Favouritism....?

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One time, my church was playing a game of Jeopardy. After the host said the question, I knew the answer and I raised my hand very slowly. At the same time, his daughter also knew the question and we were on different teams. So of course, he picked his daughter and she got it correct. Someone on my team accused him of favoritism, but he came back with a very good excuse "But guys, I have to go home soon"

Favouritism can be a problem, however to most people its unhelpable since they make their prefference without realizing and they think they are treating eberyone equally.


I have a favourite cat but only because the other one refuses to go near me 99% of the time.

I understand that favouritism happens all the time, in the sense that we all have preferences - that's why we have best friends, partners, choose particular pets over others, paint our houses certain colours etc. But favouritist treatment can be somewhat abusive when it comes to the family and pets. Yes, a parent might get on particularly well personality/hobby-wise with one of their kids and not so much with the others, but it's when the parent chooses to act on that favouritism that it's unfair and wrong, and THAT I cannot fathom. We've been taught that we must show equal love to all our family, and that's very logical as the psychological effects of favouritism towards one family member over another can be devastating. Unfair treatment is really not excusable for a parent. If you don't want to suck it up and show equal care, affection and attention towards all of your children, then you probably should not have any as fair treatment of them is a basic responsibility, in my opinion anyway. And I agree that it should be the same for pets. Don't buy pets you're going to neglect.

There are times when one of my children or pets finds more favor in my eyes than the other(s) of the same category. Usually it has something to do with behavior on their part, or more accurately how I feel about their behavior.

But I would (I hope) never express any favoritism to them. The constant rivalry between them is the biggest complication of raising a group of siblings, & I don't want to fuel it.... or to make anyone feel bad. Anyway, I know whatever I'm feeling is about me, not them. The feelings are also very fluid ~ they fluctuate rapidly over time.

I'm sick of playing favourites. I'm putting the year behind me, and I will love both of my parents equally.