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So? Are arbitrary rules a good thing? The world is full of pollution and violence and clowns too, should I just add more?</p>
<p>Well, kids do have to live in the real world so sure add more if you like. The rules parents add for 18 year olds are pretty small stuff compared to the real world arbitrary rues they will have to follow especially if financial support is involved. Do not many jobs come with arbitrary rules? Also, laws can be seen as arbitrary rules that must be followed. Rule following is not necessarily a bad thing, either.</p>
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The statement that a tattoo is disfiguring is just as much an opinion as a preference for Pepsi over Coke. Arbitrary means “based on random choice or personal whim, rather than any reason or system”, and if your complaint against tattoos is based on personal preference then it is by definition arbitrary.</p>
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Sure I can. My wife wears a cameo ring that her grandmother gave her. It is has deep and personal meaning to her and wearing it is a personal expression, but to anyone else it is just a piece of old jewelry. Any personal expression can have both aesthetic effect AND personal meaning, and the fact that you are not privy to the personal meaning does not mean it does not exist, it just means that it is not available to you - for you, the tattoo therefore can only be evaluated on the aesthetic effect. Just like strangers seeing my wife’s grandmother’s ring. And if the only issue you can see is the aesthetics… then I would consider that trivial and of no real consequence.</p>
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Go back to the definition of “arbitrary” - while such rules and laws exist, they are almost always being actively opposed and usually with good reason. Arbitrary is a pretty bad adjective when you are talking about exercising control over people.</p>
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The moral and social value in following a rule is tied to the moral and social value of the rule itself. Lots of people have done terrible, terrible things because they were “following the rules”.</p>
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What are your options then? Not to get a mortgage or take the job? I don’t think I am in the position to do that yet.</p>
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Is it arbitrary? Or, in your experience, is the efficiency of the company enhanced by having everyone present and working at the same time, specifically at the same time customers and suppliers have become accustomed to you and your staff being available?</p>
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And you don’t have a counter-argument? That is such a broad statement that I hesitate to offer my own, although I can think of a few off the top of my head. If you cannot justify the rules by which you operate then you should consider changing them, and if you cannot justify them to specific people and they continue to question them then you should really ask why you have not earned their trust and respect.</p>
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The option is to go to a bank or a job that does not make such demands - competitively, establishing such control without seeing a benefit will push customers towards competitors that have no such requirements. And yes, it may be necessary to say no outright - there are jobs and loans out there that are almost always a terrible idea.</p>
<p>“Just because someone gives you money doesn’t meant that they have a legal or moral right to dictate irrelevant terms.”</p>
<p>Moral? We can debate, but guess who will win in a battle with the employer? Legal? As long as it does not violate a law or a statute, i.e., illegal, anything goes for company policies. You think you are free to always do what you want? That’s a bloated sense of entitlement (not talking about tattoos here).</p>
<p>Does anyone remember the case a few years go in Georgia? A mother let her 10 year old son get a tattoo to commemorate his younger brother who had died in a car crash. It is illegal in Georgia for anyone under the age of 18 to get a tattoo. Someone at the child’s school reported it and the mother was arrested and charged. </p>
<p>I can understand having non-negotiable values that would cause a parent to cease supporting a child if they were violated. I just can’t understand drawing such a line over a tattoo–and especially if there can be no negotiation over any tattoo, no matter how small and unobtrusive. What possible justification, other than a power trip, can there be for drawing such a line? If there is some religious objection, I suppose I can understand it. But just because you think tattoos are trashy (which I do as well, by the way), this is something that you think is worth drawing such a line over?</p>
<p>I don’t like the “my money, my rules” approach to dealing with kids very much.</p>
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I do not think that I am “free to always do what I want” and did not make such a claim - We are all of us constrained, by both reasonable and unreasonable limits. Companies are constrained too, by law,by public opinion affecting their customer base, and by reducing their attractiveness to employees. Most companies know that they cannot place unjustifiable restrictions on their employees with consequences suffered by those who don’t get that memo.</p>
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Good. Legally and psychologically, that kid was in no position to make that decision. They should have busted the artist as well!</p>
<p>Hunt says it better and in fewer words than I have been-YES, exactly, power trip is the wording I’ve been thinking of. </p>
<p>I’m a sort-of mentor to a young lady not much older than college age who is going it alone as the sole support for her orphaned siblings. She is “financially independent”, and all that it entails. Medical crisis? On her. Car accident caused by someone else? On her. Food for 3 teenaged boys? On her. School, books, supplies? On her. Clothes for the kids? On her. School fees for all of them? Heat, power, gas, phone? On her. It is a constant struggle and balance to find the funds to manage it all, even with assistance she has earned as a caregiver.</p>
<p>I’ve been trying to imagine how a college student suddenly manages when a power-tripping parent cuts them off without so much as a minute’s thought over something like a tattoo which has nothing at all to do with their value as a person. It means no school fees, no medical care, no car, no insurance, no food, no utilities, unless this kid drops everything to somehow make a living. I’m quite familiar with how hard that can be-it’s how my husband lived until HE finished college since he too lost his parents at a young age. It’s why I help the young lady above. Anyone who would willingly do this to their child has a heart of stone, and has a moral compass I don’t care for one bit. </p>
<p>“Most companies know that they cannot place unjustifiable restrictions on their employees with consequences suffered by those who don’t get that memo”</p>
<p>Tell that to Amazons and Walmarts of the world. 
