*bangs her head against the wall*

[conuly]

How do you get through to people?

Okay, let me try. Male parents are fathers. Female parents are mothers. IF you wish to claim that men have no maternal instincts, ever, but women do, please don't use the argument "they couldn't possibly have the same instincts, because men have paternal instincts, and no I can't explain how they're different, there's a whole letter different, you moron!"

That's just confusing.

And when you finally realize that you're being slow, please, the appropriate response is most emphatically NOT "how many kids did you say you had?"

That. Is. Not. Relevant.

Interestingly, this conversation would never have started if the OP hadn't broken a cardinal rule - never say "I don't mean to be prejudiced" or "No offense" or anything even remotely resembling a disclaimer before saying something prejudiced of offensive. If you feel you need to say the former in order to say the latter, don't say it. If you really must say it, please, you're less likely to seem prejudiced or offensive if you just leave the stupid disclaimer out.

Free advice. Take it.

And yes, I know, I'm IN bed, I'm going to sleep now.

Link posted at request of kinda original poster. Do me a favor, tell me when she started using the word "typical", would you?

Comments

[marveen.livejournal.com]

I am so goddamned FUCKING tired of the smarmy non-response "Oh, you don't have any children? Then you could neeeveeerrr understand. When you give birth to a baby, THEN you'll understand."

Smirk smirk smug sneer *strangle*.

If you have to give birth to understand being a parent/mother, then how the hell do the thousands of adoptive parents (around a hundred thousand annually (http://www.adoptioninstitute.org/FactOverview.html#head))ever manage it? Or are you actually trying to say that adoptive parents are just naturally inferior to birth parents?

If you automatically acquire these "maternal instincts" when you give birth, how come there are children neglected/abused/murdered by their own mothers?

Gahhh.

[conuly]

See, that *might've* made sense for my statement that I don't believe there really are maternal instincts - I don't really believe that humans have instincts at all, at least not in the sense most people use the word.

But that's not what we were discussing on the thread.

[feathered.livejournal.com]

I was just reading about this issue in a psychology book the other day... in what sense do you think that people have instincts, if they have them? I am burningly curious.

[conuly]

My definition of instincts seems to be very different from many people's definition.

When a female cat and a male cat love each other very much are "in the mood", they know what to do. That's an instinct. When the female cat gives birth to fuzzywuzzy babies, she knows how to take care of them. This probably is also an instinct, because I doubt she remembers her early infancy.

When a human hears a baby crying and wants to pick the baby up, that might be an instinct - however, it might also be the result of memories of seeing babies being picked up by parents, people saying that it helps calm the baby down, that sort of thing. Regardless, it doesn't vary from male to female - parents generally want to calm a crying baby by picking them up. Additionally, this can be a bad thing - after a certain point, you don't want to run to your kid every time he or she cries, because then they'll cry every time they want something.

Many people say seem to use instincts to mean a combination of reflexes, beliefs, and, apparently, cravings. So if you were raised being given snacks to calm down, your "instincts" would say "feed the baby whenever he cries". But I don't think those are instincts. I think they're reactions that you learned.

I'm irked, and not typing clearly. Forgive. Did you see the toast quote?

[feathered.livejournal.com]

Yes, I did see the toast quote, and I meant to reply and say thanks for posting it, but I got distracted and forgot. Sorry!

I mostly pretty much agree with you on this issue, actually, and I rather thought that's what you'd say. I asked because, like I said, I'd been reading about it and wanted to hear if what you thought coincided with what I'd read in my book.

Personally, I tend to think that what many people call instincts are either purely conditioned or are present, but only in limited forms and as weak urges that can be overridden. Or something. I think the thing about picking up the crying baby has as much to do with the parent being conditioned than anything instinctual. You've read in your books to pick your baby up when it cries. So you do. Baby stops crying. Unpleasant stimulus is removed, behaviour is reinforced, and is therefore more likely to happen again, thus producing silly people to rant and rave about maternal and paternal instincts on livejournal. I like to call it "Skinnerizing" after good old B.F.

Interestingly, I was just reading about the theory of a neurologist called Tierney who thinks that instincts are just behaviours that are most appropriate in a situation -- biologically learned. As effectual behaviours is more likely to keep an organism alive long enough to reproduce, it's more likely to teach its offspring the same thing, making it into what we call instincts over time. I like the theory because it rather fits with the issue of humans having seemingly less instincts than animals who aren't as long-lived. Because animals that live longer experience so many environmental variations and different situations in their lifetimes, they are less likely to develope these generation-spanning behaviours that eventually become what we call "instincts" than, say, mosquitos or something that only live one year...

Of course, I'm not actually sure that there's any research to back it up, but it's good brain candy. I hope I explained it in a semi-coherent manner -- I'm tired and ill and I've been at work for far too long, so I'm not making any sense to myself. I wish I knew Tierney's first name beyond just her initials (A.J.) because then I could give proper references to her and you could look her up to get the ungarbled version. Oh well. Sorry!

[conuly]

*nods*

I *occasionally* will use "instinct" to mean "natural reaction", but only because it makes sense, and because other people also use it that way.

So, if you're in an airplane, and it depressurizes, I feel it's fair to say that your instinct to help your child first is wrong.

But that's not really an instinct. It's a natural (emotional) reaction that says "omigod! my kid could die! I must save him/her!" An instinct would involve some sort of knowledge.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

"As effectual behaviours is more likely to keep an organism alive long enough to reproduce, it's more likely to teach its offspring the same thing, making it into what we call instincts over time."

As a matter of fact, that is not what we call instinct. Instinct is untaught, unlearned, pre-programmed behavior. Sounds like Tierney may have unwittingly fallen smack into Lamarck's fallacy (http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/15817?&print=yes).


"I like the theory because it rather fits with the issue of humans having seemingly less instincts than animals who aren't as long-lived. Because animals that live longer experience so many environmental variations and different situations in their lifetimes, they are less likely to develope these generation-spanning behaviours that eventually become what we call "instincts" than, say, mosquitos or something that only live one year... "

Uh, what about turtles, then? Sea turtles, for instance, which can live at least three or four times as long as humans and, being wide-ranging sea dwellers, may encounter a wide variety of environmental conditions? Turtles are hard-wired - not that they have no capacity for learning, but they are primarily creatures of instinct.

[weemumlessmngrl.livejournal.com]

That is exactly what I meant. You were at one point trying to say that you didn't believe that maternal instincts existed, and my point was that if you've never had children, you wouldn't know. I didn't mean it to be some insult or "swarmy comment" or anything more than that.

I think I even said in a comment that when I was a kid and my dad would be talking about instincts, I thought he was just lying to guilt me into stuff. It wasn't until Lorelei was born that I realized that he might have been actually telling me the truth.

[conuly]

But I don't think *any* instincts exist - and I certainly think that most people use the word so vaguely that it's not worth discussing.

Even if I did think they existed, I'd need to see some hard evidence to accept your idea that men and women have different sets of instincts.

Swarmy comment? Do you mean snarky? You can't mean smarmy.... *is confuzzled*

[conuly]

Oh, wait, you do. I need some sleep.

Incidentally, because I *know* people take this the wrong way, I wasn't asking to say "wow, you can't spell, ur stoopid!". I was asking because I was actually confused.

[weemumlessmngrl.livejournal.com]

Hey, don't question the usage of "smarmy"... that's how one of your friends described me.

[conuly]

I'm not, actually. At first, I really didn't know what you meant, so I tried to figure it out. Then I saw that you'd been replying to somebody else who had called you smarmy, and it made sense.