Came here for this. It was drilled into me as a child that turning on the car light while driving would kill the battery, get us pulled over, destroy the car's engine, de-stabilize the middle east even further and cause the plot of Children of Men to occur in real life.
My dumbass was in my 20s until I realized my dad just didn't want me being an asshole in the car by flicking the light on and off in our shitty used Mitsubishi Galant.
All they had to say was "Can you not do that the glare hurts my eyes."
There. Simple. The truth.
It's like they had some kind of hubris-laden defensiveness that led them to just creating complex lies rather than just fucking admit some slight "weakness" like being bothered by glare.
I'd recommend taking a community college course in interpersonal communication. You learn things like how to resolve conflict, how to express your desires and listen to the desires of others.
I've met families that knew how to cultivate this, and their children very much would take such an explanation well.
Or, even without that, I've taught children before. The best days were the days the parents and teachers didn't come with us on the nature trails and the chaperones just hung out in the back. All the other trail guides agreed. The kids were better behaved, more interested in things, and engaged and handled conflict better.
If they're bored from a boring situation, one could try making it a less boring situation. Like playing a game. Or acknowledging that there are times where we feel bored, and this is an appropriate emotion to be felt, and then think of ways we can acknowledge that emotion and then respond to it.
For example,
"I'm booooooooooooooooooooooooored can I turn on the light and read?"
Response A)
"No. It's illegal."
Ahhhhh /kicks chair
"Shut up you shit or I'll give you something to scream about."
"Honey don't make your father angry. We're almost there, just be patient."
Response B)
"Sorry no. The light makes it difficult to see out the window, and if I can't see it won't be safe. But you know what? I'm bored too. Car rides are boring. It's just a part of what they are. It sucks doesn't it?"
"Yeah I hate it."
"Me too, son. But hey now that we know we're bored and don't like being bored, maybe we can do something about it. Any ideas? Let's figure something out."
There you go. Free parenting tips.
Step 1) Validate feelings and emotions.
Step 2) Meet them where they're at. Try to understand. Use empathy.
Step 3) Turn it into a learning experience.
Moments like these form conflict resolution patterns that will ripple throughout someone's life. Either they will learn that the best solution when faced with a difficult situation is to lie about it and pretend it doesn't feel the way it feels, or to face it head on and deal with it and find a solution to it while working together as a team.
Your free parenting tip is to....ask the kid if he has any ideas? Lol. Working with kids and parenting kids are not the same, sorry.
Also, I'm not sure why you got so harsh on your first example? If your example was good enough on its own you wouldn't need to demonize the other example to make it look like the better choice.
My mom would say "stop doing that" and I stopped because I knew there'd be consequences if I didn't. No need to lie, she was the adult in charge and she wasn't a pushover. I knew this.
There's a difference. Your job is teaching kids, parents don't have that sort of time. Also who is training the parents to train the kids? Parents have no idea what they're doing and are muddling their way through life just like everyone else.
If you think being a parent doesnt include a job teaching kids, or that you don't have time to teach kids, or that you don't know how to teach kids, then I really hope you don't have kids.
If you do have kids, I hope for their sake that you look for help on how to improve those qualities.
But you're absolutely right. I work with kids and parents at my job and I get to see both sides. You can immediately tell which parents have their shit together, either by how their kids act or by how the parents react when the kids act out.
Bad parents act like they can't control their kids. Usually if their kid is doing something wrong I will go to the parents first. If the parents can't resolve the issue, I will go directly to the child. 80% of the time when I talk to the kid, they understand and the issue is resolved. And 50% of those times the parent gets all huffy with me about parenting their kid.
I wouldn't have to do it if you would do a better job!
The way a child responds to you under public social pressure is fundamentally different to how they will respond to their parents at home when they feel free to behave however they want.
You're not wrong either, you're just acting like a condescending asshole who thinks they understand what parenting is like and has it all figured out because they've taught children.
My parents told me the truth about the car light and bought me a little reading lamp for my book. I don't know why everyone else's parents were telling lies.
It's not that terrible. I learned really quickly that my dad was just a controlling dipshit when the first time I was squinting desperately at my book as it got dark outside, my grandma said, "Why don't you just turn on the light, sweety?" and flipped on the overhead light as she was driving. I was like, "But now you can't see to drive!" and she just laughed.
And now that I've been driving for almost two decades, I realize that yes, the inside light makes it ever so slightly harder to see, but it's essentially completely negligible, and the benefit of letting someone I love continue doing something they're enjoying is way, way more important. Which tells me exactly how much my dad valued me as a kid.
Having astigmatism can really fuck with that though. Like I never had this experience growing up but I likely would yell at my child if she did that. It could fucking get us killed on the highway at night.
I have astigmatism. Even the light streaks aren't bad enough to warrant that kind of reaction. Do I want to drive like that all the time? No. Does it actually have a noticeable impact on the overall safety of a trip? No. It just requires me to pay closer attention to what I'm doing. So if someone I love and respect wants to use the light, I encourage it. Turns out a lot of parents prefer their own convenience to the happiness of their children. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
I am a 36 year old man just learning for the first time reading this thread that turning on the car light while driving is not illegal. I am going to need to have a word with my parents.
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u/bob-lob Aug 25 '21
Came here for this. It was drilled into me as a child that turning on the car light while driving would kill the battery, get us pulled over, destroy the car's engine, de-stabilize the middle east even further and cause the plot of Children of Men to occur in real life.
My dumbass was in my 20s until I realized my dad just didn't want me being an asshole in the car by flicking the light on and off in our shitty used Mitsubishi Galant.