Oscar gets to opt out of things, he gets to detach from the group and be the unpleasant loner on the sidelines, he gets to say "No" when everyone else says "Yes", he gets to think of trash as treasure and treasure as trash, he gets to be "perverse" and "contrarian"
-
-
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
And the rules of the show say the other characters must respect this They do *not* tolerate him crossing the line and hurting another person, they draw their own firm boundaries he can't violate, but neither can they violate his He is *allowed to be a Grouch*
1 reply 2 retweets 48 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
This was a big deal, because in developmental psych they talk about you getting a "No!" phase in the so-called "Terrible Twos" and beyond, often recurring at different stages Getting "fussy", getting "bratty", saying "No!" to things you actually want just to prove you can
1 reply 1 retweet 42 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
This is, in fact, a really important phase of psychological development where you start to get the sense you are a different person from your parents and you have impulses and desires separate from just doing what your parents tell you to do
1 reply 1 retweet 44 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
The so-called "teenage rebellion" people make fun of is just another iteration of the cycle, trying on whole value systems or belief systems just for the sake of proving that you can
2 replies 1 retweet 38 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
Hell, the "midlife crisis" is yet another recurrence, directed at long-gone parents when you realize they got their hooks deeper in you and determined more of your core values than you realized when you first moved out It's in this fighting with your past self that we grow
1 reply 1 retweet 41 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
And anyway Parents in the old days were huge assholes about the "Terrible Twos" and did NOT "respect their child's 'No'" AT ALL My parents sure as hell didn't, lots of fun family stories about literally dragging a screaming toddler into the car repeatedly
2 replies 1 retweet 34 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
Spock's advice seems almost too heavily weighted on the other side -- "I guess we're canceling our playdate entirely because he said 'NO'" -- but it's a necessary corrective Because damage from having your "NO" overridden *by force* and being told it's for your own good lasts
1 reply 1 retweet 30 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
Dr. James Dobson was the anti-Dr. Spock and my parents treated his Dare to Discipline as a bible when I was little And he just straight up said it -- those gratuitous "NO"s, the ones not borne of a "rational" disagreement but designed just to "test" you, must be squashed
2 replies 1 retweet 27 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @mssilverstein and
They are the sign of a child's perverse, rebellious will and they must be met with force -- a child's sinful nature being subdued by the loving hand of a strict parent is in microcosm how God quells the sinful delusion of mankind
2 replies 1 retweet 25 likes
It was so fucked It was a book catering to child-beaters telling them they were good and holy and righteous for being what they were And I'm certain there must've been more than a few child rapists who rationalized what they did via the Dare to Discipline mindset
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.