The Sovereign Child: A Libertarian Approach to Parenting?

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Stephan Livera podcast brought to you by Bold. Joining me today is the author of The Sovereign Child, Aaron Stupple. Aaron, welcome to the show.

Thank you so much, Stephan.

So Aaron, let's talk a little bit about this whole, thing. Maybe we'll start with a little bit, background on yourself, right? Like about your journey of, being a parent and, what I guess drove you to go and write this book.

Sure. so I, I live in upstate New-- or was, grew up in upstate New York and, on the East Coast in, in the US, and, I was always had a, an amateur interest in philosophy and got interested in- various, you know, schools of philosophy over the years while I was, you know, I was a teacher, high school science teacher for a while, and then, then I went to medicine, so I'm a practicing internal medicine doctor, and, And I kind of bounced around from school of thought to school of thought, and, eventually I got very interested in the ideas of David Deutsch. he's a Oxford physicist, he's famous for essentially laying the foundation for quantum computing, but he also is, a well-known philosopher, developer of, you know, philosophy of science, but not just of science, really philosophy writ large, and he is a, say, a devotee, a follower He's a student of the Karl Popper school of, of philosophy, and, Popper was, was a, was an epistemologist, so his big topic was the theory of knowledge and the philosophy of knowledge, and, your audience will be obviously aware of Friedrich Hayek, and he and Hayek were buds, and so there's a lot of overlap between their different outlooks. And, nonetheless, through David Deutsch and his, kind of elaboration or development of the ideas of Popper, Deutsch has a theory of childhood basically, and he was actually, A founding member of this, school of thought called Taking Children Seriously, which was, which is unique. It was mainly popular in the nineties and the early two thousands, largely in the UK, and it's since kind of petered out. But when I had my first kid, I discovered these ideas, and, you know, David Deutsch had been very influential to me, and then I had the, you know, the question of, "Was I really gonna..." Apply these ideas to my own kid, and, the short story is yes, and now I've got, we've got five of them. the oldest is seven, and me and my wife are really on the same page, which is an extraordinary blessing. And so, kind of embodying these i-ideas of David Deutsch's ideas with taking children seriously, there's some other folks involved in this school of thought as well, most notably Sarah FitzClarence. you can find her, she's done several podcasts and she's working on a book of her own. But largely the, the presence of these ideas was very small online. And, as I was tweeting about them more and more and, basically made the decision to write a book, and- And that's, that's, that's how I got to here. it had some, gotcha.

And I guess also in terms of your influences, as I was reading now, as I, I wasn't able to finish the whole book 'cause I was, I was busy with BTC Prague the last week or so. So sure, sure. I got, I, I think I got about seventy-five, eighty percent of the way through, so most of it. as I kind of read from your intro, I think you also kind of- were influenced by other sort of libertarian kinds of ideas, like the sovereign individual and things like this as well. So, so can you explain a bit of that as well?

Yes, and I, I, I left this out of the book almost completely, from an overt sense, but, the way I see it is that this is a libertarian approach. Like, I'm in time

for you, yeah.

Yeah. so I should also mention my collaborator before going too far, Logan Chipkin. so he's a good friend. He's, he's the Basically, he understands the philosophy deeper than I do, and so he was able to make sure all the arguments, really land. It's not just me kind of shooting from the hip, and, And yes, and so I, I see this book as, we see this book as, as really, a libertarian approach to childhood, to parenting. you know, it's a bold claim, but that's what we're claiming. It's, it's a freedom-maximizing, view on parenting. but it's not a view of neglect. That's the, the real key here. It's not saying, you know, you're, you're on your own, I don't have any responsibilities for you. Instead, the parent is deeply obligated, but at

authoritarian practices.

Now, people in this, let's say, in this, while we're in this niche, they might be familiar with, let's say, peaceful parenting and this kind of idea by, Stephan Molyneux and I think some other people. So where would you place your book in relation to that?