Or better yet, tiny startups. One local co requires employees to work 12 hr days 5 days a week because “they are a startup” - they even say so it in their job ads. </p>
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I said “most”, and Amazon and Walmart are definitely suffering consequences - scorn, protests, litigation, and serving as “bottom of the barrel” employers! Even that startup is going to suffer consequences - they would need some pretty impressive incentives to attract employees willing to work those hours!</p>
<p>Investment banks and consulting firms have required their employees for 16+ hours a day for a long time, and I don’t see them suffer any consequences. Most of us do not have the option of working for an employer with the kind of values and work/life balance we want. </p>
<p>“I’ve been trying to imagine how a college student suddenly manages when a power-tripping parent cuts them off without so much as a minute’s thought over something like a tattoo which has nothing at all to do with their value as a person. It means no school fees, no medical care, no car, no insurance, no food, no utilities, unless this kid drops everything to somehow make a living. I’m quite familiar with how hard that can be-it’s how my husband lived until HE finished college since he too lost his parents at a young age. It’s why I help the young lady above. Anyone who would willingly do this to their child has a heart of stone, and has a moral compass I don’t care for one bit.”</p>
<p>The young person who chooses to do this in knowledge that this is their parent’s position is making a choice, however. They can wait a year or two. Getting a tattoo is not something that NEEDS to be done right-this-minute-or-else. It would strike me that the mature adult reconsiders whether cutting off financial support is the most prudent move in the long term, but the mature young person also thinks about whether THIS is the hill it’s worth dying on this moment in time. Both sides need to search their motives for their actions. </p>
<p>On CC, there are a lot of kids who have parental constraints on colleges, majors, etc. and we tell them - right now, just wait and bide your time, when you are independent and self-sufficient you can (be an art major instead of a STEM major, live elsewhere versus mom and dad’s house, etc.). Sometimes waiting and biding things out is a good strategy versus being impulsive and cutting off your nose to spite your face. </p>
<p>“I said “most”, and Amazon and Walmart are definitely suffering consequences - scorn, protests, litigation, and serving as “bottom of the barrel” employers! Even that startup is going to suffer consequences - they would need some pretty impressive incentives to attract employees willing to work those hours!”</p>
<p>Even with all the scorn and litigation, Walmarts of the world are still in the green (Amazon is in the red but due to a different set of factors - BABA is one of them). Until the unemployment rate dips below 0, these cos will prosper no matter what the public thinks of them.</p>
<p>sseamom and cosmicfish, you are both stuck on the fact that this is ‘no big deal’ and you aren’t seeing that to me, it IS a big deal. You like your tattoos. Great. Fine. I don’t want my kids tattooed and I have set the standards. My reasons are not religious, although you seem to accept that if I said they were. I have to have a religion backing my opinion to make it right? In is not a power struggle in my home. It is not a control issue. It is a rule, and when they no longer want to follow the rules, they are allowed to go out on their own. Many kids do this at 18 because they don’t want to live by the rules. Join the military, get married, move to Vegas. Some parents have much stronger rules than I do - no sex, no alcohol, no drugs, must follow a certain religion (or no religion) or the child is out. Yes, while I’m paying the dental bills there will be no tongue studs. I’m hopeful that by the time they are paying their own dental bills, they will be mature enough to figure out the damage to teeth, the lisping, the spitting isn’t worth the coolness of having a tongue stud.</p>
<p>You said a 10 year old isn’t mature enough to make a decision to have a tattoo, and I’m telling you that my two kids are not mature enough to make the tattoo decision just because they are 18 and CAN get a tattoo. They are also not mature enough to have guns, have dogs, have children of their own, smoke cigarettes and dozens of other things that are legal for 18 year olds. I can forbid those things, but what are the penalties or consequences if they do them? They are allowed to just continue to get all the benefits of my life with no consequences? They get to do whatever they want and I’m not allowed to impose consequences?</p>
<p>One of my kids was pretty easy to raise, the other not so easy. The toddler years and the teen years were power struggles. I was pretty firm with my rules then, and it seems to have worked out in the long run. One reoccurring teen issue was her wanting to ‘skip’ school. She didn’t really want to skip, she wanted me to write a note to have her excused. ALL her friends’ parents did, so why wouldn’t I? She was actually correct, that most of her teammate’s parents would write them notes and excuse them after a loss or when they ‘needed a day at the beach.’ I would not. It was no big deal, just a day off. To me, missing school is a big deal. I told her she was free to skip and take the consequences, but I wasn’t going to have her excused. There were tantrums, there were fits, but I didn’t change my opinion. When it came time for college, most of these other kids didn’t go, or had to settle for schools they didn’t really want to go to because they had mediocre grades and scores, while my daughter had many options and scholarship. Sometimes, parents really do know best.</p>
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Again, I said “most”… and regardless, do we really want to use the abusive employment policies of justly-maligned corporations as a model for good parenting practices?</p>