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Author Topic: Child harnesses/Child leashes  (Read 16748 times)

Heron TSG

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #150 on: July 19, 2011, 09:50:04 pm »

My parents nipped that in the bud by teaching me about the failing economy, the job market, and my personal responsibility to become educated before I was five.  I never ask for anything but books and school supplies.

=/
Huh. This is eerily similar to what I do. If I want something just to play with, that I don't really need, I foot the bill myself. I don't even ask.
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Vector

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #151 on: July 19, 2011, 09:54:36 pm »

I don't even buy stuff, usually.  My grandparents sent me checks for Christmas and my birthday when I was a little kid, and the money went straight into my college account.  Didn't get an allowance until I was in late middle school.  $1 per week.  Never spent any of it.  A few years later, it was bumped up to $2/week.  I... still didn't spend any of it.  Never went up again.  Hell, I don't think I've even spent any of the money I made from my tutoring job.

Parents never did any of the "money for chores" things, either, hehe.  They told me that it wasn't reasonable and I could work for free.
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freeformschooler

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #152 on: July 19, 2011, 09:58:17 pm »

Oh yeah I should clarify: this was a game my bro was going to buy himself.

After a certain point in our lives, both me and him started buying most non-essential things ourselves. I make money fixing computers and doing subcontractor work for my mom's homeschool website business, he makes money through hard, sweaty labor for various people. There's usually a way to make money when your family is not dirt poor.

I am not sure why some people in their late teens or later still can get their parents to buy them anything they want.
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SalmonGod

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #153 on: July 19, 2011, 10:13:01 pm »

If a kid absolutely will not let up about wanting to touch a hot stove, let him get burned.

Terrible example.  Put their hand close to the stove.  They'll feel the heat (perhaps a little pain) and understand.  Healthy guided learning experience.

The real problems are with things like running into traffic, sticking things in electrical outlets, messing with chemicals, garbage disposals, diet, etc.  These are situations where you can't just let them learn the consequence on their own.  Until they are older and can understand that these things have terrible consequences, their fear of the consequences that you will enact if they don't give up will have to do.

What was she supposed to do? Remain firm and unmoving? She'd gone back and looked over the game many times. She had a life to get on with. My mom is one of the most firm and consist people I know, and she eventually deemed it, after a total of two months, not worth it to keep him from having this game. So she let him get it.

Really, I don't think just adding more punishment would have stopped my brother. He is the absolute, bar none, most determined person I know when he wants things his way.

Not the same as the kind of stuff I'm talking about.  An M-Rated video game isn't exactly a serious health issue.  (Edit:  You already nailed the one serious consequence -- allowing him to believe that was a way for him to get anything he wanted.)

With Hiro, I've had to forcibly hold him in a corner in public for as much as half an hour for time-out punishment for trying to run away from us in downtown Indianapolis right next to a busy road where no one would see him coming from between two parked cars.  At home, I've had to physically hold him for a couple hours at a time, while he kicks and screams, to prevent him from getting into expensive or harmful things. 

He also learned to induce vomiting on himself before he was even two years old.  He wasn't even talking yet.  He'd learned that he could do this to get a major reaction from people and sometimes get what he wanted, or have them distracted with cleaning up the mess.  It never worked on me, but it worked on other people.  I shouldn't need to explain how serious this could get if allowed to continue for too long.  He tried this on me one night when I had some time to kill.... I put him in an empty playpen and guarded it so he couldn't escape.  I told him to go at it.  Puke all he wanted.  He did.  He probably threw up 20 times, before he realized the situation he was in.  The bottom of the playpen was so thoroughly coated in slippery vomit that he could barely stand up.  I made him stay in there, covered head to toe in the former contents of his stomach, for two hours.  He never tried that tactic with anyone again.

Then there's his diet.  He doesn't like anything but meat and sugar.  Given the choice, he would never eat anything but chicken nuggets and candy.  Obviously, we can't allow him to do that.  However, he has a very very power bargaining chip... his diabetes.  It's not like we can shove decent food down his throat.  It's hard to sneak healthy stuff in, because he will outright refuse anything where the ingredients aren't obviously identified.  With any other kid, I would just let him starve, and he will eventually get hungry enough to eat whatever we give him.  If we try to do this with Hiro, his blood sugar will drop.  He'll have a seizure and die.  So we just have to threaten the ever-loving hell out of him.  It's the only thing we can do.  Convincing him to take his shots or synthroid pills can sometimes get pretty serious, too.

