Family is highly underrated these days by piratenews

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Family is highly underrated these days

POSTED BY: PIRATENEWS
UPDATED: Wednesday, January 13, 2010 23:52
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Tuesday, January 12, 2010 5:12 PM

John Lee, conspiracy therapist at Hollywood award-winner History Channel-mocked SNL-spoofed PirateNew.org wooHOO!!!!!!

With all the propaganda that having a family is for losers, what are your experiences where family saved your ass? Animals included.

Discuss amongst yourselves...

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Tuesday, January 12, 2010 6:54 PM

BYTEMITE

...I was born? I mean, that's pretty big. There may have been a lot of emotional neglect since then, partially because of the way I rejected affection and shows thereof as a weakness (read: total bitch and general burden), but I'm pretty sure it'd all be moot if not for that.

And I've been suicidal, and only the thought of how much it would suck for my family has stopped me. Though even that's seeming more and more unimportant and insignificant nowadays. Cats also helped, because they're fluffy and make good sponges, and sometimes will let you glomp them.

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Tuesday, January 12, 2010 7:00 PM

CHRISISALL

Tribbles helped.

The Enterprise crew was my family- more recently the crew of Serenity. Both helped me through the tough times.

The laughing Chrisisall

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 12:18 AM

FILLYGIRL

Operative: "Its worse than you know..." Mal: "It usually is."

My sci-fi family has always been more helpful and loyal then my real family. Strange, isn't it.
My cats are my 'soul mates', 'cause they live with me everyday, and haven't run away yet.

Chaplain of the 76th Independant Battalion

Do not bother dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!

...it's worse than you know...Operative
...it usually is.....Mal

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 7:05 AM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Cats also helped, because they're fluffy and make good sponges, and sometimes will let you glomp them.

Same with tribbles.

The laughing Chrisisall

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 8:51 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Funny, I didn't think all the propaganda was about having a family meaning losers, quite the opposite. I hear far more mournful cries blaming lack of traditional family "destroying" America.

For me, my family provided everything material all my younger years, but none of the support and affection it takes to make a "healthy" child. I instinctively rebelled and left the soonest I possibly could. Took me years and years to even SEE the harm that was done to me, and some of it I've never been able to erase, try tho' I might. My life might have been better if my parents had divorced when I was young; the bitterness and narcisim of my mother might have made it worse, but her hatred of my dad was bad enough to scar me. My dad offered nothing, he hid in his room most of the time and took her abuse, and he DID give me a sense of tolerance, but little more.
It was years and a lot of work that allowed me to let go of the anger and resentment I carried because of her screwd-uppedness. I don't think "traditional" family has it over one-parent family or whatever, it's the quality of the upbringing that counts, not whether one has both parents and fits the "normal" definition.

My dogs, yes, have often been my salvation. They were the only ones I could turn to safely. Those on the website I run are the closest thing I've ever had to a supportive "family", and I treasure them for that.

I think it's healthier when we CHOOSE who we call "family" once we're older; family dynamics, fucked-up parents, childhood messages, so much goes into screwing up a person that considering "family" people who take us as we are, rather than through the veil of "child" that parents never lose, has been better for me. So it's the quality of the upbringing that matters to me, not how the family is structered, and rejecting my family of origin saved me.

Can't think of much I'd credit my family of origin with aside from provision of material stuff.

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 12:25 PM

FREMDFIRMA

Actually the whole "Family of Choice" is a little discussed theme amongst mental health professionals cause it's so far at odds with the political and legal whims of the adult populace...
ESPECIALLY in light of the simple fact that the DNA leash is all some parents really have to keep the kid from telling them to piss up a rope and heading for the hills the very moment they begin to realize that how they are being treated isn't right, and without that myth, that legal assertation, those so-called parents have no way to bring the law in and enforce their dominion.

But it *IS* a myth.

Me, my mother was very supportive, even an active participant in my anti-establishment bent, but so rarely present I was pretty much my own person from the beginning of real sentience, and while I was pretty much emotionally isolated, I didn't have much in the way of stumbling blocks or hassle that didn't come externally, from the very system my mother was encouraging me to undermine.
That and from the moment I can remember, if I *wanted* to do, or not do, something badly enough, well....
*laughs*
No WONDER folks hated me so, as a child - especially one who'd get up in their case and call them out, a brazen yet articulate little prick who absolutely could NOT be intimidated...
Man, I woulda hated me too!