I would say it's unique. so I think, basically all views on parenting, essentially come down to a question of where do you draw the line, where do you draw the line? Which things do you allow and which things do you disallow? And different schools of thought prefer that line to be closer or farther away from authoritarianism, basically. Molinist quite far from it, and, But in the end, almost everybody says, "You know, you have to draw the line somewhere. You have to set firm boundaries somewhere. Kids need structure, they need, limitations. you know, and the, and the arguments go from there. You can't just let the kid run off into the street. You can't let them just use drugs, et cetera, et cetera. So there need to be some firm boundaries, but, you know, most people, I would say for this audience..." You know, they value autonomy, they value freedom, they want their kids to have freedom and autonomy, they want them to be, you know, self-assertive and, and all the rest, but that has to be within a reasonable structure, and that's the, that's the typical argument, which I was quite persuaded of myself. and what this book does, what this philosophy does, is say that that's actually a-- it's actually not the best question for parenting. there's a better question than, "Where do we draw the line?" And the better question is, how do we resolve the problem that we're having in a way that supports your safety, your health, et cetera, but doesn't involve me? controlling things. It doesn't involve me deciding what the outcome will be, that doesn't come down to, at the end of the day, myself being the authority. and that is,

okay. And so I guess before we sort of go further as well, the same kind of ideas like people will sort of wanna understand what are, what are your results, you know? Like, right. I wouldn't listen to, a fat personal trainer, you know what I mean? Like, I, I wanna know How, and listeners will probably wanna know, what-- how are things going with your five children so far?

Yeah. The short answer is it's going terrific. The- Other answer is that I, I don't think, I also think that is a mistake, no offense. yes, you wouldn't listen to, an overweight trainer, perhaps, but an overweight person can know, Can know, you know, good exercise technique, right? They can know, a lot about healthy diets, whether or not they apply them themselves, doesn't tell you about the, the state of the knowledge in their minds. The, the, the truth or falsity of what they know depends on whether it's true or false. For sure.

For me, I'm not saying it's wrong because they're fat, I'm saying- you know, just for obvious credibility reasons, yeah, you as the person looking at them should think, "Well, you know," Why, why do they have credibility? You know, that's, that's more what I'm saying. It's not, of course, a person, a fat personal trainer can tell you, you know, eat healthy, get a good night's sleep, and lift weights and all these things. Right, right, exactly. Right. They could say that, and it might be the right thing to do, but, you know, you're gonna-- if you, the outside observer, have to look and choose between, okay, a fat personal trainer and, you know, one who seems in shape

It's more just like people wanna know that you have either correctly done something, otherwise you could just be someone who's just talking. And how do you know?

Right. I would say it's a, it's a good, useful heuristic. It's a quick criticism to say, okay, well, this person, right, their family is in disarray, their kids hate each other, they're fighting all the time, right? You know, if my, if my, my kids were doing terribly, that would be a great reason to say, you know what, I'm not even bothering with

I'd say, you know, everybody's a big fan of their own kids, but things are going extraordinarily well. people remark that our home is peaceful, our kids are polite, they, don't seem to have strange, compulsions with things like screens and cookies and food, and ice cream, even though all those things are available in abundance. They have unfettered access to, everything in the house. In fact, we buy them, you know, if the kids are into cookies, we'll buy those cookies and make sure we have enough of them on

And you knew that they preferred, you know, certain foods, you would make them available even if you didn't think that they were good foods to be eating. so yeah, I would say things are going, things are going very well. Again, that was another part of this, it was, it was going so well. In the beginning, we had lots of fears about this, like, "Wow, you know, let them sleep whenever they want, whenever they're tired, let them eat, you know, as much ice cream as they want if they wanna have, you know, two bowls

And it is so clearly a, a, a peaceful, pleasant way to be that, that was a big inspiration for writing it down.

Okay, sure. So, I mean, obviously it's gonna be a bit out there and people are gonna, you know, a-and I think even from a libertarian perspective, it kinda depends on your specific you, because for, for some of us, libertarianism is more like it's specifically a statement about private property as opposed to sort of just Broad kind of, ideas of, you know, total autonomy, let's say, that, you know, it, it could be totally consistent for a person to, let's say, be libertarian from a legal theory perspective, but maybe a conservative in the home, let's say, things like this. but let's hear from you, what are some of the reasons or some of the ways you've found? You know, not, let's say, imposing some form of discipline on your, your children, that have, you know, caused them to be, let's say, well-adjusted, children.