He's calmed down a lot, thankfully.  Epic battles aren't quite so common with him these days.  The only major fights anymore are about his diet.
« Last Edit: July 19, 2011, 10:14:59 pm by SalmonGod »
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Vector

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #154 on: July 19, 2011, 10:21:29 pm »

. . . Yeah, I think I'm staying with the "not having kids" option.  Jesus.

I know very well now that I'm just too short-tempered to raise anyone.  Unless my kid were like me and terrified of the idea of disobedience--just as a break with the rules governing the universe--I don't think I'd have any idea as to what to do.
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Blargityblarg

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #155 on: July 19, 2011, 11:28:13 pm »

I don't like them because I don't like physical restraint for children. I'm not completely sure about it, though, because for me, anything at the end of a leach should be a dog and that that's "only" the mental image that come from the situation I know. If leach for kid have been around when I was a kid, maybe I'd think differently.

Don't like it but I'm not definitive about it.

Putting leaches on children is definitely medieval and, if you do it, there will be blood lost!

Those are leeches, Starver.
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kaijyuu

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #156 on: July 19, 2011, 11:32:06 pm »

If a kid absolutely will not let up about wanting to touch a hot stove, let him get burned.

Terrible example.  Put their hand close to the stove.  They'll feel the heat (perhaps a little pain) and understand.  Healthy guided learning experience.

The real problems are with things like running into traffic, sticking things in electrical outlets, messing with chemicals, garbage disposals, diet, etc.  These are situations where you can't just let them learn the consequence on their own.  Until they are older and can understand that these things have terrible consequences, their fear of the consequences that you will enact if they don't give up will have to do.
Yeah I pretty much agree with you. I just used the hot stove example since that's what I usually hear as an example of kids wanting to do stupid things.

It's just that IMO, fear of punishment should be a last resort to get a kid to do or not do something. Diplomacy first, feeling the natural consequences second (if reasonable), physical restraint third (like the leashes this topic was originally about), threats last. How often one has to resort to threats depends on the kid, but all too many parents are quick to jump to threatening since it's more convenient to just yell.

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What was she supposed to do? Remain firm and unmoving? She'd gone back and looked over the game many times. She had a life to get on with. My mom is one of the most firm and consist people I know, and she eventually deemed it, after a total of two months, not worth it to keep him from having this game. So she let him get it.

Really, I don't think just adding more punishment would have stopped my brother. He is the absolute, bar none, most determined person I know when he wants things his way.

Not the same as the kind of stuff I'm talking about.  An M-Rated video game isn't exactly a serious health issue.  (Edit:  You already nailed the one serious consequence -- allowing him to believe that was a way for him to get anything he wanted.)
How would you suggest he of challenged the rule? I think we can all agree that since the guy was buying the game himself, and he's likely mature enough to separate reality from fiction, than the rule wasn't necessary. Grin and bear it is hardly reasonable, and playing it behind his mother's back would just make things worse.


Much of my teenage angst was fighting against my parent's stupid rules. Eventually everything was settled through LONG debates until one of us was convinced of the other's opinion. Took a few years but my parents finally realized "because I know best" isn't a convincing reason for why a rule exists, and when they opened up, listened to my reasons, and actually gave theirs, things got a lot better.

A proper avenue needs to exist to resolve these sorts of things, and what that avenue entails depends on the child and the parent. I honestly can't say what should have been done with freeform's brother, or any other kid/parent. What worked in my situation, though, was diplomacy.
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SalmonGod

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #157 on: July 20, 2011, 12:02:46 am »

It's just that IMO, fear of punishment should be a last resort to get a kid to do or not do something.

I totally agree, and have had some passionate debates with disciplinarians on this issue.  Many parents have the "I hit them and they didn't do it again, so obviously the problem is solved" mentality, which is absolutely wrong.  I don't even hit unless I need a quick solution, and never with the intent of causing harm, though I'll admit I've been pushed to my limits and been harsher than I liked on occassion.

How would you suggest he of challenged the rule? I think we can all agree that since the guy was buying the game himself, and he's likely mature enough to separate reality from fiction, than the rule wasn't necessary. Grin and bear it is hardly reasonable, and playing it behind his mother's back would just make things worse.

Much of my teenage angst was fighting against my parent's stupid rules. Eventually everything was settled through LONG debates until one of us was convinced of the other's opinion. Took a few years but my parents finally realized "because I know best" isn't a convincing reason for why a rule exists, and when they opened up, listened to my reasons, and actually gave theirs, things got a lot better.