Seriously though, my Family of Choice, my "Clan", as it were, is everything to me, whether they even like me or not, I do have some profound paternal feelings towards everyone I've ever helped or rescued, or even folks I have a history of thought provoking discussion with, whether they're younger than me or not.

Family by Choice: selecting your own 'kin'
http://www.udel.edu/PR/Messenger/97/2/family.html

"Invent Your Own Healthy Family"
http://www.humanpotentialcenter.org/Articles/InventYourOwnFamily.html

And yes for those of us who don't connect well with humans, there's always non-human "people" to connect with, in fact I think the first time I ever meaningfully connected with my own kind was actually bleedover from taking care of the class pet - which was the entire intent and reason behind that teacher getting one in the first place.

Note that even as I type this, Kallista is back in the kitty room by the bowl howling "where the hell's the FOOD?!"
Furry little spoiled ROTTEN children, I tellya...

-F

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 12:43 PM

BYTEMITE

Yeah, but she's HUNGRY! Must eat now!

My cats have a special breakfast separate from their regular food. On the weekdays, we all get up around five, but on weekends, the cats do not abide the humans sleeping in. They require immediate attention and feeding.

Your link to inventing a family is especially relevant considering how that's a major theme in this little show that brought us all together.

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 12:48 PM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by Fremdfirma:

Note that even as I type this, Kallista is back in the kitty room by the bowl

Her?

The laughing Chrisisall

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 1:38 PM

FREMDFIRMA

Close.

What's funny is that her name is actually a corruption of a foreign word for "Bloodthirsty".

And yes, the irony of that fact isn't at all lost on me, Byte - because that whole concept was one of the things that drew me in so deeply into Firefly in the first place, when Mal says "My Crew" that may be what's coming out of his mouth, but his heart is saying "My Family".

River knows this best of all, two things jumped out at me from the series, from the episode "Safe".

First, she doesn't freak when Shepard is hit, she freaks when MAL *sees* Shepard wounded, very telling in that her "bond" is to Mal, specifically, and unless I am mistaken she refers to him as "daddy" just prior to the Big-Damn-Heros moment as well, they VERY much have a Stern Father, Bratty Daughter dynamic goin on there, with Simon as the Son-whos-gone-a-different-way, and even Jayne as Mal's idiot-younger-brother...

So yes, Firefly is all about Family of Choice, that's one of the main reasons I liked it.

-F

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 2:25 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)

Quote:
So yes, Firefly is all about Family of Choice, that's one of the main reasons I liked it.

Ditto Buffy and Angel as well.

And yes, while I *DO* have ties to my blood relatives, I'm actually far closer with my friends, my "family of choice", and it's them that I call first with good news or bad.

Mike

Work is the curse of the Drinking Class.
- Oscar Wilde

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Wednesday, January 13, 2010 11:52 PM

PIRATENEWS

John Lee, conspiracy therapist at Hollywood award-winner History Channel-mocked SNL-spoofed PirateNew.org wooHOO!!!!!!

I phoned a friend today. First time I spoke to him since his stroke. Lots of memory loss, can barely walk, can't drive, can barely see. 47 years old. Divorced. No wife or kids to take care of him. Living with his elderly parents during rehab. Can't even remember the name of his lawyer. He apparently missed his window of opportunity for a family life... Says he'd be better off if the stroke had killed him. It took 4 hours for cops to find him unconscious after he called 911. Docs drilled a hole in his head. Too late to get a family now?

Then I got a call from my mom. Her husband died today. Botched surgery for intestinal blockage. Turned out he was full of cancer, and he bled out. But he was laughing this morning. Age 55. So that's going on this weekend.

As for me, I'd probably be dead now except for my wife. And my cats, dogs, birds and fish. Rest of the family damn near kilt me. Died once at the dentist, floated around out of body laughing my head off, then the idiots remembered to turn on the O2.

Sometimes family is overrated. Sometimes not.

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