It occurred to me the other day that we need better arguments for adulthood.
Part of the problem faced by people who had unhappy childhoods is that they have unmet emotional needs fir understanding, love, hugs and a sense of safety.
But when you offer these things to your own children, you also offer them in part to yourself. It feels good giving them what you did not get.
But absent a conscious effort, this shades EASILY into a desire for them to remain needy all their lives. Your “giving” becomes your taking, and addiction is not too strong a word in my view.
Expressed politically, it shades easily into a malignant paternalism with a smiling benignant face.
Much of the work of making sense of the world consists in separating the lies people tell us about who they are, from the true reality.