A proper avenue needs to exist to resolve these sorts of things, and what that avenue entails depends on the child and the parent. I honestly can't say what should have been done with freeform's brother, or any other kid/parent. What worked in my situation, though, was diplomacy.

Yeah, I have always had a great relationship with my parents.  I've only ever had two major disagreements with them. 

1.  The way they raised my sister
2.  The internet

I gave up on #1 when it started creating a serious divide between me and my parents.  Behold.  My sister is impregnated at 16 by an epic jerk who has since been deported to Honduras, and all the petty, shallow socialites that they taught her to surround herself with are preying on her misfortune.

I never gave up on #2 and I'm glad.  My parents got internet to our house when I was 13 -- at a time when I was so desperately lonely and socially dysfunctional that I was starting to hang around people that were going to ruin my life.  Those people are all in jail now.  Then I started playing games online and making friends on IRC, and it helped me pull myself back together.  I firmly believe that the internet saved my life.  My parents, however, only saw my grades dropping and me spending the majority of my time in games and chatrooms.  When they started fighting with me about it, I would intentionally bomb my grades, sneak on in the middle of the night, and project my misery onto everyone.  After a couple years of back and forth on the issue, they gave up.

So I guess my point is, sometimes kids are right.  Parents need to be able to recognize when they're wrong.  Age matters here too, though.  I really don't see any reason to be strict with a person when they have the ability to think for themselves.  My parents allowed me tons and tons of freedom.  The internet is the only thing they ever tried to restrict.  I turned out more responsible than most people I know.  When my kids start getting near their teens, I can't see myself controlling too much about their lives, unless they're getting themselves into really dangerous situations.  We don't even censor our kids from anything besides hardcore porn (same way I was raised). 

I'm really against strict parenting for any other reason than necessary protections.
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In the land of twilight, under the moon
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As the end will come so soon
In the land of twilight

Maybe people should love for the sake of loving, and not with all of these optimization conditions.

Starver

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #158 on: July 20, 2011, 01:49:08 am »

Those are leeches, Starver.

Yes, but the throwaway comment with its mental jump of imagery didn't work if I didn't maintain the same spelling (albeit now being a new 'error').  It also thought it could be considered an attempt to pre-emptively feed the Pedant's Curse, and one which I believe worked wonderfully.
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Mindmaker

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #159 on: July 20, 2011, 02:06:04 am »

. . . Yeah, I think I'm staying with the "not having kids" option.  Jesus.

I know very well now that I'm just too short-tempered to raise anyone.  Unless my kid were like me and terrified of the idea of disobedience--just as a break with the rules governing the universe--I don't think I'd have any idea as to what to do.
You're always saying that like raising a kid was a job for one person alone.
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sonerohi

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #160 on: July 20, 2011, 02:13:10 am »

It's not when the parents both want kids and will play off each others strengths to make an awesome Parent-Team. However, when one parent doesn't want kids, it makes Parent-Team very ineffective.
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shadenight123

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #161 on: July 20, 2011, 03:17:42 am »

sheesh. reading all of this is making me sad and worried about the rest of the world.
looking back i'm starting to think my childhood was quite nice.
I can count on the number of my right hand the times i was ever slapped.
And it's three.
The first for walking twice in a fountain in february when i was 3 or 4.
the second when i adamantly refused something which i can't recall.
The third was for "saying to many no". at something. i was taking it as a joke, my mother thought it was a "snobbish" way of answering.

my father never even touched us. Never. But he was as scary as hell. Just the hypothesis of HIM getting angry was enough. More than enough. He would at the maximum raise his voice, just a little.

Point is, i didn't grew up an evil punk-bastard serial killer because i was never hit, or because i was hit, and i feared punishment.
i never go to disco, i hate it as a place, it's too noisy. And i'm not an alcoholic. And i'm not a jerk who answers in a bad way. YOu don't have to tell me things twice for me to answer them.
i might be a little lazy, seeing how my father enjoyed taking afternoon naps and then work at night, since he worked from home.
But that's about it.
Furthermore, the thing of "parent-teams" is quite over-rated, my mother was there for the 98% of times for me and my brother, my father just for the 2%, but that 2% was worth far more than all the 98% percents of mothers.
Because with my mother, you couldn't do things Because YOU HAD NOT TO.
With my father, it was more of the "what do you think will happen if you do it?" "try it" "go ahead, i'll call the ambulance" it was enough. Far more than enough.

i can even relate to kaijyuu situation, since after all i do have a brother who tried it.
It just took him a couple of days usually.
He did something bad, he got grounded, he moaned he wanted to go to the pc, my mother by the night/next day had already forgiven him.
And i did think it was unfair, though whenever my elevn years old self pointed it out, my mother didn't even answer. Sheesh, i was smarter than all of them put together.
"he's going to end up thinking everything is due to him" *i said
"whatever, he did enough let him go" *mother
"i warned you" *myself.
*going into the future*
"how could you fail miserably at the last year of high school?!"*mother to my brother
"i thought they'd let me pass!" * my brother.
"better if i keep quiet on this thing here" * myself, closing the door of my room. Smiling the hell out of me for having known this would have happened.

