Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: child raising brochure clarification

[Diana Carroll (dianaecarroll]

Again, I bet those parents wouldn't describe it that way. It is snarky
language. I'm 100% sure there are two sides to the story, and the one with
these words is a very biased retelling.

On Wed, Apr 7, 2021 at 4:50 PM Sharon Villines via Cohousing-L <
cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:

> > On Apr 6, 2021, at 3:19 PM, Diana Carroll <dianaecarroll [at] gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > "2 households left (in part) from feeling like other parents were not
> supervising their children” and "they didn't like others in the community
> pointing out the destruction their children were doing"
> >
> > This is very judgemental language and I'm betting those families would
> > use *very *different words to describe what went on. Sure,
>
> Why is it judgmental? It’s stated as a description of what happened—it may
> be wrong but it isn’t making value judgements.
>
> I’ve been surprised at how unwilling parents are to correct behavior that
> is not okay with other parents who don’t want their children to imitate it
> — jumping and climbing on furniture in the living room, for example.
> Running and yelling through dinner. Playing with the foam bullet guns in
> the common house and where young children are playing.
>
> Some parents think children should be allowed to make noise because
> children “need" to do it. It is an expression of their inner being. And the
> parents have a liberating parenting style that will produce free and happy
> adults.
>
> These are isolated instances and other parents and adults do step in and
> discuss the problem, how others feel about what is happening. And many
> children listen to other adults, not just their parents. They get the
> message that it may be okay to jump on furniture at home but not in the CH.
>
> In general we have a culture that discourages doing things that other
> people find disturbing, but I can think of only one household that may have
> moved because of expectations of children. I think they misunderstood when
> we said that behavior in the common house affects everyone and everyone
> should be involved in determining what is acceptable. Their child was too
> young to have done anything objectionable.
>
> We’ve had teens with serious acting out issues that everyone has worked
> through with the parents and the children came out the other end as good
> community members.
>
> One advantage of children is that they outgrow it. Just at the point that
> you begin thinking this has to stop, they got into the next phase.
>
> Sharon
> ----
> Sharon Villines
> Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
> http://www.takomavillage.org
>
>
>
>
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