[HN Gopher] How Inuit parents teach kids to control their anger ...
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How Inuit parents teach kids to control their anger (2019)
Author : Tomte
Score : 52 points
Date : 2021-09-17 17:10 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.npr.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.npr.org)
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| TL;DR: Strictly no yelling/expression of anger towards children.
| No scolding either. Teaching/parenting through storytelling (with
| most of the stories of the form "don't do _undesirable behavior_
| else _some very creative monster_ will get you ").
| drno123 wrote:
| Playing a devil's advocate here. Inuit have one of the highest
| suicide rates in the world, and alcoholism is a problem in Inuit
| communities. There may be of course many factors causing this.
| But could it be possible the venting your anger out keeps you
| from alcoholism and suicide in the long run?
| fknorangesite wrote:
| Uh, do you think maybe that has less to do with their anger
| management techniques and more to do with colonization and
| genocide?
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| I think that comes with living in an inhospitable environment
| that provides only very limited stimulation.
| lacrosse_tannin wrote:
| Maybe it has something to do with colonization????
| dang wrote:
| Past threads:
|
| _How Inuit parents teach kids to control their anger (2019)_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23927773 - July 2020 (134
| comments)
|
| _How Inuit parents teach kids to control their anger_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19396563 - March 2019 (251
| comments)
| anderson1993 wrote:
| Reading this, I'm seeing how some people might get so defensive
| about criticism. "How can you be so stupid" can scar you in ways
| to make you upset instead of accepting to do better. Sure,
| they're teasing the children, but in a way that the child can
| laugh with them and learn instead of shutting down to protect the
| self.
| abznp wrote:
| That is all fine for children, but in real life there are many
| situations where displaying anger is a perfect tool.
|
| In a movie whose title escapes me, Jack Nicholson plays an anger
| management therapist who is hired to coach someone 24h per day.
| He explicitly includes exposing his trainee to situations where
| he _should display anger_.
|
| This whole 100% stoicism movement is quite suspect to me. It is
| mostly a thing for administrator types who read the 48 laws of
| power and some manosphere sites. It is also Orwellian, since
| complete suppression of emotions is a central theme in Orwell's
| books.
|
| I've come to view it as a parlor trick for administrators to
| appear superhuman and unapproachable.
|
| Actually creative and productive people are more in touch with
| their emotions and sometimes let them out.
| bsurmanski wrote:
| The movie title is: "Anger Management", starring Jack Nicholson
| and Adam Sandler
| dwohnitmok wrote:
| I posted this last time this came up:
| https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/b0so4h/how_...
|
| This article may not be reflective of general Inuit practices. At
| the very least there is a lot of contradictory evidence that this
| is _not_ how children are actually brought up in the Inuit
| community and that in fact at the very least there is a decent
| amount of corporal punishment when deemed necessary.
|
| EDIT: Removed bit on physical abuse in the adult community
| because there are a lot of confounding factors there.
| lapetitejort wrote:
| That's hinted in the article:
|
| > Elders I spoke with say intense colonization over the past
| century is damaging these traditions. And, so, the community is
| working hard to keep the parenting approach intact.
|
| Regardless, the article shows the ideal result. Colonization or
| not, it's impossible for one person to reach the ideal, let
| alone an entire tribe. To think otherwise leads towards the
| path of the Noble Savage [0]. Adults makes plenty of mistakes,
| and just like children, we need stories to guide us towards
| better behavior.
|
| 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_savage
| dwohnitmok wrote:
| But it's not clear at all that this is the ideal result (from
| the perspective of Inuit practices) nor does it seem that is
| in fact the traditional approach.
|
| From the reddit post:
|
| > [I] came across this article on how Inuit leaders are
| protesting Canada's anti-child-abuse policy, because they say
| it is too harsh on traditional Inuit child-rearing practices
| like spanking. They complain that child protective services
| are unfairly removing children from Inuit homes, because they
| don't understand that Inuit tradition permits forms of
| physical discipline that might not be acceptable in broader
| Canadian society.
|
| https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/inuit-traditional-
| knowl... goes into more detail.
|
| Even further on in the post there's
|
| > I also found this collection of interviews with Inuit
| elders where they describe how things were in the traditional
| old days. When asked about discipline, Elder Tipuula:
|
| > "If it was a boy, it was his father's responsibility to
| discipline him. If he only wanted to spank him once, then he
| would only spank him once. He would behave for a while, and
| if he started to misbehave again, the father could spank him
| a second time.We women took care of our daughters. Some
| children reached adulthood without ever needing a spanking.
