Nutnfancy's Philosophy on Parenting

[J. D. Stembal]

Since his channel was mentioned on the call in show last week, I thought it would be fruitful to discuss his recent parenting video. A lot of YouTubers are beginning to promote their own parenting ideas online. He's a retired military officer, and self-proclaimed constitutional conservative.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J12eGSkrsvM

 

He started off in an open and philosophic manner, discussing his family, but there were several issues that kept derailing the overall message for me.

 

1) He compares raising children to owning dogs, alluding to it multiple times on different topics.

 

This is a big one, and I encounter it all the time. People want to afford natural rights unto animals out of need to protect their inner helpless child, but Nutnfancy goes one step further. In order for him to compare a dog to a child, he either has to lower the moral capacity of child down to that of an animal, or elevate the moral authority of a dog to that of a child. He succeeds at neither, because it's not possible to put two different animals, human and non-human, into the same category. Frankly, it serves as a means for him to rationalize disciplining his children like he would a dog (punish, hit, train, shun in the corner). He even goes as far as to say that you shouldn't allow a child to eat when they are hungry, just like you don't feed a dog that is begging for food. He also admits that his mother couldn't provide him enough food sometime during his childhood.

 

2) He preaches an ethic of "de-pussification" which honors toughness, strength and independence.

 

While I don't think that these qualities in themselves are necessarily bad, he takes it nearly to the level of man up without actually saying man up.. As a father of two boys and ex-military, I can see where he would take great pride in these qualities. He claims that his wife is also tough, but goes out of his way to say that she weighs 105 lbs., as if this excuses her from the level of toughness a man should possess. The story he tells about smashing his hand in a car door, thinking he broke something, and then persevering to demonstrate his level of toughness to his children crosses the border into foolhardy, and probably comes directly from his father and military experience.

 

3) Children should not be in charge of their own childhoods.

 

He refers to this phenomenon several times as "pop-culture parenting" or "default parenting" and says this is directly responsible for the degeneration of our society, looking at media exposure very critically. I was amused by this because in many of his gun review videos, he brings up notable weaponry from modern games which his children obviously play. He once said in a video, "I will guarantee you that my kids are playing them right now." If he is such a big proponent of being an involved parent, and decreasing media time, why is he recording video while his kids play video games? He may be walking the line between hypocrite and a parent who practices what he preaches. How hard is it just to not bring that stuff into the home? If you aren't playing video games or messing around with your computer all the time, chances are your kids won't either.

 

4) He demonstrates no knowledge of negotiation with children.

 

Following up from point #3, you knew this one was coming from the beginning of the video when he is trying to get his two year old son to finish eating his dinner. His son is mad, and keeps pleading that the request is "stupid" while Nutnfancy comments that this is going to be fun. He eventually bribes his son by asking him if he wants to play a game, and when his son says that he does, he immediately offers to play the game only if his son finishes his vegetables. While on the surface, this seems like a perfectly reasonable negotiation, it is not because it is an attempt to deny his son an activity he enjoys with his father simply because he doesn't want to eat. My own parents would do this to me all the time. If I didn't clean my plate of all the food, I had to sit at the kitchen table until bed time, if necessary, missing out on fun family bonding time. Mostly my parents would watch television in the next room, while I slowly chewed and swallowed every bite that I did not wish to eat, essentially training me to force feed myself. As an adult, I used to think that this expanded my nutritional horizons, but now I see it for what it is, emotional bullying.

 

5) A parent should not be recording his kids at every chance and releasing the footage online for all to see.

 

Kids have the right to digital privacy. Parents who post pictures or videos of their kids online before they have the capacity to make informed consent to a release, and signify that consent, is a violation of the NAP. You are stealing their childhoods away from them. This point also branches from #3. If you are spending time making tons of material for YouTubers, and your kids are playing Call of Duty, where's your parental contribution? Likewise, if you are playing camera man half the time your kids are growing up, you will have those memories saved, but this comes at the cost of being a parental influence because you are detaching yourself from your children's reality. Don't kid yourself as a parent. We all know that family home movies are for the parents to make themselves feel good from remembering "the good times" despite their parental shortcomings. To prove this observation, Nutnfancy shows no home movies of the times he spanked his children or when him and his wife fought, although he does show a clip where hie accidentally throws his young son into a vaulted ceiling.

 

 

There were other comments that got me nodding my head, but I wanted to focus for now on the parts that made me wince.

 

What are your comments, feelings and reactions to this parenting video? If you are wondering why I posted it here, my purpose was to raise awareness that Stefan isn't the only voice out there when it comes to preaching parenting practices. I don't mean to insinuate that Nutnfancy's approach to parenting is peaceful either despite posting the topic in the Peaceful Parenting sub-forum.

[GasCap]

I have been following nutnfancy for about 4 years now. Referring to point 3, I am not so sure if he is dictating his kids' childhood. Some indications I have got from him is that he would like the knowledge and physical handling of firearms to be passed down in the nutnfancy family. I recall in previous videos he mentioned this was the family tradition and he wanted to keep it alive. So is getting your kids interested in what you are interested in, a form of controlling their future?

