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Comment by Forgeties79 | Hacker News Reader

Children cannot fully understand what is happening to them for many, many years. This goes so far beyond planes. They don’t understand why they got jerked forward when you slammed the brakes on a car, or why the buckle burned their arm on a hot summer day. They don’t understand why they get a shot at the doctor, they don’t understand why the stove is hot, they don’t understand any of this crap until they get older and are exposed. The problem is that in order to avoid these situations, the only viable solution is to ask every parent to live in a lockdown-lite mode for 3 to 4 years every single time they have a kid. Is that reasonable?

Parents have lives and families and obligations. Kids are along for the ride until they can exert their own autonomy. That’s how it has always been and that’s how it will continue to be.

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its not reasonable because the only way kids or anyone learns these things is by experiencing them. and the earlier you expose them to these situations the better they cope and eventually understand.

its not like magically one day they are old enough to just "get it" by being explained. when was the last time you really understood something only conceptually without any kind of experience with it. its the jobs of parents and society* to safely expose our kids to the situations that they need to experience to learn how to function on their own.

Like to use the airplane example its not like parents just do it for fun and also every parent does stuff to try and give their kid the best ability to cope with the pressure change. snacks, pacifiers, timing flights around naps. its not like they are just like "eh, suck it up kiddo".

*there is a much longer diatribe about how even if you don't have kids or hate kids or never want to be in 100 ft of a kid its still your responsibility to society/biology to help make sure the next generation is raised. And maybe you could fulfill that responsibility at the literal bare minimum by managing to have a little compassion and understanding and not rag on parents who are (even by choice) doing something really hard with their kids. (flying)

> Parents have lives and families and obligations. Kids are along for the ride until they can exert their own autonomy. That’s how it has always been and that’s how it will continue to be.

It's giving: "people want to have kids but also still want to do all that fun stuff they did but now with a kid because whatever, the kid will deal with it".

Alternatively, keeping kids locked up at home for the first 3-4 years limits their exposure to a variety of situations that help their brains and bodies develop. Then the next generation has a terrible immune system, no social skills, and are underdeveloped mentally.

In fairness, I _do_ agree that there are some things that need to be given up as a parent of young kids... Don't take your kids to a fine restaurant. But at the same time, I don't think children should be excluded from 95% of things because it inconveniences someone else. If it were about preventing people from inconveniencing others, then I think there's a strong argument that it's more than just kids that shouldn't be allowed to do the "fun stuff".

I recognize that this is not an appropriate comment for HN and I'll accept the deserved downvotes for it, but: Dude, you suck.

That’s not even remotely what we’re talking about.

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