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Post by Ganbare! on Jan 15, 2010 14:31:55 GMT -5
How much of your character, behavior is like your parents' ?
Do you think genes are dominant in this regard or is it their education?
Are you more influenced by your generation societal norms (necessarily different than your parents) or is your personality made of individual choices ?
I think I'm a byproduct of several influences and am grateful for not resembling my parents too much.
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Post by milkman's baby on Jan 15, 2010 15:10:56 GMT -5
God no. But I specifically went out of my way to make sure I wasn't like them. Not that they are bad people, but their ideologies & morals, taste in lifestyle, frugality, and other things just make them particularly sad and unbearable to the average person's eye. I think I've always been independent though. My vocabulary and linguistic development was not influenced by my parents, like many people, but rather my teachers in school and the media (which is both a good thing and a bad thing).
What I was always interested in are children of immigrants, particularly immigrants that tend to speak English with a thick accent. Take, for example, my two Mexican-American friends. Both are first generation Americans in their family, born and raised in Nebraska. Both speak Spanish with their families at home, but use only English in school. One has a very thick Spanish accent while speaking English, while the other has a pure hard-crumb American accent. You wouldn't guess anything about her is Latin if you were on the phone with her. I've known of such cases with many other children of immigrants. Does this mean the girl with the accent is perhaps closer to her parents and more reliant on them for vocabulary and intellectual development? As far as I knew, both performed fairly equally in school (which would be average).
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palavore
Full Member
I put my pants on just like the rest of you -- one leg at a time. Except, once my pants are on, I make gold posts.
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
Posts: 298
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Post by palavore on Jan 15, 2010 21:38:50 GMT -5
My external demeanor invariably attracts comparisons to my father. But my interests and my principles are those of my mother.
I am the product of not having been deeply rooted in any one place. Thus, my commonality to other people and groups is rather piecemeal and on top of that there is the ambiguity of my race. So I feel as though my personality was completely forged in isolation. That is why when people ask about those who had the greatest influence on my my life, I tend to point to dead historical figures.
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Post by betahat on Jan 16, 2010 0:13:09 GMT -5
I'm a lot like my parents. I might be a bit more balanced than them in some ways - less of a worrywort than my dad, and a little more able to relax and enjoy things outside of work than my mom. On the other hand I'm definitely worse than them in some ways too - I'm definitely not as giving as them, I'm not as organized, and I'm definitely more egotistical. Apparently I act quite British, which I really get from both my parents but maybe more from my mom. Other than always looking for a great deal I don't know if I have any typical "chinese" traits from my dad.
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Post by catgirl on Jan 16, 2010 21:02:40 GMT -5
NO! My mum is a house wife and Im a med. student and have been studying/going to school nearly my whole life. She droppet out before high school. Shes much better at litterature than me and Im much better at maths/physics/biology and new languages. Also her mum (my grandmother) is well educated and very mentally active unlike her.
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Post by milkman's baby on Jan 16, 2010 22:02:45 GMT -5
NO! My mum is a house wife and Im a med. student and have been studying/going to school nearly my whole life. She droppet out before high school. Shes much better at litterature than me and Im much better at maths/physics/biology and new languages. Also her mum (my grandmother) is well educated and very mentally active unlike her. Although I could never be a housewife and I must admit I tend to have slightly negative thoughts about housewives at first, I think we underestimate them greatly. Some of the smartest women I've known were housewives, often because they had time to enjoy themselves with books at the library or interest organizations and thinktanks. My own mother was sorta a housewife for a while and I guess she's never really been that academically minded, but she can be very intelligent when she wants to be. lol There are women who will study subjects like engineering and biology and perform very well in college, but they will marry and drop out to be a stay at home mother. Not everyone who has such high-achieving intelligence will choose to pursue it in a career.
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Post by catgirl on Jan 17, 2010 7:33:56 GMT -5
I know that they can make great food and are good mums etc (just not my mum!) but still.... I think its important to be a part of society aswell!
Like they could have a part time job or something also. I could possibly be a housewife for 1-2 years after having a kid, but not longer than that. I would go crazy because of lack of mental and social stimuli.
