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Comment by throwaway_prnts | Hacker News Reader

I don't have any opinion on sleep training, but you've been downvoted a lot here and I would just like to make an observation that I don't think has been stated explicitly so far.

IMO, you are coming across as someone who views themselves as morally superior and so feels entitled to try to control others via shaming them. This is probably not who you are in real life. But IMO this is the major reason why you have been so consistently downvoted in this thread, it is not mere disagreement on the sleep issue. Even if the evidence is easy to Google, linking to it and basing your argument on that would have gone a lot farther.

If you are sincere about taking the hard road (which I have no reason to doubt), I would do some self reflection about why your communication style has not been effective here.

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If people feel shame, it’s probably because they have some ambiguous feelings on the matter. No one can force someone else to feel shame, especially not through an internet comment. People like you are trying to shame me for the posts I made, but I don’t think I did anything wrong, so it doesn’t bother me in the slightest. Maybe I could have been a bit nicer and more sensitive, but it’s not like I was throwing out insults—just clearly stating my beliefs on a touchy subject.

I definitely don’t see myself as morally superior as a person—far from it. But on this topic, yes: I believe that there are some things people do, like sleep training or putting their career ahead of their kids, that are morally wrong and psychologically damaging. That’s why I’m taking the time to post.

I don’t view downvotes as any indication of comment quality on controversial issues. They generally just reflect the tribal belief breakdown of the community. And anyway, I got as many upvotes as downvotes across all my comments itt—probably like 100 of each based on the swings up and down I saw (no way to know for sure). So it appears HN, or the portion with any opinion on these matters, is more or less evenly divided.

> I don’t think I did anything wrong

> it’s not like I was throwing out insults

> I don’t view downvotes as any indication of comment quality

I am not saying you are being downvoted because people feel shame, I said you are downvoted because you are shaming them. You are accusing others of knowingly harming their kids, because they don't care about them as much as you do.

I don't think this is fundamentally different from an insult in its role in a conversation, and in fact most people would find this incredibly insulting. Insults and shaming/humiliation are attempts to change people's behavior by punishing them or threatening to, but they don't work for convincing them of the correctness of your position. If you are in a position of power over someone you can control their behavior with threats while they still feel you are in the wrong, but of course if it's too often you may end up resented tremendously.

In this conversation you seem to be presupposing that deep down, most people view you as correct already and so don't need to be persuaded, only shamed into the right direction. I think in most things in life this is a risky assumption.

Your argument seems to be that questioning the morality of anything an otherwise well-meaning person does and might be sensitive about is “shaming” and “insulting” and an attempt to “control” the person. That strikes me as very opposed to the principles of free speech and open debate.

You’re the one that keeps using the word “shame”. That was not my purpose. I responded to the implication that there can be no good or bad parenting practices as long as one parents with love. I think that is wrong, and dangerously so. In the past, similar arguments were used to justify physical abuse.

Sleep training is very difficult for most people to do emotionally. There is a natural visceral reaction against it, and feelings of guilt are ubiquitous. That’s my basis for thinking that people already have a feeling it’s wrong, not intellectual arrogance.

I don’t think people end up doing these things because they “don’t care” about their kids—again, those are your words, not mine. It’s more likely that they are being misled and/or suppressing uncomfortable feelings. They might be going along with what a partner wants to do or emulating other parents they know. Or maybe they’ve never been presented with a clear argument against it. There are a million potential reasons.

I guess when you say things like this:

> I certainly have more respect for someone who does sleep training because they think it's best for the child, rather than for themselves. Of course, everyone will say that's why they're doing it

> I also think the reason people don't dig deeper is that they, perhaps unconsciously, would rather not discover something that is uncomfortable and inconvenient for them

> I just hope they won't do something that they know is worse for the kid because it's easier for them. In my opinion, sleep training generally falls in this category.

> People do it because they're exasperated and neither parent is willing to do something hard

> They generally don't do it because they genuinely believe it's best for the baby

> If your parenting philosophy is not based on any research or learning about what's best for your child, but instead on what's easiest and most convenient for you

> our self-absorbed approach to parenting

> because you might reach conclusions that conflict with a self-serving parenting philosophy is just another excuse.

it makes it seem like you are attacking the character of those that disagree with you.

> Your argument seems to be that questioning the morality of anything an otherwise well-meaning person does and might be sensitive about is “shaming” and “insulting” and an attempt to “control” the person. That strikes me as very opposed to the principles of free speech and open debate.

I am saying there is a difference between casting aspersions about the character of people who disagree with you, and trying persuade them that your position is correct. I see you added a link recently for some of the evidence that you found convincing. If the purpose of you posting here was to change peoples minds, that probably would have been more effective.

And no, I don't think ad hominem attacks are the same as free speech and open debate. And I don't think resorting to them so easily instead of other types of argument is a small thing either.

I don’t think those statements apply to e.g. everyone who uses sleep training, and I never said they did. But I know of parents who all those statements would apply to. It’s currently quite socially acceptable to prioritize your own ego, ambition, and indulgence over a child’s wellbeing, and plenty of people take advantage. Attitudes like GP that I first replied to are part of why these people feel justified.

None of those statements are “ad hominem attacks”. I’m not sure where you’re getting that from. I’m arguing against specific practices, attitudes, and beliefs. You’re attempting to tone police, which is much closer to an ad hominem argument than anything I’ve said, in that you are objecting to style instead of substance.

An ad hominem attack is when you attack someone's character, instead of their ideas or behavior. If you criticize sleep training because it is bad for the child and explain why, that is ordinary criticism and argument. If you insinuate that people who do sleep training do not care about their children, that is ad hominem.

To use another example: if I explained your behavior in this thread by claiming that you are a narcissist who holds yourself above others and so feels they have the right to (verbally) punish others, has trouble seeing any personal faults, and easily sees character flaws in others, that would be an ad-hominem. I have not done that, because I don't know you and your motivations, it wouldn't be constructive, and most people aren't narcissists. But similarly, most people care about their children, and arguing that they disagree with you because they don't care enough is not constructive.

That’s not what an ad hominem is. An ad hominem means attacking the person making the argument instead of addressing the substance of the argument. If the argument involves issues that might reflect on a person’s character, it is not an ad hominem to discuss those issues.

It’s kind of funny, because ad hominem is exactly what you yourself are doing. You aren’t objecting to the substance of any of my points—you’re just complaining that I wasn’t considerate enough of everyone’s feelings in my delivery and that it makes me a jerk. Even a narcissistic jerk apparently—pulling out the big guns!

I also never said that people who do sleep training “don’t care about their children” and it’s rather dishonest for you to keep repeating it. I think there is often a self-absorption issue which is encouraged by our culture, but it’s not the same thing.

The fact that you think GP called you narcissistic or a jerk really explains why it's futile to argue with you. You seem to have misread everything about the post you're responding to, including the complete agreement on what an ad hominem is.

One thing to note about your argumentation style here is that you didn't merely question their morality. You assumed that deep-down, they actually agree with you but were acting immorally anyway, and you continued from there. The news flash is that no, people don't believe that what they are doing is wrong. The fact that they find it painful does not mean that they know deep down it's wrong, as you erroneously claim. Doing the right thing can just be painful sometimes.

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