How protective should parents be?

[Depleted]

You can't trust anybody these days. My best advice, just don't have kids. Wouldn't want to bring them into this mess of a world...

Watch less news. And rethink what you were taught in school.

 

[notuptome]

You can't trust anybody these days. My best advice, just don't have kids. Wouldn't want to bring them into this mess of a world...

Pathetic outlook on life. Do you not trust God to provide for your children as He has for you? Good thing your parents did not share your attitude toward children. Don't depend on you but trust the Lord in all things.

For the cause of Christ
Roger

 

[Depleted]

i asked my son about the crime rate stuff last night. he's about to graduate with a double degree in criminal justice and accounting (which includes statistics). i trust him; he's reasonable and fair (and only 28! lol).

he said that though too many rapes still go unreported ( ), statistically violent crime rates have been steadily dropping for years. he showed me a few websites which seemed to be better than the one Tommy shared, because they went back farther.

what they show is the violent crime rate drops per capita. so though there were fewer violent crimes 100 years ago, the rate per capita has dropped (world wide, not only in this country) because there are so many more people on the planet than 100 years ago. there are, of course, more violent crimes committed than a century ago, but statisticians consider it differently.

yeah... i understood about half of what he said. (i like words, not math ) yet he made his point. to his mom. not easy to do. lol

as to the OP, i think this--

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. (Eph 6:1)

is what we should be encouraging, whether or not we agree with the person's parenting style. unless they're abusive, natch.
when the children are no longer children (which doesn't come with a chronological number), they'll have to decide what's best. none of our kids went with everything we taught them, and that's good because not everything we taught then was right. that's probably the case with most parents. we do our level best, but we're not always right.

now i'm a little depressed.

"How to Lie with Statistics" <---------the name of a textbook I had in a marketing class in college.

When hubby first suggested we move into Philly, I did my anal-Lynnie thing. (If anyone can come up with a better word than "anal," please tell me. I hate that word, but I can't think of a better one. ) It was all about if it was a good decision. At the time we lived in South Jersey. I compared everything -- politics, economy, taxes, COL, and crime. So I remember there were 512 murders in Philly the year before we moved in. 52 murders in our part of the city. (When you think "mafia" + "Philly," they live in my part of the city. There was a gang war then. Ends up it was ending, but we didn't know that then. But the vast majority of murders were mafia to mafia, and, unlike drug dealers, they're good shots, so no collateral damage.)

Five years later, the murder rate dropped down into the 200 range. Less than one person murdered per day in a city of 1.5 million. I bet you're thinking that was because the mafia war was over, right? nope!

What really happened was we got a new mayor who didn't like the numbers, so he switched the stats. If you mug someone, but the person has a heart attack during the mugging and dies, that's "murder." Unless, you're the mayor and don't want that to count. Then it's only a theft. If you shoot someone, the hospital saves his life, but then he gets an infection from the bullet and die, that's murder. Unless, you are the mayor and don't count that. Then it's just attempted murder.

Half of the cause for the dropped numbers was the mafia war was over. The other half was fudging the numbers.

I trust your son, because you trust your son. I also trust the profs that teach criminal justice to fudge the numbers. I have a friend who went to jail for two years for robbery. That's what the criminal justice system called what he did, when he pled down after being caught. Who he really was, was a serial robber, a mugger, and a pimp. He pled down, so the numbers say he was a robber. Which numbers do you think they gave your son in school? And why?

Also, Tommy was talking the last 100 years, not the last couple of decades. I do remember the biggest crimes in my small town growing up. It's what priest did to altar boys. (That never made the stats.) It's what husband did when they beat their wives and children. (that never made the stats.) BUT I also remember the first murder in that small town. THAT made the stats, because it happened in the last 20 years. I can point to hundreds of small towns where I used to live or near where I used to live that had no murder, no rape, and no muggings. (Yes, sometimes people pickpocketed, and sometimes they robbed people, but they did NOT do so violently, like they do today.) At least, I could point to them 20 years ago. I can't point to one today that hasn't had something violence since. That's the difference between the 1960's and 1970's, that isn't the same in the 2000's and 2010's.

As for why most rapes aren't reported? To convict a rapist, the target must go into details of what happened on the stand in front of strangers. The law says the charged has the right to face his accuser, so it has to be like that. And what does the target get? The "satisfying" feeling that that rapist is going to jail for a good 14 years. (Back in my day it was 4 months!) Considering only 6 rapists out of every 310 reported get that, do you blame the target?

(I will get back to the rest of what you said in next post.)

 

[Depleted]

i asked my son about the crime rate stuff last night. he's about to graduate with a double degree in criminal justice and accounting (which includes statistics). i trust him; he's reasonable and fair (and only 28! lol).

he said that though too many rapes still go unreported ( ), statistically violent crime rates have been steadily dropping for years. he showed me a few websites which seemed to be better than the one Tommy shared, because they went back farther.

what they show is the violent crime rate drops per capita. so though there were fewer violent crimes 100 years ago, the rate per capita has dropped (world wide, not only in this country) because there are so many more people on the planet than 100 years ago. there are, of course, more violent crimes committed than a century ago, but statisticians consider it differently.

yeah... i understood about half of what he said. (i like words, not math ) yet he made his point. to his mom. not easy to do. lol

as to the OP, i think this--

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. (Eph 6:1)

is what we should be encouraging, whether or not we agree with the person's parenting style. unless they're abusive, natch.
when the children are no longer children (which doesn't come with a chronological number), they'll have to decide what's best. none of our kids went with everything we taught them, and that's good because not everything we taught then was right. that's probably the case with most parents. we do our level best, but we're not always right.

now i'm a little depressed.