Yeah. I'll just take, like, just take politeness, you know, I really want my kids to be polite, right? It's not like I don't care about the outcomes. I care deeply. I think politeness is, is very important, courteousness, et cetera, and respect. The question is, what is the best way to help a kid, right? I think the role of the parent is to help them understand this, not to simply act this way, right? And if you are producing certain behaviors, but the understanding is, Confused or, you know, if a kid is behaving in, in the way that I want, but they're doing it because they're afraid of me, that's not, that's not the outcome I want. I don't, I don't think that's the outcome most people want. What you really want is the kid to be polite because they understand why being polite is a good idea. They understand the norms of politeness, they might not ex-understand them explicitly, but they understand that people respond better when you pause to interrupt their conversation, when you say things like please and thank you, and are extraordinarily subtle and nuanced. And if I force my kid to say thank you, if I force them to say, "You know, this is crucial, this isn't no, there's no discussion about this, right? For your own good, I need to make sure that you say thank you every time, and, you know, you need to apologize every time you cross the line, right?" If, if that is extremely important for me It's even more important for me that my kid understands why. And when I force them to say please and thank you, part of their understanding is that, "Well, I say please and thank you so that Dad doesn't..." Give me a hard time, right? I say please and thank you to appease my father, not to express genuine gratitude. And so I think that, that gets at the heart of it, that when you force things on kids, you confuse their understanding of what these things are for. And, you know, jumping to a libertarian perspective, right? It's, it's that, you know, we're all solving our own problems within our own unique circumstances in our own way. We're all figuring this out as individuals, and no third party can understand the nuances of the problems, of our problem situation better than we understand them ourselves, right? So as adults, right? We recognize that, you know, a third party wants to impose regulations or somehow get involved in my transactions, well, they don't really know what I'm after. And so not only is that morally wrong, but that's also degrades the value of what we're transacting, right? If you're making it hard for us to have this transaction, well, then that's, That's, you know, we're having to do extra work to get around you to deal with your confusion about what we are actually doing here. And so I think the same fundamental thing is happening with kids, that a kid getting a present from grandma and grandpa has the problem of, "How do I express thanks? How do I express gratitude?" And if I jump in there, I'm going to- To pause, let's say, to, to say thank you, you're, you're, you're reading the other person's body language, right? You wanna see if your thanks have landed, right? And so you want the kid to be paying attention to the person they're thanking or the person they're apologizing to, and you don't want them to be paying attention to, again, some third party. So, that's a, that's a quick, a quick stab at it.

I see, yeah. And so, can you explain a bit, maybe at a more general level, as you said, this idea of- Taking children seriously. I think that's probably, that's probably the heart of this, isn't it? It is. That, you know, I guess most people would be of the view that, okay, look, kids haven't developed yet, they need to be taught things like, okay, manners, what's the right way to treat other people, you know, don't hit other people, don't take their stuff, you know, like, you know, certain social elements of how we play with them or trade or talk with them, or even, you know, self-management things like how manage our own diet and our body and, sleeping at a certain time. So can you explain for us this broad idea of taking children seriously and why, you know, why that is your chosen approach here?

Yeah. So again, the title is from, Deutch and Fitzclaridge, and they kind of picked it, they, they had to like, it was hurried. I don't know, they were, they were doing something, and they needed to have a title for this thing, so they-- it was the best they can come up with at the time. But I think it's a really terrific title because, what you're taking seriously is the kid's reasons, and that is, I think that is the, the heart of this, is that we dismiss kids' reasons

Or in tune to their reasons, right? That we understand the reasons are, are everything, especially, you know, loved ones in our lives, right? If our wife, if my wife is doing something I don't like, doing something strange or something risky to herself or to her health or whatever it is, my first thought is, "What? You know, what's, what's going on? What are you thinking? How come you're-- Right? If she's suddenly drinking a lot or using drugs,

it's not, you know, you, you, you can interested in drugs. and I think the same thing applies to kids even more so, is that, you know, if a kid is being rude, you want them-- you want to understand their reason for being rude. and to correct it, you want to correct the reason more than the behavior, and, and I guess that's the, that's the, the whole thing that the, the reasons are more important than the outcomes. the outcomes can be, you know, you, you have time to fix that. It's childhood, there's years here, right? The kid has time to become, to have manners and become polite. In the moment, you know, if they don't understand what "I'm sorry" is, if they're two years old, if I just say, "I don't care what your reasons are, I'm gonna make you say I'm sorry," then you're, you're doing another thing. What you're doing is you're giving them a reason, that's unconnected with,