What about when the kids start school? Is it right to be a housewife after that???
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Post by milkman's baby on Jan 17, 2010 11:23:56 GMT -5
I know that they can make great food and are good mums etc (just not my mum!) but still.... I think its important to be a part of society aswell! Like they could have a part time job or something also. I could possibly be a housewife for 1-2 years after having a kid, but not longer than that. I would go crazy because of lack of mental and social stimuli. What about when the kids start school? Is it right to be a housewife after that??? Being a stay at home mom is very much so vital to society - they need to raise suitable kids to run the country or at least not be pathetic losers. In that sense, a stay at home parent is one of the hardest jobs on the planet. That's why I could never do it. And actually, school age kids might be the most important time for a mom or dad to stay home and take care of them. Otherwise you end up having latch key kids who skateboard around stores and bother people. Just kidding. But really, I think we don't give stay at home moms enough credit. And many of them end up getting part time jobs or even going back to school for their degree after the kids grow up and leave the house. Reason I say my mom was sorta a stay at home mom is because she always intended to have a part time job but we moved around so much. But since junior high, she's worked full time.
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Post by betahat on Jan 17, 2010 15:05:57 GMT -5
^But really, I think we don't give stay at home moms enough credit.
That's true to some extent, but the reason we don't is that the mothers who hold down full time jobs AND run a household are superheroes who end up having only 1-2 hours of leisure per day max. My mom says she "enjoys working" and "doesn't know how to relax," and her situation is more manageable because academia isn't quite a 9-5, but she made some enormous sacrifices. If you're a full-time housewife and are only managing 1-2 hours of leisure per day then you are terrible at your job (or have 10 kids). In sweetfart's own words, you should have lots of time to read and volunteer, etc. especially when the children are school-aged.
Historically, the biggest sacrifice made by stay at home moms was that many of them who had aspirations to work and be more engaged with society (perhaps because they went to university) were basically forced to stay at home (sometimes in relative social isolation) by the weight of cultural expectations or by discrimination in the workplace. Fortunately that is less true today, so staying at home has become a choice for the privileged rather than a straight-jacked imposed on women.
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Post by Ganbare! on Jan 17, 2010 16:36:57 GMT -5
I used to be a latch key kid but it wasn't too bad because I had my little sister around so we always had some crazy adventures going on like jumping from atop the fridge or worse ..... skateboarding ! We had some panic attack moments like when I broke my knee but on the bright side it taught me to rely on myself and not to expect help from others that's never gonna come. Even if it might be too soon to say that considering my relative young age but I know that if I didn't learn that I'd probably be a school drop out working minimum wage or a thug today because my family never really supported me.
I've always kept myself busy with plenty of activities, socializing and working hard not to end up in the mediocrity my parents ended up in because of their belief that their family would eventually thank them for succeeding overseas and giving them all they had.
Hideo Kojima told in an interview that he was a latch key kid, whenever he would come home, no one would be there so he would watch TV for hours and now even as an adult, he fears the feeling of solitude so much he has to open the TV in the hotel rooms he is staying to feel a presence.
Back on topic, your contributions were interesting to read but few of you actually answered the question as to what influenced you: personal choices, genes, societal norms, your parents upbringing?
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Post by betahat on Jan 18, 2010 15:09:03 GMT -5
^Back on topic, your contributions were interesting to read but few of you actually answered the question as to what influenced you: personal choices, genes, societal norms, your parents upbringing?
That's a difficult question - isn't the correct answer a bit of everything? And isn't quantification of the individual contributions next to impossible? The fact that my siblings have somewhat different interests, personalities, and capabilities doesn't really help, does it?
The simplest answer is that all of the ways I am not like my parents are due to being from a different generation, growing up in a different city and different school with a different peer group and different social norms. And all of the ways that I am the same as them are due to genetics and the home life they created.
I don't believe too much in personal choice in terms of shaping your personality - looking back on your life, it often seems like things just happened so automatically and easily. I can't remember many key moments when I had multiple choices that were truly different (and equally desirable) and really felt like I was making a choice. So for better or worse they should get most of the credit for why I am different than the Halifax, Nova Scotia average person of my age and class...
