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Don't Dismiss The Village by phoenixwren

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· @phoenixwren ·
$76.42
Don't Dismiss The Village
I just learned a new word today: alloparents.  Alloparents are the other caregivers in a child's life aside from their birth parents.  This can be their grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles, daycare workers, teachers, neighbors, friends of the family, cousins, etc.  [In this article](https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/03/hunt-gather-parent-timeless-advice-for-modern-parents/618172/), it talks about (among other things) how children are traditionally raised by lots of people - "it takes a village," as it were - and it's *really weird* how western/American culture emphasizes the nuclear family to the detriment of everyone.


![mom.jpg](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/phoenixwren/23wMikpS7e25Fft7g6FjJhSsrJ7fA6hS44P2ATth4fC7uViXt4fP2HjsVreckAzkf7XAt.jpg)

When I was a teenager, I was my brother's alloparent.  He was born when I was 13, and immediately I had caretaking duties.  That summer, I was his only caretaker while my parents, sister, and aunt were all out at paying jobs.  I watched his first steps during that time.  When I was in high school, my father had stopped working by that point, so I had to rush home after school to watch my brother because our dad was too drunk by noon to care for himself, let alone an infant.  One time, my brother escaped out the front door, and the family dog went with him, protecting him.  He was already all the way down the alley before our father realized he was outside.  Once, when I was 16 and my brother was 3, my father angrily asked me, "Why when you tell him to pick up his toys, he does it, but when I tell him, he doesn't do it??!"  I calmly told him, "Because he knows that I mean it, but you'll just yell for 20 minutes and then do it yourself."  My father actually agreed with me on that.  He was 51 years old.  I was 16.  But apparently I had better parenting skills.

I do not want biological children.  I do not want my genetic clusterfuck to be passed on.  I can barely take care of myself.  There are a myriad of reasons why I don't want kids.  But I have that experience with my brother, and he's a pretty good egg (when he does something good I tell him, "I raised you right!" LOL).  I feel like it's irresponsible to have kids if you don't really want them; children know when they are wanted (and it sucks to know that you aren't).  So it drives me bonkers when people act like I'm not fulfilling some duty or not fully human if I don't breed.  I have been told things like, "What will you do when you're old?" as if children only exist to care for aging parents, or legit I've been advised that I should make babies because it's supposed to lessen the pain of endometriosis (which I have, yes, I'm a trans guy if you're new here), as if *pain relief* was a justifiable reason to bring another person into the world.  I just.  My head exploded.


![blood fountain.jpg](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/phoenixwren/23wCEE6ZW4L1kgzGH7C1P8MiD7KwfYAmPQBEVskFzBWgruLoMNGa1wwCjjrFwfoCm7WdS.jpg)
*This fountain is an accurate representation of how I feel about menses*

In US culture, people act like if you don't have your own children, *well.*  You don't know *shit* about kids.  You don't know how kids think (um, excuse me, we were all children once?  Did you forget?).  You don't know how to hold a baby.  You don't know how to calm down a crying, screaming temper tantrum.  You don't know what to *do* with them, and therefore you *cannot be trusted* with their perfect little snowballs.  Meanwhile, I've witnessed actual parents of children oblivious to their kids *bolting out into the parking lot in front of oncoming traffic* in the store I worked at (I was the one who chased after the *toddler* and stopped him from getting run over by an SUV and when I found mom later she was *across the store* and didn't seem ruffled when I told her), oblivious again to their kid *climbing the 20 foot high warehouse shelves full of 2x4s* when I worked at Home Depot (again, didn't care when I brought the kid to them, again, across the store), and of course, there's my own dad.  Being the one who spawned the offspring does not automatically imbue you with magical, child rearing wisdom, obviously.  But oh gee my childless ass couldn't *possibly* know better than *the mom who gave her toddler a stainless steel straw at Starbucks and when he hurt himself with it went full Karen and got them recalled*, instead of, you know, not being a fuckwit and giving a toddler a hollow metal pipe to put inside their mouth.  I wasn't there for that one, I only heard the story when I asked the barista about the recall because I saw the sign and owned the straws.

Now, obviously, there are some wonderful parents out there (thank the Gods), and there are some healthy relationships between them and the other people who help take care of their kids in some way or another.  But too often, you see parents treating the alloparents in their kids' lives with disdain (witness how many parents treat *teachers*, for instance, let alone daycare workers).  And we wonder why we're so isolated and alone in our culture.  We're so indoctrinated to be islands of self sufficiency, we don't recognize or appreciate that none of us truly are, no matter how hard we try.  And we embed this in our kids young when we demonstrate to them that only their nuclear family really matters, instead of a sense of community.


