• metaltoilet@hexbear.net
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    5 months ago

    We did it because: A) it was nice for 10 year old me to have some money to spend on candy or whatever dumb things my parents didn’t want to pay for. B) Learning to prep, prepare, and sell it really did give me an appreciation for the workers who have to do it every day. C) It was just fun.

    • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
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      5 months ago

      Kids should not be getting into any of this shit until they’re 16. Before that the only shit they should be doing is like an hour on a paper round and only when they’re 13+.

      It’s absolutely culturally damaging to a society to groom kids into this as totally normal at a young age and the message it sends to adults across society as well is that if kids can be doing it then why aren’t you. That it’s your own fault for not having the hustle to earn - even kids can do it. It reinforces some of the worst aspects of capitalism.

      You may have enjoyed it and you may want to defend those memories you have of it and may even get a twinge about me saying negative things about something that is fundamentally american in culture (a little nationalist defensiveness perhaps) but all of that does not change the fact its impact is fundamentally reinforcing capitalism. It should be dismantled but attacking something children do is inherently difficult because people will stand up and argue the kids enjoy doing it in defence of it to set you as the bad guy.

        • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
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          5 months ago

          Sexual grooming and the act of grooming children for a specific social outcome are different things and that should be inherently obvious from the context.

          I will not use another word. It is an act of grooming intended to achieve a specific social and cultural outcome beneficial to corporate america.