Meet inside The Shops at Waterloo Town Square - we will congregate in the indoor seating area next to the Your Independent Grocer with the trees sticking out in the middle of the benches (pic) at 7:00 pm for 20 minutes, and then head over to my nearby apartment's amenity room. If you've been around a few times, feel free to meet up at the front door of the apartment at 7:30 instead.

Topic

This meetup, we'll discuss what an adult is, moments we have met adults, and the adults that we aspire to be.

The day of this meetup is also the day of the Ontario provincial general election. KWR kindly requests that those who are capable of voting prioritize going to the polls over arriving on time.

To round off our discussion with a splash of civic duty on the second last day of Black History Month, we'll dedicate some time to discussing Martin Luther King Jr (an adult if there ever was one)'s Letter from Birmingham jail. 

Reading

Letter from Birmingham Jail - Martin Luther King Jr, 1963
Audio Link: youtube

From the Birmingham jail, where he was imprisoned as a participant in nonviolent demonstrations against segregation, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote in longhand the letter which follows. It was his response to a public statement of concern and caution issued by eight white religious leaders of the South.

Potential Discussion Questions

Adapted from Sydney Rationality

Conceptualizing Adulthood

1. Who is the most adult person you know? What is it about them that makes them an adult?
2. Who is the most adult person who you know of, but haven’t met? (i.e. in history or popular culture but not someone you know personally) Why them?
3. Think of a time recently where you acted like you weren't an adult. How do you explain your behaviour?
4. How would you distinguish between appearing adult and genuinely being adult?
5. How have your friendships changed as you’ve grown more into an adult?
6. How has your relationship with authority and rules shifted since you were younger?
7. When confronted with a difficult decision, how do you feel your adult reasoning processes differ from the ways you might have approached it in your adolescence?
8. What material or symbolic possessions do you associate with adulthood?
9. If you were to be all around more adult, what would you be doing more or less in your life?
10. How do you evaluate if other people are more or less adulty when you meet them?  (this can be petty or profound; I think people are more adulty if they go birdwatching and less adulty if they play certain video games.)
11. How does adult-ness relate to mental health pathology like narcissism, ocd, adhd, etc?
12. What aspects of adulthood do you think previous generations mastered earlier than people today, and which aspects do you think today's adults handle better than previous generations?
13. Are there domains or situations where being "less adult" might actually be beneficial or appropriate? What's the value in maintaining certain childlike qualities?

Manufacturing Adulthood

1. As a society with a limited pool of truly adult people, where should we encourage them to participate in society to make the world better? I.e. Become doctors, politicians, teachers, start charities…?
2. Do people who are more adult have greater responsibility? Should they?
3. As a society, how do we cause there to be more mature adults around?

Adulthood and Civic Duty

1. King writes about the difference between being a "thermometer" that merely records public opinion versus a "thermostat" that transforms it. How does this distinction relate to your understanding of adult civic responsibility?
2. How has your sense of civic duty evolved as you've matured? Are there civic responsibilities you've taken on or abandoned as you've gotten older?
3. How does voting fit into your broader understanding of adult civic responsibility? Is it sufficient, necessary, neither, or both?
4. King distinguishes between just and unjust laws, arguing there's a moral responsibility to disobey the latter. What level of moral development do you think is necessary to make these kinds of judgments responsibly?
5. Does true adulthood require us to balance our individual rights with our responsibilities to the broader community? How? To what extent?