[Eric Revelin]

What's interesting is the way different people approached this based on the initial post.

The first post didn't give us much information. This kid had an opportunity to get a job and he didn't take it. He got yelled at and he smirked. He felt it was due to his parents being at a lower level of consciousness.

None of that in itself shows arrogance or a sense of entitlement. It implies it, but it doesn't prove beyond a shadow of a doubt whether or not this is the case.

Think about the forum this is posted in and how the main site advocates avoiding conventional employment and using your mind to create the kind of reality you want to live in. It also talks about things like intuition and subjective reality and many other topics that are along the same lines. One interpretation of the initial post is that he felt, intuitively, that this job is a bad fit and he should hold out for something else. He knew that his parents wouldn't understand but when the moment of truth came he laughed, not out of disrespect for them, but because he understood something they don't. Things will turn out for him in the end in a way that's agreeable to all parties.

Is that interpretation valid? Unless you can read minds or you are extremely intuitive, no. There's not enough information to prove that's what he was thinking and feeling. It is, however, a demonstration that perception is everything and things may not be as they appear.

In more general terms, there is often a lack of respect from children toward their parents, but parents do not always do right by their children. In extreme cases you have rowdy little brats that spit upon their loving mothers from birth til adulthood without ever giving their parents their proper due. The other extreme is abusive parents that stifle creative thought and instill the idea that life is suffering, it is only suffering, buck up, get used to it and go get a job, any job, no matter your interests, so you can help support us. (To clarify: you need money to survive. Nothing wrong with that or encouraging someone to find some work so they can contribute either while they figure themselves out or they get something going. There is a problem with the survivalist mindset that says this is the only concern in one's life.) Either extreme is very rare with most cases falling within shades of grey. That is, you have loving parents who try to be understanding but do not always do right by their children, and they fail to handle situations like this with the kind of finesse that would lead to a harmonious outcome for both them and their children.

Parents are often judgemental and prone to jumping to conclusions even when they don't mean to. Having personally dealt with a parent like this, no amount of reason is enough to get through to them. On the other hand you have children who fail just as badly at understanding the position of their parents. They focus on how they were messed up by what was done to them and what they were taught, and they never express thanks for what their parents did right. They are often uncooperative and they feel a sense of entitlement because, "this is what you did to me and this is how you can make it right."

Now, not all these things hold true in every shade-of-grey case, but you'll find elements of it in nearly any situation. This is why a combative attitude on anyone's part only makes things worse. The parties involved aren't enemies, or at least they shouldn't be. Children aren't always dumb, know-nothing creatures who need to be told what to do and how to live. The actions they take aren't always totally nonsensical, even when they're not understood. Similarly, not all parents are old fogies whose only desire is to make their children into little mini-mes that will carry on their will after they have joined the earth as dust and bone.

I am from a school of thought that says respect needs to be earned, no matter who you are, even if you're a parent. Simply being a parent does not entitle one to respect, nor is it a shield from criticism. It's a hard job, but it's one you sign up for the moment you remove your pants. You know what you could potentially get yourself into. You don't actually know what you're getting yourself into, but you know [intellectually] what you're getting yourself into. (to illustrate what I mean, imagine a couple that's ecstatic to have a child, then imagine that same happy couple falling asleep in the middle of angry sex because they haven't got any sleep since they brought the baby home. It was angry sex because, being so sleep deprived, neither of them is feeling particularly chipper. They started having sex because they were yelling and throwing things and they figured this was a better means of trying to release the tension since they can't afford to replace their lamps or dishes because of the baby.) Feeding and clothing and educating a kid is incredibly time consuming and expensive, but there are ways to half-ass this job to the point where doing enough to maintain the child's existence isn't actually doing the poor runt any favors. The cost and the time invested will be nothing compared to the resources the child later spends on therapy. Plus, considering the social stigma (and legal penalties) that goes with not doing your job as a parent is enough to motivate even the worst of them until the kid turns 18. The point of all this? The kid is not always at fault and parents don't always deserve one's time and attention. Sometimes they are very toxic figures in a person's life.

I could write plenty more, but this is long and I should get to the point: immediately defending one side or the other is a bad play. In this case I'd wager neither the original poster or the parents are blameless. Neither of them are worth defending, nor does either side need a defense. They need to work this out amongst themselves. A little laughter concerning this whole situation is hardly a bad thing. I hope collegekid finds the work he was born to do.

To touch on one last point quickly: it doesn't seem like the "you have to do things you find unpleasant" work ethic is the best thing to instill within a child. I've found for myself that two varieties of work ethic work a lot better for me: "Do what you wish to do, no matter the odds, no matter who would stand against you; you must listen to your heart and do what it longs to do." and "Sometimes you will do things you find unpleasant. Don't just suck it up and accept the unpleasantness. Maybe you have to do it but it doesn't need to be torture. Find the positive. Figure out how you can turn this into an opportunity to learn and grow. See if there is a way you can enjoy it by changing your perspective." Anybody can be tough and cold in this world, where we are told day after day that we must suffer in our work and we must accept it. It takes guts and ingenuity to transmute these experiences into something better, and ultimately to pursue what our soul desires. This change in perspective has worked so well for me that I wish my parents had instilled it in me instead of the classical work ethic they taught. I'm still grateful since that programming gave me a challenge to overcome. It showed me what didn't fit and what didn't work, and that caused me to search for something else.

Bless the parents, bless the children. No matter what our roles are we are all simply looking for our way in life and a bit of understanding on both sides does a lot of good.