• petrol_sniff_king@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    1 month ago

    I’ve been around enough to know they respect sometimes not being treated like children.

    I’m not saying that a child who’s not ready for something should be forced to deal with it. The role of a parent is to be a safety net they can run back to every time the world gets a little too scary—literally, there are studies about this. But for a child that is ready, who wants to know, what I mean to find out is why you would reject them.

    I don’t want to explain concpets that most actual adults cant understand, or even discuss in a mature way, to a child.

    See, the worry I have is that things like this are the reason those adults don’t understand it. In some respects, these adults are still children because they were never given the opportunity to learn.

    And it’s not like it can’t be useful to them. The fact that people can be abused, like certain aspects of it, then hate themselves for liking any part of it—I mean, I can think of a few “left alone with uncle” situations that really ring true here. If they can’t understand what they themselves are going through, I really don’t know what hope they have.

    Just to reiterate, I’m not saying we should gather up every 4-year-old and show them a snuff film. What I am saying is that, to some degree, growing up is a self-directed process, and when somebody is ready to tackle something, they should at least be given the chance to experiment with those ideas. Even for adults: only as much as they can handle, and a warm, comfortable room when they can’t anymore.