AIBU to wonder at people experiencing natural consequences.

[RexWillKillYou]

do other people find it difficult to sympathize with people complaining when they experience Natural Consequences Stuff like:
you drank too much - hangover
you cheated on your spouse- your kids think you’re shit.
you live beyond your means- and you’re skint.
you refuse to go to engage with the diabetes clinic- and look what’s happened.

bad stuff happens to people (all of us) at some point without us doing anything. But we don’t have to give it a hand, and shut our eyes to a mess of our own making.

I don't think I actually said 'no child should ever take responsibility for their actions' though, what I implied was that, as a teacher you have some responsibility for safeguarding in areas you can control - I believe the glue gun was one of those cases, although cannot say 100% without knowing the age/intellectual capacity of the child.

How about you stop trying to 'muster up sympathy' and settle for keeping your big mouth shut when it comes to other people? Many of us have family members who are suffering because of their decisions in respect of health conditions that they didn't cause or anticipate. Your tone is bloody grating.

You say you have worse faults than being judgemental. Start with those and apply yourself with gusto to those rather than sticking your nose into other people's business and writing thick-witted threads.

I don’t know. Moaning is annoying, but I find I’m more irritated by, for example, a relative who loves to crow about people making their own choices. She recently directed this at my siblings because they work in low paid ‘nurturing’ jobs instead of managing hedge funds. They made ‘choices’, apparently, and shouldn’t complain that they struggle with the rising cost of living. She has a slightly better paid office job, and inherited an expensive house from a relative.

A lot of people I know who lack empathy for poor choices generally seem to me to have had a big stroke of luck somewhere along the way, and have forgotten about it.

It takes extensive reflection to understand one's own mixed motivations, and some might be better at it than others.

They didn’t cause or anticipate, but do have the power to engage with treatment. And equally the power and choice not to.

But if you are picking up the pieces /suffering because of their choices, then most people will be sympathizing more with you than them. Regardless of what any of us do with our big mouths.

...and in some cases, the correct support.

Such wise words. So true.

...and if that treatment doesn't actually exist how to do you suggest they engage with it? What 'power' do they have in that situation?

The pp said they are making decisions/choices about their illness. So I assumed there are choices, and the family member is competent to make the choice, and the pp it isn’t in enabling mode, running herself ragged helping them avoid the natural outcome of their decision.

I don’t know whether that is in relation to a cure, preventing worsening, shortening an episode. Not really relevant, I think, unless you had an example in mind.

Sometimes, although I do cut more slack for less privileged people for whom there can be more barriers to making the 'right choices' ; I've read some interesting articles by people who have lived in poverty, for example, giving very good reasons it was harder for them to make 'good choices' about things like nutrition, relationships, finances etc when they were without financial resources.

OK then OP. Answer this one for me. A kid does poorly in their G.C.S.E's. Is this a NC of being a lazy sod?

There is a lack of basic care and support for many medical conditions.

Do you think? I know I don’t ever blame rape victims.

maybe I am twisting here, but at the other end of the scale do criminals that ‘didn’t mean to’ deserve sympathy over their victim. We still put road killers/one punchers in jail even though they miss their kids, feel frightened, and are upset by the victim impact statement.

Is there never a point where we just say “I feel sorrier for your kids than I do for you”

If they are a lazy sod. Yes.

If they aren’t, and it’s poor or disjointed teaching/their sibling died that morning/they have undiagnosed dyslexia/they are a child carer (to
limit it to the examples personally known to me) then no.

If it’s a mixture then partially.

I think my sympathy wanes at the point where other people are affected by another individual's repeatedly reckless decision making.

I'm currently on a thread about an OW who is constantly whinging that her stepchildren spend too much time with their dad - I'm definitely all out of fucks to give on that one!
I'm also irritated by women who know their partners are complete shits, but then still go ahead and have several children with him. Then they act surprised when he does nothing at home and doesn't contribute financially. At some point, experience should tell you that something isn't a good idea and you should take ownership if you do it anyway. And I hate that their kids suffer for it.

But I would (and do) have sympathy for people with health conditions that are self inflicted because there are sometimes complex reasons why people can't help themselves. Or people who never had the groundwork growing up, to enable them in making good choices.

I agree, but then the choices/decisions thing wouldn’t be valid. Would it?

Not whining about it but I left school without completing my GCSE’s. It probably changed the course of my life. But I was only 16 and was in a social setup where it was normal. Because of my ignorance I wasn’t able to make the better choice

That's a bit different @Annaishere. You were a child and cannot he expected to have the same knowledge as experienced adults. So much of how children perform academically is linked to how they are parented and the life experiences of those parents.

I have never met an addict who didn't either have a significant family history of addiction, a serious trauma history or some degree of mental illness (often caused by the first two). If we actually funded proper mental health treatment AND drug rehabilitation longterm the benefit to society would be indescribable.

I've found my own life has become much more pleasant and peaceful since deciding not to assume the worst of people. I now assume that everyone has a reason for acting the way they do, and recognise that I'm just as fallible as everyone else, and prone to making "bad" decisions for my own complex reasons just like everyone else. I still feel sympathy for most people who suffer, because I don't want anyone to suffer.

@Annaishere I apologise if I caused offence. I was in no way suggesting that poor G.C.S.E grades were always a young person's fault. I was hoping to provoke an understanding of the complexity of the issue. Of course, teaching standards, parental involvement, having a quiet space to study, outside influences, gangs etc can impact grades.

Your OP is so self-righteous it hurts. It reminds me of a particularly odious primary school teacher I had who used to warble "I've no sympathy for you!" at crying children. No idea why it made her feel good to kick people while they were down; maybe you could explain it to me?

Which was exactly my point. 🤔

I know loads of y11 students who despite being very able fucked about in their mocks in autumn 2019/early spring 2020.

Then along came covid which cancelled their exams, and they got teacher-assessed-grades which very accurately evidenced how much they had fucked about in their mocks. So so many able kids got exactly the consequence that their teachers and parents had been warning them about by not putting in the effort.

Outside covid, unfortunately there will always be kids who don't get high grades due to lack of ability, for whom learning just doesn't click. The otherwise academically able kids who piss about in class and don't do any revision certainly deserve the shit grades they will inevitably receive. Then they will spend a good chunk of their adulthood regretting their CHOICES.

@BlueRabbitYellow im not offended. My parents were actually really angry with me. I just thought oh I’ll go to college later. I wanted to work just very short sighted of me, thinking I knew it all.