If you give a mouse a cookie | Read Aloud | Storytime
If you give a
mouse a cookie.
(1) If you give a mouse a cookie | Read Aloud | Storytime - YouTube
This on the surface is a great kid’s book, however, it
shows, what could be called the slippery slope fallacy. So, it is about to do
we have free will. Something that is up
for massive levels of debate and people has dedicated their whole lives to
trying to solve this question there are many thoughts on this and many
different schools of thought. It also goes into in a very small way moral responsibility
to others. It is about a mouse that is
freely given a cookie, yet there are more and more requests. On the person who
freely gave the cookie to the mouse, given that the cookie was given willingly
I do ask the question about does the person that is giving the mouse a cookie
understand the consequences of his actions. This goes into the Law of
unintended consequences, this law being that you can’t always see the
consequences of your actions and that at times these actions you might expect
one response but actually receive another one that isn’t what you expected or
even wanted a the time. So in this context, we see that in giving the mouse a
cookie the consequences are that he then wants a glass of milk, then a straw, and
on it goes.
The morality is interesting as it goes to the concept of self-determination
so how do you direct yourself in life or is there a deity that directs your
life. This deity could take many forms
and does depend on how and where you grew up. As if you grew up in a society
that is mostly based on the Judo- Christian worldview. This is around the religions
and cultural traditions of Judaism or Christianity. We do see more of the moral obligation around
these ethics. In the rule of doing unto others what you would do to yourself. However, if you grew up in a household that
didn’t have these traditions or ethics it does then ask the question around well
how you become an ethical person as it comes to self-actualization and day-to-day
decisions.
We also see how these decisions affect others as are you
free to make that decision if it is legal to make the decision but unethical at
the same time. It is about a mouse that is freely given a cookie, yet there are
more and more requests. For the person who freely gave the cookie that gets
frustrating for the person because this person didn’t expect the requests of
the person.
This goes into the Slippery Slope fallacy and the question
do we have free will, as the cookie was freely given to the mouse, so I don’t
see an issue, around this. The mouse also did help in the house but got carried
away, with the cleaning. So, it goes to the Bootstrap mentality the thinking that
you can pull yourself out of a difficult situation without help from others.
This at times isn’t possible to do this. In many situations
it is very difficult to do this, in the context of disability at times it is
almost impossible to do so. Yet this is not possible, as the metaphor is if you
are struggling with your boots and bend down to pull up your bootstraps they
are possibly going to break, the bootstraps being a metaphor, for the person so
it’s seeing a person at breaking point and just telling them to work harder or to
stop being so lazy.
What people don’t see
is that they are being cruel when they say that a person just needs to pull
themselves up by their bootstraps, as it can be impossible to do this. In the context of this mouse, he is small and
if he is small, he is going to need help, to do things and in return, he does help
as well, he helps with the housework.
Yet I do see boundary issues with this at times because he
wasn’t asked to do the housework yet did do it and again, we do see that he was
doing things without being asked. I do see that it’s great that he was willing
to try and clean up after himself.
I do also see that this mouse does have the traits of
someone with ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) a neurobiological
disorder that affects the brain and behaviours that go with these behaviours,
so having difficulty understanding what is important, having basic social
skills as I am going to assume because this book is for a child that the mouse
is childlike.
This seems to be a growing diagnosis in many people, and I
do seriously wonder about it at times as we seem to be pathologizing a range of
what could be considered normal behaviour considering the amount of
“stimulation we have as a society now.”
Through devices that we can let rule our life instead of helping us with
our life.
There also is the
question of the chemicals that we are putting into the environment, and this
would also affect behaviour as well as diet as at times for people with low
incomes that live in “food deserts,” these being an environment where there is
a lot of fast-food options but not a lot of options for fresh healthy food,
like a supermarket or farmers markets. As well as the cost factor of these
foods. These food options often are loaded
with salt, unhealthy fats, and hidden sugars, as well as chemicals that we now
know, do influence people’s behaviours.
However, when we look at the behaviour of both the mouse and
the child in the book, we see that they are both helping each other and I would
question if the “demands are demands,” or if they are requests. As they say, he
is likely to this being that he understands that no is a reasonable answer, to
a request so he is willing to have good sensible boundaries, in that he understands
that No is always a reasonable answer to a request or even a demand placed on
you that you don’t have the ability with that request.
However, given that the cookie was given willingly I do ask
the question of does the person that is giving the mouse a cookie understands
the consequences of his actions. This goes into the Law of unintended consequences,
this law being that you can’t always see the consequences of your actions and
that at times these actions you might expect one response but actually receive
another one that isn’t what you expected or even wanted a the time. So in this
context, we see that in giving the mouse a cookie the consequences are that he
then wants a glass of milk, then a straw.
So on the surface if you give one thing freely the person will keep asking, “so
this context is “if you give an inch
they will take a mile.” Yet many people don’t have the self-capacity to ask for
what they need and to be proactive in working towards it, so they have what is
called learnt helplessness and this is quite an interesting one to go down as
we are seeing it talked about more and more, in the context of “Covid,” cost of
living and “human rights.”
However, we see that in the Covid response that It did
depend on the person’s mental state at the time and where they were living as
it did depend on the situation and restrictions at the time. As health care
professionals and others that we in Australia call essential workers these were
workers that jobs were essential to keep society from collapsing, and they had no
changes in their work situation, however, many people did find a massive change
in their situation fiscally, mentally and health-wise.
In the context of human rights, we do see that this mouse is
using dignity of risk to risk asking for what he needs. He does take it to the extreme,
but the person is willing to help him.
So this is sticking to the social contract of being able to help others
and not expecting anything in return.
This Altruism is what keeps society going by seeing that people are less fortunate and having social programs or services both private and government programs, such as the NDIS ( National Disability Insurance Scheme ) unemployment benefits, and job search agencies. That provides practical and fiscal help with some of the charities that come to mind are Churches or Mosque associated charities so the red cross or red crescent in countries where the majority are of the Muslim faith. The salvation army can help in many situations.
When you need help and as a society, we do need to help those
less fortunate than ourselves. It is impossible to do things without help at
times as we are social beings. We do need basic social interactions with those
around us. These social interactions can
be as simple or as complex as a walk in a park or as complicated as a party to
celebrate what is happening in someone’s life.
However, due to the way that society is set up at times, we
need money and often this is the divide in many people’s life. This is where
the bootstrap mentality comes into play around being able to pull yourself up
as if you don’t have the money or even know how to ask for that help it can be
hard to understand what is happening, especially when you don’t understand the
consequence’s or can’t predict the consequences of your actions.
As all actions have consequences yet what these consequences
are can be difficult to understand. For
a child, it seems to be an issue as you need to teach a child that actions have
consequences. Then they can understand what appropriate behaviours are and
operate in the world that we live in and this world can be very complicated and
complex even for grown adults with no disabilities to navigate.
We all have very different experiences of being in the world
and different lessons that people have taught us. As well as our upbringing can teach us that
the world is either a good or bad place. So for some people growing up was
difficult as they didn’t have the guidance needed to keep them on the right
path, yet for others, we see that they had guidance and supportive parents that
planned for them or had a happy accident and were able to keep a stable
environment for the child.
For people who see the world as a bad place, we see that
they generally had a very unstable home life and were taught to be self-reliant
from a very young age. This then leads
to how we see the world and our place in it as we do have people who see the
world as a fair and equitable place to be in yet we do have others that see
that life isn’t fair.
Comments
Post a Comment