 

Also his kids and been on multiple adventures such as hiking, run and gun, motorcycle, camping, etc... so it seems to me that they have lots of good family memories together. On his elder son tactical doodle's channel, he posted a video saying how nutn spend a lot of free play/ role play time with toys etc... with him ( there is a play time that lasted 3 hours or more). Tactical doodle also mentioned that nutn would put away his supernintendo for months which is in accord with nutnfancy dislike toward video games. I would say he did his best in parental involvement. But for most parents who send their kids to school, peer influence would be a huge impact (downside) on the child especially when it comes to video gaming... I am still not so sure if he failed in terms of preping his child in terms of playing video games because I don't know how much time they spend on video games per day,week, etc...

 

hope we will have a good discussion 

[J. D. Stembal]

I have been following nutnfancy for about 4 years now. Referring to point 3, I am not so sure if he is dictating his kids' childhood. Some indications I have got from him is that he would like the knowledge and physical handling of firearms to be passed down in the nutnfancy family. I recall in previous videos he mentioned this was the family tradition and he wanted to keep it alive. So is getting your kids interested in what you are interested in, a form of controlling their future?

 

Also his kids and been on multiple adventures such as hiking, run and gun, motorcycle, camping, etc... so it seems to me that they have lots of good family memories together. On his elder son tactical doodle's channel, he posted a video saying how nutn spend a lot of free play/ role play time with toys etc... with him ( there is a play time that lasted 3 hours or more). Tactical doodle also mentioned that nutn would put away his supernintendo for months which is in accord with nutnfancy dislike toward video games. I would say he did his best in parental involvement. But for most parents who send their kids to school, peer influence would be a huge impact (downside) on the child especially when it comes to video gaming... I am still not so sure if he failed in terms of preping his child in terms of playing video games because I don't know how much time they spend on video games per day,week, etc...

 

hope we will have a good discussion 

 

I would say that if he wanted to strike to not be a pop culture parent, he would have to unschool or homeschool his children. Obviously, that horse has already left the barn. It no use bitching about how the new generation is so emotionally detached when you send them to a school that most likely wants to use Apple products to enhance the leaning experience. Children talk to each other digitally now, just as we are. (Go figure.) It is natural that the child will want to do all the things that his father and mother do, assuming there is a strong parental bond.

 

I took trombone lessons as a child, and then I wanted to quit after two years. (The music teacher was a hateful bitch.) My parents told me that the only way I could quit is if I started taking piano lessons. I don't recall ever wanting to play either instrument. This was a clear case where my preferences were being dictated to me (it is unclear by whom), indicating a very weak parental bond.

 

Parenting without media is almost a completely foreign thought to me. I was essentially raised by a television and computer. I know limiting exposure to media is the right thing to do as a parent, but I would obviously be at a loss navigating the lonely void that was my childhood while trying to parent. I don't presently have children, so it's a moot point for now.

[GasCap]

I would say that if he wanted to strike to not be a pop culture parent, he would have to unschool or homeschool his children. Obviously, that horse has already left the barn. It no use bitching about how the new generation is so emotionally detached when you send them to a school that most likely wants to use Apple products to enhance the leaning experience. Children talk to each other digitally now, just as we are. (Go figure.) It is natural that the child will want to do all the things that his father and mother do, assuming there is a strong parental bond.

 

I took trombone lessons as a child, and then I wanted to quit after two years. (The music teacher was a hateful bitch.) My parents told me that the only way I could quit is if I started taking piano lessons. I don't recall ever wanting to play either instrument. This was a clear case where my preferences were being dictated to me (it is unclear by whom), indicating a very weak parental bond.

 

Parenting without media is almost a completely foreign thought to me. I was essentially raised by a television and computer. I know limiting exposure to media is the right thing to do as a parent, but I would obviously be at a loss navigating the lonely void that was my childhood while trying to parent. I don't presently have children, so it's a moot point for now.

 

I think for a parent that is ok with sending their kids to school. He actually is doing a pretty good job. I believe he is more influence than dictate. He wants his children to have certain skillsets/experiences, ie guns handling,backpacking, motor bike etc... and I think he did more than a good job doing that. I don't think doodle was unwilling to go run and run with him since he successfully build doodle's interest on guns through early child gun handling and playtime with tanks and stuff. that being said I have heard him and the kids mention that camping, run and gun, back packing is a lot of work and not very fun.

 

stefan said that some things are not fun to learn or do at the moment but it's crucial for the kid's future such as reading. You still have to do it despite the kids unwillingness. of  course you will have as many conversations as possible to let the kid know why it is important to learn certain set of skills. The kids can thank you later and of course they never do.

 

 

Looking back to my childhood, I was a Overtime media kid. video games was everything and I regret every moment of it. My parents never interfered and I wasted probably 10 years of my life. I wish I had Stefan and Nutn as my parents to influence me back then.

 

I also had to learn piano. I didn't hate it but I didn't enjoy it and ended up quitting maybe 2-3 years in. I wish my parents had insisted because this would have been a nice skill to have.

 

 

But ya if you send your kids to school, it will turn into a battle of influences and from the families that I have encountered. The parents lost the battle.