| Some of them needed to be spanked, and would thank us when
| they were older for correcting them. Parents would spank
| children to make them aware of things they had not been
| paying attention to. Some children were spanked when they did
| not deserve it and this was bad for a child's development.
| When they realized they did not deserve a spanking, they
| became angry. Children who deserved to be spanked grew up
| being thankful for the discipline they received. Children who
| did not deserve to be spanked grew up to become angry
| people."
|
| > Elder Ilisapi adds:
|
| > "Some of us tended to take out our frustration on our
| children when it was our husband who we were angry at. Even
| if the child had done nothing wrong, if he made one small
| mistake, we took out our frustration on him. If children were
| treated like that, they could be damaged. It was their spouse
| they were angry at in the first place but they took their
| frustration out on their child. That is not the way to treat
| a child. It is not good."
|
| With the link pointing to http://www.tradition-
| orale.ca/english/pdf/Perspectives-On-Tr...
|
| EDIT:
|
| It seems pretty clear that physical discipline is a part of
| the traditional approach, even if it is recognized as
| something that should have limits and be used carefully.
|
| This seems to be in direct contradiction with the article's
| assertion that the parenting style is "gentle."
|
| If anything, it seems potentially that this "gentleness" is
| the modern approach rather than the traditional one. There is
| a choice quote later on in "Interviewing Inuit Elders:
| Perspectives on Traditional Health" (the PDF link)
|
| > Things are completely different today. We only reprimand
| our children verbally because we are not allowed to use
| physical discipline with our children anymore.
| seph-reed wrote:
| Amazing stuff.
|
| Don't exhibit the behavior you're opposed to. Pre-emptively stop
| bad behavior by telling stories that something bad will happen.
|
| I do wonder if this approach has social-size limits? Kind of like
| Santa Clause, where city kids tend to find out sooner than rural
| kids.
| sonofhans wrote:
| I've spent many years explicitly teaching my son not to try to
| bury his anger. Anger is a biological imperative. As humans -- as
| mammals -- we don't have the option not to feel it. Like any
| other emotion, it has to go somewhere. It is either felt and
| expressed, or felt and repressed.
|
| They key is to feel it but not attach to it, and not use it to
| hurt yourself or others. Feel it, express it if you need to in
| non-hurtful ways, then let it go. This isn't my idea, and it's
| not a new idea --- it's central to Buddhism, for example.
|
| So I reread this and worry -- where are those kids putting their
| anger? Because for sure they're not escaping it entirely.
| smorgusofborg wrote:
| OTOH I think there was a Penn and Teller's Bullshit about anger
| therapy that claimed therapies designed to harmlessly let out
| anger actually raised anger levels. Anger and frustration
| clearly have social phenomenons where they build without any
| additional rational information.
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| My theory is that almost all folklore is ancient public child
| safety awereness campaigns, like Jenny Greenteeth:
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenny_Greenteeth
| Avamander wrote:
| There are a few more common and known folklore that's simply
| ancient public safety and etiquette campaigns. They're not only
| for kids.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| A key difference: Inuit have _time_ , and this parenting concept
| requires _lots_ of time (waiting until tantrums pass, to tell
| stories, and to process emotions). In western societies however,
| parents rarely have adequate time for interacting with their
| children - it 's why so many kids are parked in front of screens:
| it gives parents the time to do household chores without being
| distracted.
|
| If we as society want to raise our children in better conditions,
| we _have to_ limit work weeks and raise wages so that a 20 hour
| work week is sufficient to raise a family on.
| cl0ne wrote:
| Do you realize how much time and effort it takes to live in the
| arctic? It's a full time job. You need to make sure you have
| enough firewood for the winter, enough food from hunting and
| fishing. You need to maintain vehicles, equipment, and your
| home so it can withstand harsh conditions, etc.
| silicon2401 wrote:
| One of my favorite lifelong traditions has been to check out the
| local library, which sells donated books for 50C/. My family had
| no education, no connections or friends, basically nothing but a
| hard work ethic. So for me the library was a gateway to priceless
| knowledge and stories that I had neither the means nor know-how
| to acquire otherwise. Thanks to that library I was able to build
| up a modest but decent library by high school, with books about
| Roman and Greek philosophy, obscure but outstanding Sci-Fi and
| Fantasy books, and even anthropology. It always feels so fateful
| and serendipitous to have a gem come to me through such a
| spontaneous, unplanned path.