![image.png](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/phoenixwren/23z7SJvJG17eFb3wSd7DtxUVbP7pqaRGTrVSmZxenXRX8MUrSut96wWQL4WETNxqezcXv.jpg)
*art by N.o. Bonzo*

It is my humble, childless opinion that parents should *embrace* their kids' alloparents.  It can help the parents not feel so overwhelmed, help the alloparents feel appreciated, and help the kids feel like they have lots of adults they can turn to who care about them (especially if, Goddess forbid, that kid is being abused somewhere; if they feel wholly dependent on their abuser, they're unlikely to go to their auntie or teacher and tell them what's going on, but if they have a whole community of caretakers, they might feel comfortable sharing).  It can foster community, solidarity, and mutual aid.  It can ease loneliness and people can learn from each others' experiences and skills.  In short, it's of benefit to *everyone* when we work together, and appreciate what each of us has to offer.  Not to mention, it helps keeps kids safe.  I'm old enough to remember the days of yore in the long, long ago when all the parents on the block knew all the kids and would keep an eye on us as we played outside.  Nobody called CPS because you were playing outside unsupervised; you had ten adults peeking out their windows every now and again to make sure you were okay and paying attention to how far down the block your shouts were coming from.  We had an elderly lady on our street who lived alone, and us kids regularly paid her visits - beneficial to her *and* the kids.  There was no tragic story about the isolated senior who was found dead two weeks later because nobody knew them; we were her kids and she was our friend.  We chatted in her kitchen and played with her dog and on Halloween, she gave her special kids *full size* candy bars (Halloween gold right there). ;)  It was a community.  And we miss out when we hide behind our privacy fences and overbooked schedules.

It can be difficult to be the one to take the first step, but reach out!  Meet your neighbors.  Offer to get groceries for your disabled neighbor who has to isolate during covid.  Bake your kids' teacher a cake.  Arrange alternating days where you and your kids' friends' parents pick them up from school.  Whatever.  Build the community *now* and not just when you're in a crisis.  Make a support system where everyone helps everyone, and suddenly those bumps in the road of life become a bit more survivable.

And don't give toddlers metal straws. ;)


![bee good.jpg](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/phoenixwren/Eq7Rj8rXwQk8MqdTqk6B1HekztwEXWAFHMHxm4pBnCffNVeUmcPYxTMYtoitWvE95JC.jpg)
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@co2fund ·
Thank you @phoenixwren, for using the CO<sub>2</sub> Compensation Coin (COCO / SWAP.COCO) [on Steem-Engine](https://steem-engine.net/?p=market&t=COCO) or [on Hive-Engine](https://hive-engine.com/?p=market&t=SWAP.COCO) to reduce your CO<sub>2</sub> footprint.  You want to join? Buy some [COCO](https://steem-engine.com/?p=market&t=COCO) / [SWAP.COCO](https://hive-engine.com/?p=market&t=SWAP.COCO) and transfer them to CO2Fund's account @co2fund.
πŸ‘  ,
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@comandoyeya ·
$0.03
Wow es una exelente opcion, todo sea para mejorar, saludos.
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@phoenixwren ·
Β‘Gracias! :)
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@minismallholding ·
>people act like if you don't have your own children, well. You don't know shit about kids. 

If you haven't ***raised*** any children, then you'll never fully comprehend what it is to raise them. They don't need to be your own for you to experience raising children, so it's funny how people think that way. It's a bit like how people seem to think that you can't love an adopted child as much as your own blood child. The idea of never being able to have my own children never really troubled me, but it seems to trouble some. Not that adoption is particularly easy these days.

*Interesting story as an aside. When I had my first child, I got to know another mother with her first about the same age who was a pediatric nurse. She confessed that she used to think she knew all about raising children until she had her own and then realised what mothers meant when they she gave them advice and they'd say "It's not that easy!" I guess working with cistern isn't quite the same as caring for them around the clock.* 

Anyway, thoughts on the village and nuclear family after reading both yours and the linked article is that they shouldn't be mutually exclusive. I can see how we've reached that point, though, with us no longer living in communities and essentially not knowing those around us. Why would you trust someone else with your child if you don't know them? Even school teachers are barely known to parents. If you see them enough to begin to get to know them, then the following year they get a new teacher and you have to start over. I've always been a supporter of having different teachers and role models in my girls lives, but more often they've been the teachers and coaches in their extra curricular activities who we've gotten to know over the years. 

Gone are the days of all the kids playing out and lots of parents watching, because both parents now have to work to make ends meet. I was lucky that for a few years we had a neighbour with a daughter the same age as my youngest and we all used to gather out the front for them to play and us to adults to natter. Since we moved to Australia, though, there have never been other children near where we've lived. Thinking back to my own childhood, we used to play out with the neighbouring children, but only when we lived in council houses. Once my parents were able to buy their first house we were surrounded by older couples either with children who'd left home or who were much older than us.