what regret, right? If you give them a, you know, make sure you apologize, say you're sorry, you're giving them fear, you're giving them anxiety about their dad, you're giving them reason to be a little bit on guard when their dad is around. The thing is, kids like adults are always constantly generating reasons for how the world works and for what they're going to do next, and that, that process isn't able to be controlled. that process is, you know, the, the, the foundation of freedom, that we are all individually generating reasons all the time, and, and again, an, an external person can't know what our reasons are exactly, and they can't know what reasons we're gonna develop in the future. So, so if I limit your access to cookies, the kid is gonna start thinking up reasons, maybe Dad's a, maybe he's a jerk, maybe, maybe cookies are, are poison, maybe cookies, you know, if you eat too many cookies, you-- maybe I'm a bad person, right? Maybe I'm, I'm a bad kid for wanting too many cookies, right? These reasons are going to pop up in their minds Even if we're imposing rules, and I would say especially if we're imposing rules, part of their reasoning is going to be about how to get around you, how to deceive you, the parent, how to present a false persona to you. So, taking children seriously is taking their reasons seriously, and, and the question is, how do you, how do you deal with a reasoning being? How do you deal with a brand new baby, right? A, a, almost completely ignorant, helpless-

being who was generating their first reasons about the world. That's a, that's an awesome prospect.

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Yeah, I, I use the tooth-- brushing teeth is like the easiest example for me. And again, it's-- these things are all mundane, but, behind all of these. And, so brushing teeth, many parents would say, you know, if they're-- if they wanna promote autonomy, right, they'll encourage them to brush their teeth. If the kid doesn't wanna brush their teeth, they'll tell them why you have to, right? There's an explanation there, and I think that's great, except for, at the end of the day You know, regardless of whether you, agree with my explanation or not, the kid's brushing their teeth, that's the, the conventional view. And explanations like that often basically come across as getting a talking to, right? Nobody wants an unwanted lecture, and so- instead, as a, you know, taking their reasons seriously is-- I would say, you know, why is my kid not-- why do they not want to brush their teeth, right? And I try to understand the problem from their perspective. you know, understand it's, you know, it's limited, I can't understand it perfectly from their perspective, but I can make some guesses myself, right? Maybe they don't like the taste of the tooth pae-paste, maybe they don't like the feel of the toothbrush, maybe they, right? Maybe, Maybe they, they just don't like this kind of forced nature of this. you know, I-- So one way of addressing this is to say, "Hey, let's go to the store, right? We go shopping together all the time, and I let them pick out their own toothbrush. And there's, right? There's tons of different types of toothbrushes, and suddenly it's, it's their project, right? It's their..." You know, they have ownership

of it now, yeah.

Right? And so they are understanding, you know, the role of a toothbrush, what it, what the toothpaste is, that their preferences matter, that they have, well, certainly agency here, but also fun adds to it, right? it's not like I'm saying, you know, here's, here's what I want you to do, but, you know, you, you-- At the end of the day, you do whatever you want. Instead, it's perfectly valid, perfectly reasonable to make You know, there's, I don't think there's anything manipulative about that. Certainly, you, you can be manipulative in that regard, but what we do is we make a big deal about how brushing your teeth makes your breath smell nice, which is true. So we-- my wife and I will breathe our, our freshly brushed- Teeth breath at each other and we'll swoon and we'll make a big game out of it. you know, some of the kids love that, other kids that don't, you, you try a different game. But,

in that context, brushing teeth is understood as this pleasant thing that my parents do. It makes my teeth smell nice. I get to use this, you know, this toothpaste that I like the taste of, right? So everything about that in the kid's mind is about the actual, situation of brushing one's teeth. teeth, and it has nothing to do with an adversarial relationship with their mom or dad, right? So I've done two things. One thing is that everything about teeth brushing is real, right? It's about taste, it's about the feel of the brush in your mouth, it's about how your breath smells. Those are all, that's actual true knowledge about the world And, I've, I've, I don't have any adversarial issue going on here. I have no confusion about being forced to do this or that by mom or dad. I've given the kid no reason to think that dad's a pain in the ass or that, you know, I'm bad for not brushing my teeth, et cetera. And I, I would say that's the, that really gives you a, a picture of the whole thing. There's kind of two parts of it. One is taking no for an answer when they say no, and trying to modify things. What are they saying no about? Is it this? Is it that? Is it the taste? Is it the, right? And just keep on trying new and new things. And the other thing is, how can I make this appealing? how can I make this appealing in an honest way? right? If brushing-- I brush my teeth

Concepts that can be made fun and made appealing in their own sense and have a kid opt in voluntarily, and that's the magic. Can you create for all the norms in the world that they're really important? That means they work. Like politeness works, the rules of the road work, You know, the, language, right? The rules of language, the constraints of language work. So if they work, they're helpful, they'll, they're useful, and a kid will want to opt in if, and, and your job is to open these worlds up to them in a fun, inviting way, say, you know, If eating this way is great, then we're gonna make this really appealing to you, we're not gonna force you and badger you and punish you into eating well because, right? That, that, that right there is a good reason to be suspicious. If something is so great, why do I have to be, forced to do it?