But since your identity seems to be to forged in opposition to your parents and their perceived failures, it seems like you are coming from a very different place. Of course, they are still a major influence in that oppositional role - I'm sure most people either seek to emulate their parents (me) or be very different (you, my wife). Do you feel like you have overcome genetic limitations from them, or that they failed to live up to their own potential?
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Post by Ganbare! on Jan 18, 2010 16:48:29 GMT -5
Obviously for most people it is a mix of all that, I was just wondering if any of you believed in self-determination.
My parents are in any case vastly better individuals than their respective families sadly they were brought up with the "your family before everything else even your spouse and children" immigrant mentality.
To think that my father's side of the family, everyone ended up wealthy because of the millions he made in the West while he's nothing now makes me sick. I know they despise me as a dumb, mixed-blood loser, I'll probrably never hear it from their mouth though, I haven't met them since I was a toddler.
Same story for my mother, she supported her brothers and sisters, only thing she got in return were insults, threats, mental manipulation.. The worse part of all that, it's that I cannot even blame them for it since most of them are "victims" of T. Cruise's cult or are in asylums...
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Post by Ganbare! on Jan 18, 2010 16:52:45 GMT -5
As complex and weird my personality and life are, if you'd meet me in real life, you would probably see me as just another regular (maybe even boring!) guy. I never talk of these things to friends or peers.
Anyways, I try my best to live my life, to accept the idea I have no family and that I have somewhat won at the genes lottery. So I do not think they lived up to their potential of living happily ever after but hey, even in 2010 considering the world poverty, epidemics, weather catastrophes, materialistic mentality and inherent human nature, who really is?
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Post by catgirl on Jan 20, 2010 10:34:27 GMT -5
I know that they can make great food and are good mums etc (just not my mum!) but still.... I think its important to be a part of society aswell! Like they could have a part time job or something also. I could possibly be a housewife for 1-2 years after having a kid, but not longer than that. I would go crazy because of lack of mental and social stimuli. What about when the kids start school? Is it right to be a housewife after that??? Being a stay at home mom is very much so vital to society - they need to raise suitable kids to run the country or at least not be pathetic losers. In that sense, a stay at home parent is one of the hardest jobs on the planet. That's why I could never do it. And actually, school age kids might be the most important time for a mom or dad to stay home and take care of them. Otherwise you end up having latch key kids who skateboard around stores and bother people. Just kidding. But really, I think we don't give stay at home moms enough credit. And many of them end up getting part time jobs or even going back to school for their degree after the kids grow up and leave the house. Reason I say my mom was sorta a stay at home mom is because she always intended to have a part time job but we moved around so much. But since junior high, she's worked full time. Maybe Im just comparing it too much with my mum... And I think her life could have been better if she didnt stay home THAT much. I know its a good thing raising the kids and giving them attention. But in the end the housewife may end up with not much social experience to interact well enough with society. Some end up being a bit asocial in some way. My boyfriends mum is a housewife as my mum, and it doesnt seem like they have much friends. They only have the family if you see what I mean? I stayed home with mum until 5 years, and luckily I went to kindergarden 1 year so that I finally learnt Norwegian so I could FINALLY communicate with others my age. But unfortunately for my brother he stayed home with mum until he started school, and he didnt know Norwegian well enough so he had to repeat the 1st year at school
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Post by moralhazard on Feb 2, 2010 6:13:08 GMT -5
Hmm, not much of my character or behaviour is like my parents. My mum enforced on me the importance of a good education, to which I'm grateful, otherwise I would have bludged through highschool. Apart from this I do butt heads with my parents for the most part. I'm extremely practical, down to earth and appear to be easy going. My mum on the other hand can get easily annoyed, frustrated and even paranoid. Although we may reach the same conclusion to a problem, we will arrive at using different methods. What really influences me are my own experiences and morals. But then my morals would be the result of also being exposed to my parents morals since the day I was born. Hmm, so now I suppose my character/behaviour is a combination of experiences, learning from mistakes and also exposure to parents. But then exposure to parents could also be classified as a combination of experiences so this train of thought can bloody continue on forever. Man, this day has just been too long for me
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