What concerns me currently about the drive to move away from the nuclear family is the fact that there is no other real support network if we do. The way our society currently is, I feel it would only serve to disconnect us from one another all the more as we'd have no-one we felt we could trust to turn to. The village would have to be provided by government run entities and the problem with that is that even teachers are finding their hands tied by government regulation. With child protection rules in place everywhere, those teachers/coaches are also restricted in the kind of care they can give a child, so it's becoming a more distant and cold kind of village out there. 

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@phoenixwren ·
$0.10
>> Thinking back to my own childhood, we used to play out with the neighbouring children, but only when we lived in council houses. Once my parents were able to buy their first house we were surrounded by older couples either with children who'd left home or who were much older than us.

This is regional here, too.  In New Jersey is where I played with my friends on the block (btw, my parents both worked most of that time; I was a latchkey kid), but when we moved to Colorado that was bloody *unheard of*.  So there are definitely local norms depending on where you are.

>> What concerns me currently about the drive to move away from the nuclear family 

I have seen zero evidence of any drive to move away from the nuclear family.  Can you give me an example?  Where is this happening?

Basically what I'm saying is that we need to *make* our community, or try to, ourselves.  I still live in Colorado which is very isolationist, but I'm trying in various ways to make community and know my neighbors.  And coming from the perspective of both a dysfunctional (to put it mildly) family and being part of the queer community, the focus on *just* the nuclear family is *so* harmful for people whose families are abusive, toxic, have disowned you, etc.  NTM we have an epidemic of loneliness nowadays, and even if people had a positive relationship with their family, maybe they have passed away, maybe they live thousands of miles away, etc.  More of us are single nowadays and so we don't have a nuclear family of our own.  Widows who only had their spouse as their support are often left with no help at all.  Etc.  And of course, it just isn't reasonable to expect your spouse to fulfill ALL your social needs; even if you have a wonderful and supportive relationship, humans are tribe-minded creatures.

But yeah - child protection rules.  Talk about well-meaning going astray.  Somehow they always seem to tear apart families that actually love each other but kids suffering real abuse never seem to get rescued.  What gets me the most is when they take a kid away from their family because they consider that child neglected due to the family's poverty, but then they put them in a foster home where the foster parent is paid to take care of them.  Why.  Why don't you just give that payment to the parents who love their kid but are just struggling working for minimum wage or whatever.  Why??!
πŸ‘  
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@minismallholding ·
$0.03
Yes, we were latchkey kids too. I feel like it was a sign of the times, at least for the working class. The new way forward.

>I have seen zero evidence of any drive to move away from the nuclear family. Can you give me an example? Where is this happening?

It could be fear mongering. The first I came across it was via my eldest. Long story there, but I think it was what she was reading on Reddit and such like. We were struggling financially, yet still trying to pay for her uni. I was job hunting with my husband and I expressed the need for us to pull together as a family and for the girls to help out around the house. My youngest helped, but eldest didn't and basically gave me this argument on the nuclear family being the wrong thing to focus on. It puzzled me at the time and prompted me to double check the definition, because I've always expressed the importance of extended family too. It turns out she was using the attack on me in the wrong context; *wanted to use it as a reason to not do anything to help the family, but still wanted us to go all out for her so she could party with her friends*. However, what she said of it sounded like there were a lot of things being said against the nuclear and that it shouldn't be supported. 

It could also be people reading the wrong thing into articles on not just focusing on the nuclear family, but extending to the community around us. It seems a lot of people think we either need one thing or another. Either way, I keep hearing mentions of government policy trying to destroy the nuclear family. Much of it could stem from the removal or threats of removal of children from the home and the splitting up of illegal migrant families. 

>Basically what I'm saying is that we need to make our community, or try to, ourselves. 

I'm glad you clarified this. As I mentioned above, we can probably get the wrong end of the stick when the focus of an article goes more positive on one side than the other. 

Are the Buy Nothing groups taking off over there like they are here? I'm noticing my local one (I think they're all encouraging it) is working to address the community side of things as well. Ours has started a book club and meeting up weekly for that. I can really see the potential for them to reach out to those who feel isolated. 

You're right, we need to take these things into our own hands, but it's so hard to do so in our society as it stands. I love the idea of self contained communities, like the eco-village project eco-alex is doing, but it's not something that governments are very supportive of, so you need some form of financial backing or money yourself.

There are so many areas where we could do with devolving a little and returning to past ways. I was talking with my dad and hubby about this yesterday and my dad was saying that there are so many things that have changed to bring us to this point. In the UK, the mining communities essentially got torn apart with the closure of the mines. Friends and families ended up scattered across the country as the moved to find work. My husband grew up playing with his cousins and friends from school, while my cousins lived in different parts of the country and I barely knew them.


There's also never a right answer for the right thing for everyone. Did you read Ladybug's [recent post?](https://hive.blog/hive-124452/@ladybug146/march-8th-international-women-s-day-the-socio-economic-impact-of-covid-19-on-women-and-narcissistic-abuse) Shocking when even a community can fail a child. 
πŸ‘  ,
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