Blog Post 7

I find that the one comparison that Chenyang Li uses compares two different situations. He compares not having enough money to support their children is equivalent to not having enough money to support their elderly parents. What Chenyang Li proposes is that there is this special bond between parent and child. In the case of being unable to provide for both your child or your parent – who do you choose to support? In a sense, it would be more of an obligation to care for your child. A parent wants to see their child raise their own children– to have the same feelings and sacrifice as much or more to their own children, repaying the knowledge they dispersed on them, repaying the sacrifice they themselves spent on the new parent. 

Also, in Chenyang Li’s piece, he mentions that parents do not send their children away because they cannot afford them. Consider this case of an adoption. A child is given up for the sole point that the parents, themselves, cannot take care of the child. How do Chenyang Li’s arguments fair when placed up against circumstances like adoption or orphanage? To which parent does the child owe loyalties too? I feel that Chenyang Li’s arguments do not specify which is more important to filial loyalty. Does it rely more upon rearing of the child? Or their birth?

Also, Chenyang Li seems too quick to dismiss ideas of friendship and love being as important to filial obligation. What if an older sibling rises to the challenge of raising the child? Does that child find filial obligation with that sibling? Or say a mentor in case of the sibling?