I always try my best to recognize babies and young children as very intelligent and internally thorough and complete.
I've found that as I've gotten older, my internal world and emotions and what I want to say really hasn't changed. The biggest thing that's changed is that I'm more articulate, able to better say what I need or how I'm feeling. Meanwhile, when I was young, I lacked the vocabulary or social know-how to articulate what I was feeling, and that adults would just about never sit down and try to work with me to figure out what I'm feeling, and they'd try to invalidate how I'm feeling because they're better at using words, or just generally don't take me very seriously.
When I work with kids, especially ones that can't speak, I've found a little bit of respect and empathy goes a very long way. They almost always want to communicate something to me and express autonomy. A toddler whose parents insisted was very ill-behaved was very, very nice to me because I recognized that what they wanted was to handle their food on their own, go to the bathroom without being escorted, stuff like that.
I get that you're not talking about toddlers or young children, and I recognize that functionally they're essentially on a permanent escort mission and can't do anything on their own, and that's what I believe you mean by "object". I find that line of thinking to be, I dunno, maybe a bit disrespectful? Like, certainly I can see why it's "correct" from some definitions, but it's not something that I'd let enter my heart. To me, babies have deeply complicated and involved inner worlds. They've spent their entire life in this strange, alien world with massive people and brand new, unpleasant sensations. They can't do anything on their own, but they think, and they want to communicate, and they're so overjoyed when they can do something and get recognition from it.
This was actually a joke I didn't make obvious enough - I largely agree with your point but from an opposite perspective: children's lack of knowledge and experiences does make them incomplete, but the same applies to adults. There is always room for new growth and understanding towards the platonic ideal of completeness, and that means children's thoughts and feelings are just as inherently valuable and worthy of respect as any adults. Neither has every perspective and understanding, but they both know how they feel better than anyone else.
You are completely right about respect and empathy though. I used to work with 5-11 year olds and volunteer with 11-18 year olds, and a lot of the time difficult children just needed someone to listen to them, particularly the neurodivergent ones. They know full well when you're being patronising or not really listening, so talking to them in much the same way as you would an adult works wonders.
I always try my best to recognize babies and young children as very intelligent and internally thorough and complete.
I've found that as I've gotten older, my internal world and emotions and what I want to say really hasn't changed. The biggest thing that's changed is that I'm more articulate, able to better say what I need or how I'm feeling. Meanwhile, when I was young, I lacked the vocabulary or social know-how to articulate what I was feeling, and that adults would just about never sit down and try to work with me to figure out what I'm feeling, and they'd try to invalidate how I'm feeling because they're better at using words, or just generally don't take me very seriously.
When I work with kids, especially ones that can't speak, I've found a little bit of respect and empathy goes a very long way. They almost always want to communicate something to me and express autonomy. A toddler whose parents insisted was very ill-behaved was very, very nice to me because I recognized that what they wanted was to handle their food on their own, go to the bathroom without being escorted, stuff like that.
I get that you're not talking about toddlers or young children, and I recognize that functionally they're essentially on a permanent escort mission and can't do anything on their own, and that's what I believe you mean by "object". I find that line of thinking to be, I dunno, maybe a bit disrespectful? Like, certainly I can see why it's "correct" from some definitions, but it's not something that I'd let enter my heart. To me, babies have deeply complicated and involved inner worlds. They've spent their entire life in this strange, alien world with massive people and brand new, unpleasant sensations. They can't do anything on their own, but they think, and they want to communicate, and they're so overjoyed when they can do something and get recognition from it.
This was actually a joke I didn't make obvious enough - I largely agree with your point but from an opposite perspective: children's lack of knowledge and experiences does make them incomplete, but the same applies to adults. There is always room for new growth and understanding towards the platonic ideal of completeness, and that means children's thoughts and feelings are just as inherently valuable and worthy of respect as any adults. Neither has every perspective and understanding, but they both know how they feel better than anyone else.
You are completely right about respect and empathy though. I used to work with 5-11 year olds and volunteer with 11-18 year olds, and a lot of the time difficult children just needed someone to listen to them, particularly the neurodivergent ones. They know full well when you're being patronising or not really listening, so talking to them in much the same way as you would an adult works wonders.