I see. Yeah, so it's, it's a, I guess, an approach of finding ways to make it engaging for the child, a way to make the child feel like he or she has, has some choice, and they are choosing to do it for themselves. I guess the common question that a lot of people will have at this point is, "Well, what about providing some sense of structure or rules for the child?" Maybe a common example, and you, you, you were touching on this earlier, and I think you touched on it in the book. I think, okay, let me phrase the question this way. Yeah. The parents may be listening thinking, "Look, if I let my kid choose whatever they want, whenever they want, my boy is gonna eat ice cream and cookies every meal of the day. I-- is that, you know, is that a problem? How do you, you know, what do you, what do you find in your experience? And I know you touch on this in your book."

So there's two ways to look at this. One is if you take a kid that's been food restricted and screen restricted, right? And you open up the floodgates and give them sudden unfettered access, they're probably gonna binge for perhaps weeks at a time. and that's its own issue, and I could talk about that, but I think that is primarily a problem that has been created by a life of restriction, right? And so, putting that aside for now, if you start from the beginning, and, our kids have started from the beginning, we got them iPads as soon as they were interested in them. They all have their own iPad, and again, we have, you know, all the food that they like to eat is available, In abundance. That said, my kids don't b- just eat nothing but ice cream. you know, one of my kids will eat quite a bit of ice cream, but He, he's not eating only ice cream, he's eating some other things. So some days it might be all ice cream, but he's not sitting on the floor just like eating the whole bucket of it. he's not overweight. He, he understands How much is too much, right? Not on an intellectual level, but just on a visceral level, because he has always been the person who determines what he eats, basically. What he eats has never been modi-- mediated by a third party. And like I said, every, every mediation by a third party is a confusion. He doesn't have any confusion about, about food. And so, you know, one, one notable thing, they wanted, the kids wanted a gumball machine. So I bought this gumball machine, and it comes with a whole bag of gumballs. And he sat down and just ate like gum, piece of gum after piece of gum after piece of gum, chew it, swallow it, chew it, swallow it. He, he ate the whole bag. And then he went and puked. And that, that was it. I didn't say a word, I didn't say, "You know, it's gonna make you sick." I didn't, you know, he, he got to the point where it made him sick. and he almost never eats. We go to the store and buy candy, they buy bags of candy all the time. They, they never eat the full bag of candy. They get, they get sick of candy the way I do, 'cause candy is nauseating after. Like, the nice thing about I had that experience of

eating, of overdoing it, yeah, sure, overdoing it. But what about in examples? So obvious example, I mean, I'm sure people are thinking about this, about this too, is, is what I'm thinking about, because it's what I'm thinking about typically, What about when it's like something really dangerous that you can't afford for them to make that mistake? You know, like the kid shouldn't be playing with a chainsaw or playing on the edge of a cliff. You know, like the just obvious sort of, they're not gonna get the chance to make that mistake in a small way before it seriously injures or harms them or kills them.

Exactly. So your job is to, how do I, how do I help you do what you're, like, what, what are you after? Again, taking the reasons seriously. So if you're running out And no, I don't. I grab him and I drag him, I force him away from, out of the street, right? although you'd do the same for your friend who was wandering, stumbling toward a cliff, right? You'd tackle him to the ground. Is that coercion? That's not. That's saying, you know, I'm, I'm saving your life, and you would, you would, you're, you're happy that I did it once you realize what I did, right? Your reason is confused, you don't, you don't understand the danger that you But the question is, the, the conventional view is, well, then I have to make a rule. The rule is no running in the street, and that's what I'm objecting to. They're not gonna-- I'm not gonna let my kids run in the street, but it's not because I make a rule. Instead, I say, you know, what, what, what's attracting you to the street? Right? Often the kid wants to run in the street 'cause parents run after them. Right? So if we need someone to chase you around, let's get you in the backyard