|
| One of these books was "Never in Anger", by Jean Briggs, which I
| knew would be at least mentioned in the article as soon as I read
| the title of this link. It's really an outstanding book if you
| have any interest in anthropology and getting a somewhat inside
| look at other cultures.
|
| I could quote the whole article, but this section captures a
| sentiment I took away from the book:
|
| > Even just showing a smidgen of frustration or irritation was
| considered weak and childlike, Briggs observed.
|
| > For instance, one time someone knocked a boiling pot of tea
| across the igloo, damaging the ice floor. No one changed their
| expression. "Too bad," the offender said calmly and went to
| refill the teapot.
|
| > In another instance, a fishing line -- which had taken days to
| braid -- immediately broke on the first use. No one flinched in
| anger. "Sew it together," someone said quietly.
|
| Since childhood I've been in love with philosophies like Stoicism
| and Buddhism and worked hard to practice emotional regulation in
| my daily life. I've at least improved my own abilities,
| regardless of how that may compare with others. But I've never
| seen such an admirable implementation as the people covered in
| "Never in Anger". I've tried adopting their approach in my own
| life, but it definitely takes a long time to learn how to really
| control your anger, rather than just suppress it and convince
| yourself it's controlled.
|
| I highly recommend anybody interested in my comment or the
| article just go ahead and read the whole book, it's really an
| excellent work. And if you have any other suggestions, please
| recommend them. I've already added Brigg's second book, "Inuit
| Morality Play", to my reading list after seeing it mentioned in
| the article.
| a1pulley wrote:
| I wonder whether the Inuit aversion to anger is a cultural
| adaptation to living in close proximity to others through long
| winters when sulking off to one's own room or house isn't
| possible.
|
| In the boiling water and fishing line examples above, it
| doesn't seem like anger would serve much of a practical, social
| purpose--it's more important to fix problems, maintain working
| relationships with friends and family, and continue to survive
| Arctic conditions.
|
| However, modulated anger _does_ serve an important purpose in
| larger, less tightly coupled societies. Disengaged employees--
| contractors, fast food workers--are much more responsive to
| anger or the the threat of anger than to nuanced conversation.
|
| I grew up in a household in which yelling and anger were taboo
| --it wasn't necessary for anyone's work and it detracted from
| our quality of life. I didn't understand the emotion's utility
| until I married into a family that owns a small restaurant
| empire. The empire would crumble without occasional yelling at
| vendors, government administrators, employees, managers, and so
| forth. It took years for me to admit that utility, but I'm
| still not comfortable with it.
| hairofadog wrote:
| Wow, I have been thinking about this _so much_ lately, as I think
| irrational anger is one of the primary ills of modern western
| society, especially in the United States (or at least that's
| where I observe it directly). I can think of no better anecdotal
| example than my tendency to allow myself to wallow in subreddits
| like _publicfreakout_ or _bullybackfire_ or
| _iamatotalpieceofshit_. I find them to be addictive and yet when
| I finally put down my phone I feel both angry and dirty, and my
| own personal philosometer tilts away from _people are basically
| good_ to _people are basically evil_ , and the next thing I know
| I'm browsing Redfin for 40 acres in the mountains, and I think
| about purchasing a shotgun to lean up behind the door of my cabin
| there. None of it is healthy or productive.
|
| Anyway, thanks for this post and I think I'll buy this book.
| leobg wrote:
| Well, anger is a positive emotion after all. We actually like
| being angry. For one thing, anger masks any underlying emotions
| that would make us feel more vulnerable (sadness, desire,
| loneliness, etc.). And then it comes with a rush of energy, and
| superiority, and a sense of purpose. That's why I believe Paul
| Graham says the most dangerous distraction for a founder are
| disputes. Because anger trumps any goal you have set for
| yourself, of you let it. Hence those who have no goals at all
| are often the angriest.
| jinushaun wrote:
| As a recent parent of two kids, all this stuff is very intuitive
| and I think all parents deep down instinctually know this true.
| The hard truth is that you can't take shortcuts with raising your
| kids. You pay the cost now, or you pay it later. But easier said
| than done when you're exhausted...
|
| We've tried many things with our first child. He was, for all
| intents and purpose, one giant A/B test. And the data
| consistently shows that neither rewarding, disciplining, scolding
| him or timeouts work. The only thing that works (actually works)
| is (1) finding creative ways to playfully diffuse the current
| situation, (2) listening to them to identify the root problem and
| (3) turning the lesson into a game (inception). This takes A LOT
| more time and energy than simply yelling at them. It's a full
| time job.
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(page generated 2021-09-17 23:02 UTC)