For probably a good reason, I can’t post new comments to YT, but can reply. This dear diary response comment is to a video “Stop LYING to your CHILDREN!” by Topless Cat Lady on YT.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a723OUPoU78
Dear diary,
Children are sponges, things you aren’t conscious of they are absorbing as vouched for behaviour. With young kids development so fast and brain activity superior to adults in their early years, respecting children in this way, makes it easy to give them the respect they deserve, that includes tactful honesty. You can’t do that by saying one thing, and doing another. A majority of human communication is without spoken word. So realising that my whole existence is a blueprint my kids are going to be imprinted by, living the change you want for them is the only way.
That includes personal development to address emotional and relationship issues of myself going back to my parents, their parents, and how cultures society and immigration have meant nothing is one multi-generational simple village farm society anymore. So with a better understanding of myself, shared with my wife, inspiring her to do the same (not telling her, again leading by being the change I want in myself, and having others see the good and choose it themselves). We’re on the same page as aspiring vegans. I started 8 weeks initially very strict (whole foods fruit/veg except cooked potatoe/rice, fruit/veg, no wheat, no caffeine, no alcohol) to prove to myself I can break life-long habits. I didn’t ask to be cooked for or catered for, I said it’s not hard (it’s easier than cooking!) to load up fruit and veg and eat raw. I got my mungbean sprouts going again, ate selectively from family dinners. Soon enough my wife cared to cater for me, family meat consumption decreased, I pacifistly responded to kid’s queries on why I don’t drink coffee, and put the questions back to them gently about why I don’t need to eat meat, dairy and egg, if I have enough yummy ripe fruit and crunchy fresh vegetables.
At our first parent/teacher meeting, when discussing behaviour, asked what we want for our daughter, the pre-primary school teacher responded you can’t teach empathy, her son is nearly 30 and hasn’t learnt it yet. I guess I fundamentally disagreed and had her own example supporting me. I agree you can’t “teach” it, but enabling kids to “learn” it, or at least framing what they know into a pattern of empathy, and seeing how organised empathy is effectively a lovely society without wasting time and energy in constant conflict.
So without preaching, my 5yo I’ve now heard talk to some of her friends it seems who also no longer eat ham sandwiches, because that comes from pigs that have to die, chicken comes from the birds, and so-on that are living and if we don’t need to eat them, they don’t have to die. We’ve committed to pets already before aspiring veganism, the kids even just went to the zoo with their grandparents, so the un-natural enslavement is something to subtley address. From the bad traditions, I can still use it to prompt their empathy, speak of natural wild healthy social animal behaviour versus captivity/pet confined version, and how their actions affect the animals. When they see the problems, it will be from their own ideas and questions, not preached to them. I guess I’m wanting them to find intrinsic motivation to do good that is self rewarding for them, rather than a short lived extrinsic motivation because of a reward system for agreeing with what I’ve preached.
By aspiring to be a polite pacifist vegan, I also accept in all this for them to discover empathy by themselves, they may choose otherwise, so I don’t want to set a confined existence of prohibition. When they can sneak independence at adolescence, they are likely to react like an Amish 18yo exploring their sins of the wider world in deciding whether to remain Amish for life. My aim is to be the best I can be as a role model, help them think for themselves, and expect they will be able to go on with a 35 year head start over myself, who is trying to unwind the first half of mainstream modern western life, to now get a proper life home-schooling as an adult for what’s important.(To spell it out, that’s not formal education and specialising in the economy for wealth nor forming relationships to perpetuate the same).
When removing some layers of delusion, beginning to look and assess your life and impacts on others, seeing consumer as a wasteful word rather than something that needs rights and protections to be respected by society, you sit in a life that isn’t really what you’d like, you know it has negative affects on the world, a lifestyle that’s unaffordable, with relationships formed and children raised within its constructs, it’s a fine line from being depressed to keeping healthy enjoyment while gently working to live the change you want.
Sincerely,
An aspiring (aka hypocrite for the haters) polite pacifist vegan.
One Motorcyclist - 1 Motor Cyclist 