Pathetic.

[qcontinuum]

So this is his latest obsession. He stages a revolution in the Continuum, wins it, has a child, and he's *still* completely besotted with ridiculous mortals, to the point where he's got nothing better to do than send them letters. Using this ludicrously primitive network, no less.

If you're going to play at being a mortal, do it. Immerse yourself in it. Don't take to yourself the privileges of omnipotence and yet obsess over communicating with mortals. I can't believe how absurd he is. And talking to them as if they could actually give him insight? Whining endlessly about his problems with the child? (Which, frankly, don't surprise me. The child is spoiled rotten. I might have expected Q to have no concept of discipline.)

How completely ridiculous. Also, completely expected. I knew he'd be up to something stupid, although I boggle at quite how stupid.

Comments

*Everything* is a contest in the Q Continuum.

[qcontinuum.livejournal.com]

Oh, Q, raising a child is not a contest to be won!

Well, um, yes, yes, actually, it is.

That's how we work. We argue with each other until we're bored with arguing and then we can compromise. If a Q backs down and tries to compromise before that point the other Q will see that as a weakness and push their point forward. You humans call it "give them an inch and they'll take a mile."

Every time we've argued about how to raise the child, she backs down long before she's convinced me of any of her points. Therefore, she doesn't believe in them as strongly as I believe in my points. Therefore, I should win. Since we more or less have access to all the same information and since there's a huge supply of it, we consider passion about an opinion to be the only metric of who's right when there's a disagreement.

Instead of trying to 'steamroll' each other to prove you were right, what the two of you should be doing is trying to find some common ground, some way in which you can work together for the best interests of your child. Because when all is said and done, don't you *both* want the best for him?

Theoretically, yes. She thinks that by being downright abusive to the poor thing in the name of "discipline" she'll prevent him from committing most of my excesses. Why that would be so terrible as to justify her behavior, I don't know, and she can't convince me of it BECAUSE SHE KEEPS BACKING DOWN. If she doesn't have enough passion in her convictions to argue with me, why should I believe she has anything valid to say? Just because she wants what's best for him doesn't mean she has any idea what that is. I mean, I want what's best for him and I have no idea what that is, so why would she have any more clue than I do? She's an expert on mortal warfare and I'm an expert on dissent, rebellion and trickery; neither of us know much about how mortals raise kids, but my expertise seems to be a bit closer to it than hers is. And she's being mean to the poor kid. I mean, I'm quite capable of being a fairly nasty customer myself, and I didn't get a rep as a demon or a god of lies and darkness on several thousand planets for nothing, but I can't see how she can be so cruel to her own child.

Oh, for...

[qcontinuum.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'm the bad guy, aren't I? "I can't see how she can be so cruel to her own child." You know perfectly well that when you say things like that to humans you conjure up visions of bread and water and coat hangers.

I do not abuse the child. I tell him "no", a concept you apparently have trouble with.

You see, Captain, Q apparently thinks that the appropriate way to train a child is to let him do more or less anything he wants and then clean up his messes afterward. Since this is what the Continuum did with *him* for most of his existence I can see why he believes this, but he was never actually a *child* and it wasn't the right thing to do anyway. *I* believe children need limits, particularly immortal, omnipotent ones who'd *have* no limits if their parents didn't impose any. I believe that punishment should be consistent and that letting something go three thousand times and then turning the child into a flea and keeping him that way for a week on the three thousand and first is a completely ridiculous way to teach a child right from wrong. Not that Q's grasp of right and wrong has ever been all that solid, and I think he lets the child get away with so much because he's vicariously enjoying the chaos the child creates.

I do feel passionately about my beliefs. What Q is overlooking in his description of how negotiations are *supposed* to go in the Continuum is that this has never, ever worked with him. He simply doesn't compromise. At all. The only time he ever has was after we turned him mortal for a day up until Quinn's death, and since winning the war he's been even more insufferable. I *can't* argue him into submission; the child would be an adult before he backed down. The Continuum can override him and ignore the fact that he won't agree if a majority decide otherwise, but in any interaction one-on-one with another Q, he wins, and I can't get the Continuum to back me up because they hate me now. And I can't apply the kind of consistent discipline and limits I think an omnipotent child desperately needs with his other parent undermining me at every turn.

Perhaps this custody sharing arrangement will work. I certainly hope so, since we can't seem to agree at all on how to raise the child together.

Re: *Everything* is a contest in the Q Continuum.

[kathrynjaneway.livejournal.com]

Well, apparently your method works quite well for the Continuum, though as a 'limited' Human I marvel that you ever manage to get anything done and aren't constantly in a state of Civil War.

But, since having a child was a new and radical departure from the Q way of doing things up to now, don't you think perhaps it might be wise to consider trying new methods of dealing with him, and with each other as far as his welfare is concerned?

Re: *Everything* is a contest in the Q Continuum.

[qcontinuum.livejournal.com]

Well, apparently your method works quite well for the Continuum, though as a 'limited' Human I marvel that you ever manage to get anything done and aren't constantly in a state of Civil War.

I'll admit it worked much better before we invented a means of killing each other one-on-one.

But, since having a child was a new and radical departure from the Q way of doing things up to now, don't you think perhaps it might be wise to consider trying new methods of dealing with him, and with each other as far as his welfare is concerned?

We *do* try new methods of dealing with him. I mean, we have to. I may have mentioned that Q instinct (well, not literally instinct, we don't *have* any literal instincts, but you know what I mean) is to psychologically attack any Q that demonstrates weakness or lack of self-control. When everyone is even in their level of abilities that works, but we found out with Amanda that it doesn't work with new Q, so we were able to *mostly* avoid making that mistake with q. We're more or less inventing the concept of child rearing in the Continuum from scratch. Even Amanda was far more advanced when she joined us than q is.

As far as dealing with each other... you say it like it's so easy. We've had a particular means of interacting with each other for longer than your species has existed. And besides, she's completely wrong. Imposing mortal military-style discipline on a Q is either going to create a creature with no ability to engage in independent thought, which will destroy him as a Q, or it'll create a creature who takes the first chance to rebel as soon as he's old enough to stand up against us, and I don't want to see the Continuum do to *him* what it did to me to keep me in line. Or do what it did to Amanda's parents. He has to be allowed to make his own mistakes and *understand* why they're a bad idea. And I do so say no to him.

Re: *Everything* is a contest in the Q Continuum.

[kathrynjaneway.livejournal.com]

And besides, she's completely wrong

It's absolutist statements like this that I really can't see being helpful. Especially as you contradict yourself later on by pointing out that you *do* say no to your son, as Q insists is necessary.

Imposing mortal military-style discipline on a Q is either going to create a creature with no ability to engage in independent thought, which will destroy him as a Q, or it'll create a creature who takes the first chance to rebel as soon as he's old enough to stand up against us

Not necessarily. Again, wasn't your purpose in having a child to create a new kind of Q that hadn't existed before? Perhaps you will manage to raise him to be a self-disciplined being, based on the example and patterns you've set for him. That *both* of you have set for him. It doesn't have to be an 'all or nothing' proposition, that either he's an automaton with no mind of his own or else an out-of-control rebel. Even for the Continuum, there has got to be a happy medium.

My mother uses to say that raising a child was like handling a wind-up toy. You can prepare him and point him in the direction you wish him to go, but where he actually ends up is ultimately his choice. But that doesn't mean that all the preparation is futile. You just have to hope you've given him a solid enough foundation that when he *can* make his own decisions, he makes them wisely.