Tuesday's Most Active Threads

Yesterday's most active thread was the "Karen" thread that I discussed yesterday. So, I'll skip that one and start with the next most active thread which was titled, "I cannot believe there are still people out there spanking their children..." and posted in the "Elementary School-Aged Kids" forum. The original poster says that she saw in another thread that some parents still spank their kids and she is "floored". Spanking is a perenial topic that is always divisive. As in this thread, there are posters who believe that spanking is necessary to create discipline. As one of the first posters to respond writes, "It's pretty obvious your kids are the ones disrupting everyone else, OP." Such posters attribute a host of negative behaviors to children who are not spanked. In response, posters with views similar to those of the original poster argue that discipline is possible without spanking. "You do know you can discipline without hitting right?", says one such poster. In between are posters such as one who writes, "I think a swat on the butt is no big deal. Spanking with an eye to hurt is a different animal." Basically, these three positions are stated and restated throughout the thread, along with a large helping of stories about posters' own experiences growing up. Several posters seem to take a perverse pride in having been spanked when they were young. Some posters also discuss laws against spanking that exist in other countries and suggest that spanking is a barbaric and unenlightened practice. Others blame a host of today's problems on a decline in spanking. One of the more bizarre exchanges I stumbled across involved the American Academy of Pediatrics' recommendation not to spank. A poster argued that this recommendation is not valid because the organization is silent about the practice of "cry it out" which the poster apparently also considers abusive. This left me pondering whether there are people out there who support spanking but find CIO too barbaric. However, it turns out that the poster in question actually opposes spanking. She just has a bone to pick with the AAP and apparently believes that criticizing the organization is more important than acknowledging a policy position with which she agrees. Another argument made in the thread is that far worse things happen to children than spanking so, it is implied, spanking is not worth the concern. I imagine such posters refusing to fix flat tires on their cars because other cars have blown their engines or been totaled in wrecks.

The next most active thread yesterday was posted in the "Off-Topic" forum. Titled, "Your single biggest grammar pet peeve?", the original poster says her's is "using her/him in place of he/she" and gives the example, "Her and her husband are going on vacation next week." I don't have a lot to say about this thread other than that it is 17 pages of pet peeves about grammar errors. Most of the examples are simply idiomatic expressions or regional colloquialisms. I make enough grammar errors myself that I am really not in a position to be bothered by them.

The third thread at which I'll look today was titled, "No playdates because other siblings won't have a friend" and posted in the "Elementary School-Aged Kids" forum. The original poster provides a lengthy description of her 7-year-old daughter's experiences with playdates. Apparently the daughter doesn't get invited to many playdates. When the original poster organizes playdates, the kids that she invites tend to come with either younger or older siblings. The original poster is bothered by this and would prefer that the siblings not be included. Recently, the original poster's daughter has received several playdate invitations, a development which the original poster attributes to older siblings being away at camp. This also bothers the original poster for reasons that she doesn't really explain. Reading this post, I expected that the original poster would be in for fairly rough treatment from DCUM posters. But, to my surprise, most of the initial responses were supportive of her and critical of parents who bring siblings to playdates. Even posters who provided explanations for why siblings might be included were sympathetic to the original poster. But, that atmosphere didn't last forever. On the second page, a poster blamed the original poster's child for the lack of invites, saying, "Maybe your daughters lack of social graces and kindness is why you are not being invited". I am sure one of the posters from the previous thread noticed the grammar error in that statement. Several parents argued that while they understood the original poster's interest in having her child play with a friend only and not the friend's siblings as well, they were not going to make an effort to find alternative arrangements for siblings. This is especially true when the playdate is at their own home. One poster wrote, "If the kids are fighting or annoying each other, I'd intervene, but a kid insisting to just play with her friend and not interact with the family doesn't belong in my home." The solution most posters recommended was to start drop off playdates. I can see how this would work at the original poster's home in which case only her child's friend would be dropped off. But, I don't see how it resolves the issue of siblings being at the friend's house if the original poster dropped off her daughter there. At some point this thread turned into a fight between parents with single children and those with large families. I can't describe all the details of this because I quit reading before I really got to that part. But, if such conflict interests you, the thread is currently 16 pages and not getting any shorter.

The final thread at which I'll look today was originally posted in the "Off-Topic" forum but I moved it to the "Metropolitan DC Local Politics" forum for which I believe it is more appropriate. Titled, "Surge of Violent Crime in Moco", the original poster is concerned about an increase in violent crime in Maryland's Montgomery County. Specifically, the original poster points to 5 shootings and 2 stabbings over the weekend. Ironically, a thread started today complains about moderators of the Reddit subreddit about Washington, DC deleting threads about crime. Any DCUM thread dealing with crime will demonstrate why that is not such a bad practice. Crime is a complex issue that doesn't have simple answers. If it did, those simple solutions would be implemented and crime would no longer be a problem. But, web forums, including both DCUM and Reddit, rarely attract the sort of thoughtful posters prepared to intelligently address a complicated and nuanced issue such as crime. Instead we get those to whom everything is political such as the one who posted, "Apparently voting Democrat has horrific consequences". I am sure that this poster meant to write the grammatically correct "voting Democratic", and his misuse of "Democrat" was simply a typo (if not, add this as my grammar pet peeve to the grammar thread above). But, the posters grammer was not the only shortcoming of the post. As another poster pointed out, Montgomery County has long been led by Democrats but didn't always have a significant level of crime. Others blame immigration and increased diversity amongst the population. In crime threads, racism is never far from the surface and often, as in the case of some posts in this thread, clearly above the surface. For instance one post makes no bones about it, simply blaming crime on, "the latinification of moco". Trying to police comments of this sort, especially if they are not reported as this one was not, is more than a full time job. No wonder Reddit moderators don't want to do it. I don't want to do it either. Posters trot out their own pet issues. Those in favor of gun control blame lax gun control laws supported by Republicans. Those who want school resource officers returned to schools blame increased crime on the removal of SROs. The racists who are more racist against Black folks than they are against Hispanics argue that it is Black males rather than "the latinification of moco" that is the cause of crime. Some posters blame the pandemic. I don't know what the solution to crime is, but I guarantee that it will not be found in this thread. I should probably adopt the Reddit policy regarding crime threads.