Is there anything that can be learned from cases like Buttigeg and Harris where at least one of their parents was ostensibly a proponent of Marx? Have any of you known or had communist parents?
I'm trying to avoid my own kids becoming reactionary and the only thing I know to do to avoid that is show them internal consistency with my own views(valuing consent, consistency, openness, compassion, reason, creativity, and an unbreakable will), educate them on class conflict and historical materialism, and give them opportunities to reinforce the innate kindness within them while also introducing them to various other groups so that they grow up to feel a human connection to anyone regardless of differences in age, gender, nationality, etc.
I'll be closely involved in their school work to help counter imperialist propaganda in their public school education.
I'll be involving them in programs like 4H so they don't become alienated from the means of production and their environment.
I'll be insisting they get part time service industry jobs when they're old enough to help radicalize them against the inhumanities of capitalist exploitation
Additionally, the only communities I can think to raise them as a part of are SRA, and UU. If y'all have any suggestions I would love to hear them.
I'd rather my kids grow up Quaker than Unitarian Universalist, having grown up UU!
That said, my guess is that having a good relationship with your kids is essential. Listen to their feelings, talk to them, let them know you respect and admire them. Don't hit, yell at or punish them. Reason with them, redirect them, compromise with them. Set them up to behave with clear expectations and routines. That's the best chance you'll have of them listening to anything you have to say, but know that you're one small part of their world, and you can't control what they believe.
That's a great point, I am by far their favorite parent and I think that is in large part due to how I listen to them and place great importance on their consent.
I haven't had a direct connection to the UU church, I just read a lot about them and had a UU friend who was very well adjusted. I live in California so idk of there's a quaker community out here. Is there anything about UU you think I should know?
Teach them the stuff we all know we wished we were taught in school. You got some good early childhood advice already, so teach them about the cool radical stuff as you feel they are ready for it. The militant labor movements and unions that attained the few rights as workers they still enjoy today, the unwhitewashed version of the civil rights movement, the real badasses of history and the cool stuff that gets omitted. So much of what they will be taught by schools and their peers will not only be wrong but not nearly as cool as real history.
Kids love to feel like they're being let in on a secret or some forbidden knowledge.
You know I keep that mf-ing thang on me (Zinn's People's History, Dunbar-Ortiz' Indigenous Peoples' History, etc) I'd love any recommendations you have for essential reading/viewing though.
Hell that's like all I ever wanna talk about! They're 2 now but I can't wait to tell them about all this shit.
Currently still trying to finish reading Du Bois' Black Reconstruction and I would highly recommend the Marx Madness podcast if you need some supplemental commentary and contemporary reference to go along with reading some of those older texts. So far they've done full readings of Capital, State and Revolution, Imperialism, Wretched of The Earth, and are almost finished with Black Reconstruction.
Most UUs are ime perfect liberals. I once watched one storm out of a racial justice seminar. They're all woke and tolerant until you test it at all.
What's that UU thing?
It's a religion. Unitarianism was a European tradition that believed that Jesus was just a prophet and not God himself.
Universalism was an American protestant tradition that believed all people were destined for heaven.
They were syncretized with tramscedentalisn which is like, protestant nature worship. Think Thoreau.
Both were involved in abolitionist and anti mexican war movement, albeit in some truly do nothing ways.
During the 60s they combined into a single church, despite their diverging views on the trinity.
Rather than have a dogma, they believe that each person has to find their own spiritual truth, and so a lot of them end up atheists lol.
Now it's just sort of church for white liberal atheists. They have a joke that "diversity at a UU congregation is 5 different colors of Subaru in the parking lot."