Monday, June 22, 2026

The sample paragraph revisited

…I had a generally happy childhood. Then, in 2016, they (my parents) started going further and further to the right (coincidentally(?) the year Trump was elected the first time) and getting drawn into conspiracies until they finally moved to a different state completely for ‘freedom,’” shares a Reddit user, “We simply no longer have the same values or beliefs. I will not let my own children be around them unsupervised once I heard them call COVID a Chinese conspiracy.”  Source

A cynic would read between the lines and recognize that the narrator constructed a Karpman Drama Triangle with their children cast as the victims, their parents as the aggressor/oppressor and themselves as the virtuous rescuer/enabler. 

Furthermore, the cynic would ask "Cui bono?" (Who benefits?).

Is it possible that the narrator is hiding their anger and venom behind a curtain of a narrative construction of righteous indignation? Is it possible that the narrator is angry angry that they were deprived of free babysitting? Is it possible that the narrator's energy is due to having their fantasy shattered when their parents valued saving themselves thousands of dollars in taxes every year over saving the narrator hundreds of dollars in the cost of babysitting?

The crocodile tears on social media absolves them of having cost and bother of transporting their children all-the-way to a Red State in the summer. They can enroll them in the city's free youth programs and let the kids walk.

The narrative allows the parent(s) to project virtue to all of their friends rather than cheap and petty. 

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