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Comment by Maha-pudma | Hacker News Reader

I'd have no issue telling you to mind your own if you tried telling me how to manage my kids.

I think the issue here is the general expectation that you should not be managing your kids during work time, including video meetings during work-from-home. You can be minding the kids, you can be working, you can't do both at the same time.

The "social protocol" expects that if all adults in the household are working then childcare services are a must-have; but as lifestyles and services are disrupted for Covid-related resons, this is becoming unworkable for a large number of families.

Why are people so up their own ass about receiving advice and aide with their kids?

Do you get hostile and reject people helping you with flat tire, when you're lost, chasing down you escaped dog?

Do you jump to the conclusion that the offer is indictment of you're parenting?

Simple. The only people who try to help are people who don’t have children. Everyone is the perfect parent until they have their own children. Then they know to not speak as they understand that children are different and what worked for their kids may not work for others.

If you were at a gas station washing your car windows, you'd probably be annoyed if some guy drove up and started giving unsolicited judgmental advice about your tires.

If you were at the park playing fetch with your dog, you'd probably be annoyed if someone started giving you unsolicited judgmental advice about dog grooming.

Would you like it if I saw some code you were writing over your shoulder and I started correcting you and giving you advice on how you should be coding it differently? Maybe, but more likely you would feel defensive depending on my tone and/or how you interpreted my tone.

There's a whole paradigm that centers around exactly this. It is called pair programming. It is quite popular.

Indeed, and believe it or not, it is quite popular for 2 people to co-operatively raise kids as well. It's called "parenting".

Sarcasm aside, I think the main difference between pair programming and OP's scenario is that usually it's unsolicited advice that is unwelcome. Pair programming is usually consensual.

You can’t provide advice until you have a full picture of the situation.

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