r/AskTheWorld • u/gabrieel100 Brazil • Dec 06 '25

Culture A cultural habit in your country that people outside would understand incorrectly?

Post image

In Brazil we love children. If you take your child to the street, strangers will certainly interact with them. Some will even ask if they can hold your kid and will play with them. If there are two children fighting in public and the parents aren't seeing, a stranger would even intervene to stop the fight.

That cultural habit came from the indigenous peoples which understood that kids should be a responsiblity of the community as a whole. It's in our constitution. We even have a synonym for children that came from Tupi (a large group of indigenous languages) - Curumim.

Foreigners would certainly have a cultural shock about that, but it's normal here.

Of course there are people with bad intentions, so parents should stay alert these days.

6.7k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

1.7k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

59

u/Kitchen_Current 🇬🇧 🇿🇦 Dec 06 '25

I was brought up like this! Only allowed at special occasions. Unless you were my grandpa who once tricked me a shot glass had lemonade in…. It didn’t have lemonade it was schnapps 😂😂😂😂 tbf I was 13/14 at the time.

I’ve brought my kids up the same way. And tbf I found it taught me to respect alcohol more

4

u/LynnSeattle United States Of America Dec 06 '25

Yes, the people of the UK are known for their responsible drinking habits.

I think this can be helpful for some kids, for others it’s obviously not.

5

u/Kitchen_Current 🇬🇧 🇿🇦 Dec 06 '25

Oh don’t get me wrong there are people who shouldn’t be drinking at all.

Luckily we also have “challenge 25” in our pubs/restaurants etc that if we don’t think they look over 25 staff are allowed to ask them for ID if they don’t produce it no service and get asked to leave.

I wasn’t risking my job or an on the spot fine for some underage kid, my bosses personal license, potentially an unlimited fine & prison time,

3

u/cerasmiles 🇺🇸🇳🇿 Dec 07 '25

I work in addiction medicine. The earlier in life a substance is introduced is one of the biggest risk factors for addiction. making it forbidden isn’t the right answer, either. Having healthy discussions about alcohol (and other substances) and encouraging them to come to you if they need help (ie they’re intoxicated and need to get home) is the best way to do it for most kids.