And this is the thing, people act like the difference between withholding food as a rational, justified form of discipline and as capricious tyrannical abuse is obvious, that we all know the distinction

Well, Can Opener Dad thought he knew it too https://twitter.com/nberlat/status/1345782015208075266?s=19

This is the thing some people aren't getting about this story

It's not just that he did a bad thing, his *value system is off*

He didn't do something shameful that he tried to hide and you caught him at

He was trying to *brag* about being a good dad

In his telling of the story, he wasn't doing this out of simple selfishness (I want to eat before she does), or simple open cruelty (I want her to go hungry to punish her for pissing me off)

He presented it as a willing sacrifice (Neither of us are gonna eat until you learn)

So many of you people act like being a good parent is just a matter of not being "selfish" or "lazy" - "You know what you need to do and you just don't step up"

This guy thinks he is stepping up

He's working really hard at it, harder than most dads

This is what I was trying to get at in my other thread, how a "lazy" dad who "did the bare minimum" would be so much less fucked up

Just opening the goddamn beans and moving on with your life

But this is what Noah was talking about

It's not that being a bad parent means this stereotype people have of being a parent who just doesn't give a shit and gets drunk and lets the kid walk into traffic

Yeah, I agree most parents do care

They fuck up by caring

Whether it's genuine altruism or compassion or love or it's mixed up with ego and more complex forms of selfishness is a whole mess I don't care to suss out

The point is that yes, they do care, but what they think they have to do to be a good parent is often all fucked up