A two-year-old sits at the dinner table. A parent says, "We are Catholic." Or "We're a hardworking family." Or "We don't say things like that — we are Democrats." The child hasn't developed any frame for evaluating these statements. The child doesn't know what Catholic or Democrat or hardworking means. The child only knows that this is who we are, said in the voice of the person who feeds them and tucks them in.
The label goes in clean. There's no resistance. There's no version of the child yet that could resist. By the time the child is old enough to ask whether they want to be Catholic, the question feels nonsensical. They already are. The label has stopped being something they wear. It's become something they assume they're made of.
K's harshest observation about families: the love is genuine. The conditioning is genuine. They're inseparable. The parents aren't lying. They're passing on the labels they received the same way, from people who also genuinely loved them. The factory has been running for generations. Staffed by people who would die for their children. Manufacturing the next batch of fragments.
This is why "I was raised that way" feels like an answer and is the problem. Say the phrase out loud. Notice the shoulders soften. The investigation closes. The phrase admits that the self was constructed by hands the self didn't choose, in a setting the self didn't approve. Most people stop right there.