The fact is, in a vast majority of cases, parents should listen to their childrens, sheesh, just because you're 23 to 40 years old it doesn't mean your always right and your children is always wrong. Especially if you have two or more Usually listening to the smart one of them helps you prevent certain things.
obviously you must come to understand who's smart and who's not.
Another smart case was the following:
"should we look at dragonball?" "yes" "can we look at the simpson?" "no they are ineducative".
i kept silent. truthfully speaking, between a fighter-anime where people get killed every tot episodes, and the simpsons which is more humour than anything else...and where rarely you can recreate the same situations...and which also has some sort of family morality in it...
But still, after my "genius" brother decided to try a kamehameha throwing himself down from the bed and ending face-front against the floor, no more dragonball.
And yet no simpsons.
i had seventeen years when they gave me the "ok" to watch the simpsons.

i think that growing a child or more is a thing of compromises. You make compromises when you marry, you must make them when you get to have childrens.
there are things you can do and things you can no longer do.
If you have a two years old, you don't bring him to the restaurant when you want.
You bring him to your grandmother house, where you can tell him how to do things.
Or to your cousins house, or somewhere else where you can teach them.
Only afterwards you bring them to a restaurant.
Same for other things. You can at least give them the theory part Before bringing them somewhere.
"in a cinema you must not yell, cry, or make noises." said an hour before, and repeated for an hour, is better than going to the cinema, sitting down, and then saying
"FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STOP CRYING!"

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Maggarg - Eater of chicke

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #162 on: July 20, 2011, 08:25:20 am »

My dad worked away too much for Parent-Team, but he made up for it by doing all that traditional dad stuff. My mum's an unbearable control freak with serious issues to do with other people's privacy and independence, but she's a primary school teacher and a devout Catholic so I guess I'll let her off for that.

I generally did what all good children do and did a lot of the stuff they told me not to, and got off fairly light because they remembered when they did that. That's why there's a dead tree with a ruined tree-house (read: wooden pallet and planks.) and a patch where nothing grows (home-made explosives woo). Big scorch marks on the paving in the back garden where we once made a large furnace thing from old slabs and clay to try and melt copper pipes - didn't get hot enough though :<.
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Gamerlord

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #163 on: July 20, 2011, 08:58:47 am »

My dad worked away too much for Parent-Team, but he made up for it by doing all that traditional dad stuff. My mum's an unbearable control freak with serious issues to do with other people's privacy and independence, but she's a primary school teacher and a devout Catholic so I guess I'll let her off for that.

Lucky. My dad works a lot, and he doesn't do any of the 'traditional dad stuff'. And my mum has no excuse for the level of control over the lives of my sister and I that she demands.

RedKing

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Re: Child harnesses/Child leashes
« Reply #164 on: July 20, 2011, 11:12:38 am »

I think my wife and I make a pretty good Team Parent. (Wonder Parent powers, Activate! Shape of...a border collie! Form of...a badly-needed bath!)

But yeah, it can be maddening, especially before the age of 5 or so, because logic simply doesn't work. And you want to avoid scare tactics and bribery. So sometimes, as much as I hate it, the answer to "Buy whyyyyyyyy?" is in fact "Because I said so." End of discussion. If you try to explain the underlying reasoning, they're not likely to get it or even listen. My daughter will turn 5 in November and she's starting to get it. She understands that if a stranger comes up and tries to lead her away or puts their hands on her and we're not right there next to her saying its OK, that she's going to yell "I don't know you!" and try to find us or a grown-up that she knows or a policeperson. She doesn't need to comprehend the full range of horrific outcomes that a stranger could present, just that "Strangers are OK. But they shouldn't be touching you or taking you anywhere unless we say it's OK."

Fact is, it's a Crapsack World out there, and it's a damned difficult thing to arm your child against that while simultaneously trying not to traumatize their growing minds and scare them into a shell. So yeah, the harness can be a tool in that, if used properly.
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