The car and play with the car. So it's not about, and then I put a fence up so that, you know, the, the street isn't readily available to my kids, but the fence has a gate and, you know, it's not locked, like if they, you know, they- They're not imprisoned in the yard, but if they go through the gate, then I know to pay attention here and, you know, talk to them about the, you know, what I'm worried about if they- Go through the fence, and now we're careful about the cars. So their awareness of cars, I think, is at least as good, or not better, than other kids who are protected from cars, right? If the car is this evil, dangerous thing, and there's no rule about no going in the street, well, then you are blunting their understanding of The cars and traffics and the risks. you're also giving them reason to think that you're a, a buzzkill. You're giving them reason to think that they are bad or deficient in some way. They have this desire for running in the street and that's a bad thing. it sets up all these problems. Instead, I try to correct for those problems and in the, in the event that we are close to the street, I'm paying very close attention to them to make sure they're Understand what's going on, and if they do run in the street, I'm gonna grab 'em. So it's,

yes, I,

I'll

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You know, people addicted to this sort of whatever, cocoa melon or whatever, whatever, whatever it is. what's your view on this kind of concept around screen time and addiction and these things? And these things,

I think it's, short answer is it's, I think it's, it's nonsense. I think we are victims of some very bad ideas about screens. so why is that? it- The, another way to look at this is to say, you know, managing your own preferences, managing your own interests, that, that is what life is, right? Like you and I, we wake up and we're constantly making trade-offs, we're constantly reorganizing as we discover new things, those move up high, and then that has to push something else down, and any, any given moment, something that was minor becomes major, and, and- And that's, that is how we author our own lives. And our kids will become adults that do the same thing. And what kids are doing is they are, they're not just managing their preferences and priorities, they are building out the tree of- Preferences, and many preferences conflict. Ice cream conflicts with being thin, right? Watching the iPad conflicts with, you know, having a good relationship with your grandmother, let's say. And so the question isn't what are the best priorities, right? A, any libertarian would understand that, right? Like, no central authority tells us how to manage our preferences. and the-- and I think that's even more important for kids, because they're learning not only what they prefer, but they're learning that they're the author, and they're learning that they're the ones that move these around. And so- That's and when you introduce food, sleep, all of these things are the context in which you discover and develop and elaborate and, and modify your preferences. And so what you pay attention to is, I would say, like the most sovereign act, right? It's the, it's-- I would say, if, you know? If I was worried that my kids would grow up to be, you know, fearful and obedient to authorities, you know, I would, I would try to control what they pay attention to. That would be, you know, this idea that, Anyways, I'll stop there. So I think, what kids watch, I, I think the content is, you know, children's content is nauseating to most adults because we, we already know this stuff, right? When a kid's watching Coco Melons, it's the first time they've seen, you know, characters interacting, these shapes and colors and sounds and songs and whatnot, this is all new to them, and so they are indulging in this amazing, Digital content that is virtually free, how wonderful. iPad is the greatest thing for childhood, I think, since, since the last greatest thing. And so,

If a parent is trying to control screen time, you're just, you're introducing all the problems I was talking about before. Somebody else can, is, gets to be determinative of what you pay attention to, certain things that you like are actually bad, you're not to be trusted around interesting stuff, you have some vulnerable inner nature that needs to be policed by somebody else, the algorithm is out to get you, I mean, I can go on and on, and I can, I can talk about each one of these individual things, it's, it's a big co-topic, but sure, yeah. I'll, I'll, I'll pause you one, one, one last thing, sorry. Yeah, go on. since my kids have had unfettered access, they are, like, when their grandparents come to visit, they don't, the, the, last weekend they didn't use iPads at all. They were just interacting with my parents, because the iPad isn't some forbidden Glued to my phone, I use it when it's i-important to me, and then I put it away when something more interesting is around. And my kids function the same way

I see. So I think in the end, it sort of comes down to more like what's guidance versus what is a hard rule. I think that's sort of, you know, that maybe it's a sort of a distinction, I mean, 'cause I'm sure there are, as you, as you said, even with the road example, clearly we're not gonna let our kids like just run on the road and get run over by the car. So obviously there's like some rule about that, or it's, I mean, I don't know if you wanna call it a rule, but when catch them before they run onto the road, it-- both of us would do that with our children. So right. It's, it's not really a difference there, it's more just like, what is the way that you guide? them and maybe how permissive you are about aspects of things like, okay, food or screen time or things like this, where I could imagine there are differences or maybe, you know Other people who have children listening, maybe they have slight differences on exactly how permissive they would be.

one thing is, I do force my kids, right? On occasion, I'll force them to do this or that. getting in the car, often, right? Like, "Oh, gotta go and,