I admit that this has now become personal after what happened last night. A mother levied charges on me through her child. (PM me, if you want to know what's happening. I really don't want this to go out in public for reasons you'll understand, if you can figure out how that happened.)

AND, considering a year ago I had to face the fact that obeying my father would kill him and possibly many people around him, is obeying your parents always a good idea? When is it time to honor them by disobeying them?

I get there is a huge difference in that verse between a child and an adult, but when does that change to a more adult version? At what time should kids make up their own minds? Strangely, even before last night, this was my thought when I wrote the OP.

And what roles do the rest of us have?

 

[Depleted]

Well I think all parents and all kids are different. What works for one may not produce the same result with another. My daughter lived at home through her college graduation. She returned home and stayed with us for a few years longer while she went on to trips to Europe and paid down some of her bills.

As a parent I encouraged her to stay and enjoy the low cost of living at home but she wanted to go out and have more personal freedom. I did not resist and she got an apartment of her own. Job instability brought her back and she stayed another year or two with us. She moved back on her own and eventually got married. All that to say she was more than mature enough and did very well on her own. My daughter got a MBA while she was living at home which would have been much more difficult on her own.

All that to say God leads and directs. My daughter had a desire to prove herself by being self supporting and I found it best to let her go at the pace she was comfortable with knowing that we were behind her to support and encourage her. The Lord made it possible and He blessed in the process.

The big danger here is to the parents. Do not attempt to live your life through your children. Do not try to make them perfect by not allowing them to make mistakes. As long as they do not cause bodily injury that leaves life long damage they will be alright. God loves and protects our children in ways we cannot. We teach them to trust God but we must follow our own advice.

For the cause of Christ
Roger

After college, I had no job. Dad assumed I would come home, continue to take care of my younger brother and the house. I would not. I would not because I know me. Had I gone home, I would have stayed home. It is comfortable. I would not have to be responsible yet. I may never need to be responsible. And I surely wish I could have explained that to Dad in a way he'd understand. 40 years later, and even with dementia, he plays the same tune, "but you could have come back home."

I admire you for letting your daughter take wings at her speed. I admire you for knowing when to hold on and knowing when to let go. That is my fear here, that some may hold on too long.

And, I really don't know if that's what's going on, because I did not come from a Christian family. I came from an Irish Catholic family. (Mom wasn't Irish nor Catholic, but she so wanted to be Catholic for so long, she worked at becoming both -- Irish and Catholic. lol)

 

[notmyown]

I admit that this has now become personal after what happened last night. A mother levied charges on me through her child. (PM me, if you want to know what's happening. I really don't want this to go out in public for reasons you'll understand, if you can figure out how that happened.)

AND, considering a year ago I had to face the fact that obeying my father would kill him and possibly many people around him, is obeying your parents always a good idea? When is it time to honor them by disobeying them?

I get there is a huge difference in that verse between a child and an adult, but when does that change to a more adult version? At what time should kids make up their own minds? Strangely, even before last night, this was my thought when I wrote the OP.

And what roles do the rest of us have?

yeah, i don't know! (shocker)

it varies so much from person to person as to when they're able to think and live as an adult.
you're right, sometimes it takes actually doing it....

so i don't know.

i think, though, that here in this site, where we don't see the daily interactions and how the young person does day to day, our best course is support them without contradicting what their parents say.

maybe because i would have been unhappy if some random internet stranger started telling my 17 yo not to do what Mark and i say? (unhappy being translated as truly peeved. )

 

[Depleted]

I admit that this has now become personal after what happened last night. A mother levied charges on me through her child. (PM me, if you want to know what's happening. I really don't want this to go out in public for reasons you'll understand, if you can figure out how that happened.)

AND, considering a year ago I had to face the fact that obeying my father would kill him and possibly many people around him, is obeying your parents always a good idea? When is it time to honor them by disobeying them?

I get there is a huge difference in that verse between a child and an adult, but when does that change to a more adult version? At what time should kids make up their own minds? Strangely, even before last night, this was my thought when I wrote the OP.

And what roles do the rest of us have?

And I just figured out "levied" wasn't the best choice of words there. What happened wasn't that bad. (I don't want anyone thinking this is a big scandal. This wouldn't even make the weekly paper in a town of 100 people in dire need of the latest scoop. lol)

 

[Depleted]

yeah, i don't know! (shocker)

it varies so much from person to person as to when they're able to think and live as an adult.
you're right, sometimes it takes actually doing it....

so i don't know.

i think, though, that here in this site, where we don't see the daily interactions and how the young person does day to day, our best course is support them without contradicting what their parents say.

maybe because i would have been unhappy if some random internet stranger started telling my 17 yo not to do what Mark and i say? (unhappy being translated as truly peeved. )

Kind of how I lean, but if I knew, I wouldn't have asked.