parents and non parents.

My pets always went outside.

I had a dog and like many dogs. She liked to lick. I never let her lick me though. Im not fond of slobber.

My aunt and uncle have a saint bernard living with them. They have a lot of slobber. I dont let her slobber on me either. Or sit on me.

Btw this thread does need some babies:

Playful Kittens - YouTube
 
Dean Winchester has survived both Hell and Purgatory. Not to mention haveing a wet kipper of a brother. I'm sure he can handle living in the shire with Frodo
 
I think he means mobiles as in the dangly things that people hang over the cot, that spin in circles.
 
So why have pets if they can't show you affection? If you can't handle slobber or some uninvited close contact there's little point in having a cat or a dog.
 
My mind must have just filled in the blanks in the same way my fingers miss out entire words when I'm typing. But it's the same difference. Keep in mind babies can't actually see that well for a few days/weeks (can't remember exactly which) after they are born. So everything they see is just a fuzzy shape. They couldn't tell a bird of prey from a sledge hammer for a cuddly toy.

In fact there was an experiment on TV a while back involving some monkeys. Basically a rubber snake was put in an enclosure containing monkeys that had grown up in the wild and captive born monkeys.

The wild monkeys reacted with alarm calls when they saw the rubber snake and kept well back. The captive born monkeys who had never seen a snake and therefore had no concept of a snake or the potential danger it posed had no problem approaching and investigating this new object.

What we can take from that experiment is we learn to be afraid of particular things. Either through experience or because we've been told to be afraid. In other words fear is cultural. We primates have to learn to be afraid.
 
So your pets go outside.

For a cat - it's still going to take a crap in someone elses garden. Just because you don't see it happen and it's not your garden doesn't mean the cat still scratches it's own poo and then spreads that around it's own body with it's paws. And that's if the cat doesn't try to eat the crap directly.

And dogs. Sure it will crap outside too. But unless you live on a very large property you still have to go out in the yard to clean up the poo. Otherwise there is just poo everywhere and the yard it just a dog toilet and not good for anyone else. So what did happen to the poo?
 
But would you call yourself a responsible pet owner if you let you cat roam around and crap where it likes even if it's in other people's property? And you still haven't responded to the issues of domestic cats, especially those that roam not being especially clean animals that presumably show physical affection to you.

And Blade, as you started this thread on the topic of being able to understand being a parent without having children yourself. Do you believe that you yourself have this kind of understanding?
 
But it's how they instinctively say hello. It's like wanting to eat a banana that doesn't taste like banana without having to actually go through the trouble of eating the non-banana tasting banana.
 
Actually it's not, it's becoming less common. More highly educated people tend to be more inclusive and compassionate and less violent, typically, and each generation is smarter than the last, fairly substantially. Think about how much less socially acceptable it is to be bigoted today than it was even 30 years ago. There is a socially sensitive momentum driving our collective societies forward.
 
re the music keeping babies quiet thing.

The upside of having three at once is that you realise pretty quickly (sorry Aikiwolfe, Im going to have to disagree fundamentally with you here...) how much of what you get is pre packaged. Two of my daughters are identical, one not, although she is obviously very similar. They all have markedly different preferences when it comes to almost everything, and have done since birth. This was all the more remarkable because they were - like almost all triplets - born quite early and all weighed less than two kg. We spent our fair share of time in the intensive care ward.

The differences include tastes for music, even down to what instruments they prefer to play with when they have a chance. Electonica of various sorts - up to and including slamming drum and bass, but not dubstep or glitch hop, would make them two out of three quieter (now they just dance like a pack of nutters), opera was the taste of another, and baby Rose has a penchant for metal. The only two genres that seem universally loved are reggae and folk - mostly Breton and Irish.

paul
 
I don't know why this made me LOL, but I'm still chuckling about it.



Yes, I experience it all the time with children. But I'm frequently told my "rapport" with children is exceptional. I assume it's because I am merely an overgrown one.

Fascinatingly, if you expose yourself to enough human violence, your "war face" will keep adults from bumping into you even in very crowded spaces. Your body languages changes in a socially powerful way and eventually you hafta teach yourself to "switch off" to avoid the effect. Some violence professionals call it "radiating menace" and it's a important tool for LEOs, military, and security.



Wrong or not, it's my driving motivation for practicing yoga.



Haha, that is so true about kids + cats. I've been making an identical comparison for years. As someone who is allergic to cats and used to be ever-so-slightly apprehensive around children, I can personally attest to both species finding my discomfort somehow intoxicating.



It isn't, though that would be hilarious. (Their captivation is about visual processing, depth perception, and training motor functions between their hands and eyes.) I am demented though; I used to think it was hilarious to make bird of prey noises when my ferret was being naughty just to watch his tail instinctively bristle as he went rigid with fear. (Don't judge me, ferrets are notorious pranksters themselves. And kleptomaniacs.)
 
Nope. Same as kids. I wouldn't call a parent who does that a good parent, either.



Yeah. Of course there are things I wouldnt let them do. Lick me for example. I wouldnt kiss them on the mouth or let them kiss me on my mouth. Naturally, they can use a facecloth like we do.



Nope not entirely. I understand a lot though. Ironically, people have said to me and other childfree people that it is often us who would probably make the best parents.
 
You might make a great parent, but you have demonstrated an alarming lack of knowledge/empathy about kid behavior in this thread.
 
John,

in my experience kids are pretty good judges of character, kind of like dogs. If they get on with you naturally, be flattered. That or they can just smell weakness... :-)

paul
 
You haven't read my dog kicking thread, have you?

Na, I'm not really mildly nervous around kids anymore: not since I've dated a few single moms and spent a considerable amount of time around the little carpet lickers. I've come to accept that I won't accidentally break them and I'm quite a bit better than many parents are with 'em. I have no idea why precisely, but I'm a magnet for even the cripplingly shy or withdrawn ones. It suits me just fine as I like kids a lot more than many adults. They have all the best toys.
 
I do the same with a friends dog and pheasant noises but use my phone. The dog spends most of its life in a wood so it's always chasing them
 
Back
Top