Marathe and Steeply on choosing — "The rich father who can afford…"
The rich father who can afford the cost of candy as well as food for his children: but if he cries out “Freedom!” and allows his child to choose only what is sweet, eating only candy, not pea soup and bread and eggs, so his child becomes weak and sick: is the rich man who cries “Freedom!” the good father?
Context
The parable that gives the argument its teeth. The indulgent father who can afford everything and demands nothing, who invokes the child's freedom to eat only candy and calls the resulting sickness liberty — this is Marathe's America, and it's also, quietly, a portrait the theme keeps drawing: the father whose withholding of formation is disguised as respect for the child's choice. Himself figuring Orin was a big boy lives one register above this parable. Steeply's answer — that citizens aren't children to be paternalized — is the counter-argument the whole novel stress-tests, and the scene leaves it genuinely open: is the father who refuses to choose for you loving you, or feeding you candy until you're weak and sick?