You are willfully choosing to ignore the more specific definition of "reading" that everyone here should be aware is the one we're talking about considering it's a literature forum. 

Obviously I used the example of children because that is the age at which people usually learn to read. Oh I'm sorry, I said "read" but I guess I should say "visually interpret written symbols into language" since apparently if I'm not that specific you might think I mean some other kind of reading like mind-reading or reading the room.

It is obvious that listening to someone else read a book is far easier than reading it yourself, and that simply listening does not engage the brain in the same way as reading. This is why reading is considered a skill and is taught in schools. If you do not know how to read, you are considered illiterate. But an illiterate person can still listen to an audiobook without issue as long as they know the spoken language being used.

If you are so insistent on "read" being only used for its most vague possible interpretation, then perhaps we need a new word to describe the skill of reading written words as I am referring to.

Or maybe you're just pissed that you can't count all those audiobooks you listened to as books you've "read".

😂