" or if you're in the airport and you're about

to take off, it's like, "Oh, definitely, those are, those are easily negotiable, you know? " Right, those are not negotiable, but, but But there's often, when I force my kids, it's a one-off episode. I never say, "The rule is, when I'm ready to go, you're at the door and you have to be paying attention and get in the car when I'm ready to go." instead, I'll say, "Shoot, you know, I, I wasn't able to prepare for this. Usually I can prepare them. Usually I get their clothes ready. I get ready myself a little bit early so we're not rushing out the door. I get them their iPads, write some snacks for the car, and like, it's fun, like, "Let's go with Dad. Oh, Dad's going off somewhere, and they, they wanna come with me. " And there's no element of force at all. But sometimes, that I don't have Prep for that, and I just gotta go, and they don't want to, and I just force them into the car, and they're screaming, and I'm holding them down, and I'm strapping them in the car seat. So I do do that on occasion. But when I do it, I don't say I, I, I explain to them and/or tell them that it's my failing, right? I didn't prep this for you, I'm sorry. you're coming with me, and I'm sorry. it's not about-- and so it's a one-off, I-- it's my fault. you know, I'm not begging their forgiveness or anything, I just say sorry, which is just different than reprimanding and lecturing a kid that, you know, you have to do what I say, when I say move, you move. and then this, and then it's not this recurring, you know, rule, every time we get, we leave the house, you, you know, get your shoes on and, right? If we're going off to school or wherever we go on a regular basis, you know, it's, it's not It's not the expectation, instead I say, "Well, you know, what was my failing that they didn't voluntarily get in the car? And how do I tweak things so that next time they voluntarily do get in the car?"

I see, yeah. one other interesting topic I noticed was this idea of wanting the child to be open with you so that you understand and you can catch things out early. I found that interesting. Can you elaborate a bit on that? Why is that important, and how do you achieve that?

So I'd say it's trust, right? parents will say, and you, you talk about outcomes, right? Let's say I was, you know, you want your kid to be healthy, you want them to be safe, et cetera, et cetera. How much do you want them to trust you? And, issuing controlling rules will degrade trust, and the reason why it will degrade trust, if there's, you know, only so many cookies, if there's only so much screen time, then when you, when you impose rules on a kid you establish yourself as a gatekeeper, and gatekeepers, kids can't help but think of reasons to get around the gatekeeper, right? To conceal things, to deceive, to lie, et cetera. and so- Whenever you present yourself as an adversary who will, who will-- even if you're not taking away their iPad, even if you're not controlling their food, if you might control their food, simply being the presence of somebody who might decide on a whim Seemingly to you, again, to take their reasons seriously for the kid, the ignorant kid, when a rule lands that they don't understand, it, it appears arbitrary and it might even appear to be personal, And so when somebody is arbitrarily controlling you, it's very reasonable for you to not trust them, right? And to, to tell them things that they wanna hear, to, certainly to lie, to deceive, and to create this false persona. and this was extraordinarily clear to me with, my daughter. She didn't wanna do first grade. She did kindergarten, but when first grade came along, she didn't wanna do it. And, we wanted to make sure that she understood as best as possible. But she was opting out of here, so we, we arranged to have her visit the class. And so we went for twenty minutes, she and I, we'd go to the school, but she didn't want me to leave her, and, so I was with her the whole time. We'd go in the classroom, and these are her friends from kindergarten, right? She hadn't seen them in a long time, and she was like joining in with them, and then they went out to recess, and she was playing around on the playground, and I thought for sure she was gonna You were so happy you're here 'cause she missed the first couple days of school. Are you gonna stay tomorrow? Are you gonna stay tomorrow? And she, she basically kind of shrivelled up into a little, you know Because it was so obvious that they were pressuring her, and she, and she, you know, she shook her head meekly and said, "Yes, she was gonna come back tomorrow." And we walk out of the building, and as soon as we go out the door, she said, "Daddy, I said yes, but I wanted to say no." And like, it just broke my heart, and I said, "You never have to tell me something that you don't think. You never have to put on a false face for me." And, and I think that's just absolutely precious, for the safety reasons, right? For the health reasons, for all the other reasons I want her to learn how to read and, and learn math and be productive and have a career, right? But I-- to, to get those things, my strategy is that she trusts me, she has no reason not to trust me, I'm never her adversary, I'm always on her side, right? Those people in the school were, were manipulating her, they were trying to get her, and you can see if you-- a life of School is a life of learning how to play ball, learning how to make people happy, learning how to appease adults to the point where you don't realize you're doing it. It's all unconscious, and I think that is the root of being, insecure. It's the root of being, You know, having this kind of crippling self awareness, you're policing yourself constantly in the eyes of others, these are the things we don't want, right? This is-- and I, and I feel like this is, you know, I, Well, anyway, the, the false persona is devastating because if someone's hiding, if a kid's hiding something from you, you'll never know, right? There's no drugs, there's no, you know, you can't eat, unhealthy food, no seed oils, right? Well, the kid is, is gonna deceive you, they're gonna-- you're never gonna know about the seed oils that they have successfully hidden from you. And they got nothing to do all day but to think up new ideas. They're extraordinarily creative. They got all day to think about it, and if you

