were looking for a reason to either cluck their tongues at children's behavior or find justification for disciplining them when their parents were not. Occasionally in fiction it is used as a sigh towards Olden Times, when grandparents and family lived on the same property and took turns on responsibility for child care.
But that's not how things worked, even back then. Grandmother may have lived in the same home, or aunts lived close, sure; but aged parents were there expecting to be taken care of as well. "Child care" in many of my friends in that situation was simply having an adult home, not actively supervising the children or providing moral guidance. Mothers were expected to care for their children under five themselves, or parentify older children to do so for them. Older children were expected to be seen not heard, or punished therefore. In our case, "it takes a village" meant when my aunt was overwhelmed with her three other children as well as her child undergoing cancer treatments, she dropped them off with my mother and they lived with us for a while. Yes, family was there, but only in extenuating circumstances. Some other families have grandparents that provide part time or full time child-care, but there is also quite the conversation and resentment on their end that they didn't sign up for raising a second set of kids. In small towns, "it takes a village" was simply everyone knowing your parents, and calling them when you weren't where you were supposed to be. I still remember my best friend getting a furious call on her cell phone when we were ditching because a family friend saw her and I go into the coffee shop during school hours. "It takes a village" provides more oversight, but did not dilute the responsibility of parenting. In this day and age, it is actually kind of frightening, as expectations of helicopter parenting may lead a simular situation to be reported to CPS instead of the family.
Switch over to the Instagram/Parenting forums. "It takes a Village" seems to be instead be grieving the complete lack of support systems that were expected to manifest after child birth, but did not. Mothers constantly post how parenting is so much more work than they thought, and that if only family life were not so nuclear family focused, everything would be easier. There is constant reddit article after article confused and angry about how when folks have children, their friends do not step up and help them with child care or seem particularly interested in babysitting/spending time with the children one on one to let the parents rest (providing the "village" time and financial support). Today I got to overhear a stranger's loud, aggrieved conversation as I picked up my coffee about how infuriating it was that a list of family members and ex-friends had either only seen their toddler X times in the past two years and hadn't provided gifts X and Y, or support Z, and thus they were no longer considered friends. It was really interesting to hear the transitive property of "I love my child and thus everyone who loves me should also love and want to spend time with my child as a benchmark of how they feel about me."
Of course, adding more adults to a functioning social system does make it easier to raise children, no doubt. See poly triads or communes where everyone signs on to do so, and then concurrently receive legal rights to access and support the children they commit to putting time and resources and love towards. Rights coming with responsibilities. I think the difference here is that in most cases, especially in overculture, most folks don't actively sign on for responsibilities, and receive no rights in return.
In Instagram/Without Children forums, there is the annoyance that in choosing to be polite and not actively excluding folks from bringing their children to a social event rather than getting a sitter, or even trying to include parents by choosing child friendly sites like playgrounds/toddler gyms, parents are still getting angry that the childfree folk want to spend time with the adult parent rather than run around with the toddler. The idea that you cannot separate the parent from the child for two hours for a social function without somehow rejecting the adult-parent and casting yourself as the villain seems entrenched.
So wild. This village being so heavily nostalgia'd about doesn't ever seem to have existed. Parenting is hard work, absolutely. But I also can see friends/family who did not sign up for it not getting actively involved and not feeling any guilt about that. Fifty years ago having children wasn't a choice for most; today it is, and it is expected that folks (barring circumstances) have the resources to do so if they do so choose.What mostly generates undertones of surprise is just how righteous everyone acts from all these angles. Indignation that they are expected to help/won't help/won't help in the way idealized. Pushing and pulling and attempts at narrating ideal ways of connection and support when rarely the narrator even bothers to see things from the other angles. Exhausting, fascinating, usually with none of the above discussing desires, extrapolations, or really anything with any of the others involved beyond labels of "rudeness/selfishness" all around.