And it does, it's not just the food, right? If you were controlling food, what else might you control, right? A kid doesn't compartmentalize control in one domain and say, "Oh, but my dad is totally chill about everything else, I'm sure," right? One area of mistrust makes you generally mistrustful of a person. So I see trust as the ultimate safety, the ultimate lifeline. If I've got my kids' trust, then they'll be open to my suggestions, and if I never-- if they can always opt out, if I always take no for an answer, then they are much more- interested in what I have to say. If I'm afraid of something, my kids are deathly afraid of it, almost pathologically. I'm saying, "Oh, you know, I have to temper myself and say, 'You know, I was just kind of kidding, I wasn't that afraid of that thing.'" They are very responsive to my view on things because there's no false persona.

yeah, okay. Yeah, okay. Interesting. so,

I guess let's sort of, I guess summarize the key points, as, as I've understood them then. So it's really, you're, you're, as you're saying, it's this idea of taking them seriously, having an approach of- Trying to engage with the underlying reason for something, trying to find alternatives that are, I guess, fun or engaging, but I guess m-maybe the areas where I probably disagree are it's maybe more just like, what is the level of where you would be permissive or where you would- I, I, I don't know. I still, I, I, but I do find it interesting, some of the, stuff you present about things like screen time and addiction and maybe the term addiction is being a bit overused. Oh boy. so, and, I think the wanting the child to be open with you, the parent, is also an interesting one. I've definitely, I've seen that kind of when I talk to either even my wife or other, you know, friends, that kind of idea that they relate even with, Parents, and how open they were. So I guess just kind of summing things up, do you have any fi-final, takeaway for people and where can they find you online?

yes. So I, I, you, not trying to give you a hard time. You, you went with the, like, where do we draw the line? I still don't quite see where we draw the line. And what I'm trying to, it's not easy, what I'm trying to say is that we just abandon that, right? And, and instead, you know

rely on trust, and I'm gonna develop such a strong bond of trust with my kid that they will be open to my, my ideas. And if they're not, if they don't get it, well, then I can figure out something in the short term to make sure that they're safe. Like if they're climbing on the table, I can do some modification, right? If I can't get them to, you know, I'm not gonna make a rule that there's no climbing on the table. Instead, you know, my job is to say, "All right, well, how do we make this fun?" I'll put some padding around the, the table, or I'll, you know, I'll, I'll play with you on the table so I'm there in case you stumble, and then, modify from there. But, but summing it all up, I don't know, I would say, a big, you know, the, the light bulb for me with libertarianism was COVID, like so many people, and everybody's got their COVID story, but my, My light bulb moment was the idea of, you know, my grandmother and, you know, other people's grandmothers would have different ideas about how much to isolate. And, right? Some people would wanna be-- were very safety conscious, and other people thought, "You know what? I'm old. it doesn't matter. Right? I, I, I don't have much to lose. I don't wanna miss out on a year with my grandkids." And, and that nobody, nobody, nobody can know what is the best choice for that person. It depends on their And with kids, we want them to create their own value structure. I think that's just the, that would be the summative, summative statement on it. But, the book is free, so the, the PDF is free. it's the sovereignchild dot com for the links to Amazon. There's an audiobook and, also, and I'm on, I'm on X, I'm a Stupple on X, and my collaborator Logan Chipkin also is, is on X and findable. Excellent. We yammer back and forth. Okay, well,

yeah, I, I think it's an interesting book. I've gotta, I've gotta finish the last, part of it, after this, but, thanks for joining me, Aaron.

Thank you so much, Stefan. Really appreciate it.