I have spent the last half-hour reading articles in news publications all lamenting the same thing: declining behavior in children. I don't know why it should surprise me to see these kinds of articles since our society has largely given up on the idea of training and disciplining children in order to make them productive individuals in society. What surprises me is more related to the fact that people are actually starting to notice and beginning to open up a dialogue through these kinds of articles that could lead to a healthier approach to raising children.
In the Sunday edition of the New York Times, a surprising article was written about the downward spiral of the behavior of children and the lack of respect they have towards adults. This particular article, entitled "Kids Gone Wild", pointed to a recent survey that revealed "nearly 70 percent of Americans said they believed that people are ruder now than they were 20 or 30 years ago, and that children are among the worst offenders. (As annoyances, they tied with obnoxious cellphone users.)"
Let's think about this for a moment: children are more rude now than they were 20 or 30years ago. That would put us back around, say, 1975 to 1985, right? Now, since we're talking about children's behavior in public, then we're talking about children that are probably around the age of 8-10 years and older which would result in children who were born sometime in or around the 60's, give or take a few years. This would be around the same time that the influence of the "Builder generation" was dwindling and the rise of free love, women's liberation movements, and rebellion became pretty popular. The influence of those who actually believed in such things as discipline, hard work, elder-respect, and personal sacrifice was beginning to lose it's hold on the public mind.
What we have seen of late is the result of the social philosophy of those raised in what many called a "post-Christian" age, meaning an age in which Judeo-Christian values which had, to this point, been the driving force of society, were largely abandoned. People began listening to many different voices, like Dr. Benjamin Spock, who is seen by many as the driving figure of the more permissive attitudes of parents towards children. In fact, some have even said Spock is the primary cause of the rebellious sixties, a point of which is debatable, but according to the popularity of his book (which falls third in all-time sales behind the Bible and Shakespeare), it is not surprising.
These children of the 60's grew up and began influencing culture themselves...and eventually [shudder]...having children of their own. We're talking people like the "material girl" herself, Madonna. Perhaps no one else has had such an influence on a generation as she has. Ironically, as these cultural architects age, they find themselves unable (or unwilling) to consistently live the lifestyle they vociferously advocated:
Even Madonna - her "Papa Don't Preach" years long past - has joined the throng, proclaiming herself a proud "disciplinarian" in a recent issue of the British magazine Harpers & Queen and bragging that, as a mom, she takes a tough line on homework, tidiness and chores: "If you leave your clothes on the floor, they're gone when you come home."
Part of the problem is that too many fathers listened to Madonna and stopped "preaching" to their kids. They became more tolerant of their children's behavior and gave up on teaching them to show respect and did little to earn it.
Unfortunately, people like Madonna learn the lesson long after they have already influenced millions to act just like they did and raise material kids who know nothing of respect and care nothing of civility. Perhaps even more sad is the fact that, through her music and sideshow, she continues to preach the very things she no longer lives.
It seems we have come to a point of publicly complaining about the behavior of children, but not really knowing what to do about it. Funny, this article in the New York Times points to the lack of discipline in children's lives, yet the moment that discipline is carried out by parents or educators, someone cries foul.
We live in a society that is confused. There is a growing number of people who realize that our social structure is out of control, but most feel unable to do anything about it. On the one hand, there are parents who either fill ill-equipped to actually be parents or are too tired to fight the battles that lead to better kids:
Most parents, Dr. Kindlon said, would like their children to be polite, considerate and well behaved. But they're too tired, worn down by work and personally needy to take up the task of teaching them proper behavior at home.
"We use kids like Prozac," he said. "People don't necessarily feel great about their spouse or their job but the kids are the bright spot in their day. They don't want to muck up that one moment by getting yelled at. They don't want to hurt. They don't want to feel bad. They want to get satisfaction from their kids. They're so precious to us - maybe more than to any generation previously. What gets thrown out the window is limits. It's a lot easier to pick their towel up off the floor than to get them away from the PlayStation to do it."
Of course, then there are the parents (who may be in the majority), who parent according to a prevalent social Darwinist worldview (whether they are aware of it or not). These are the ones who train their kids to compete and win at all costs; it's survival of the fittest out there...a dog-eat-dog world and if you aren't prepared to win, you will be defeated. These are the parents that instill in their children a drive that will take them to the top but leave a whole lot of people...and life...in their wake:
Parenting today is also largely about training children to compete - in school and on the soccer field - and the kinds of attributes they need to be competitive are precisely those that help break down society's civility.
Parents who want their children to succeed more than anything, Dr. Kindlon said, teach them to value and prioritize achievement above all else - including other people.
"We're insane about achievement," he said. "Schoolwork is up 50 percent since 1981, and we're so obsessed with our kids getting into the right school, getting the right grades, we let a lot of things slide. Kids don't do chores at home anymore because there isn't time."
On the other side of the coin are those who are paid to train children. Many are so shaped by the current cultural climate that they, themselves, barely have it together, believing that children should be shown nothing but respect, removing terrible obstacles to their developmental processes like punishment, expectations, and limits to their freedom...ooooh, limits bad; freedom goooood. These are the ones who should quickly be shown the proverbial exit door to public education. Others, though, know what needs to be done and desire to do it, but feel as though their hands are tied and are, therefore, helpless to do little more than watch the next generation slip a little farther down the path of no return:
...other adults, even those who should have authority, are afraid to get involved. "Nobody feels entitled to discipline other people's kids anymore," Dr. Kindlon said. "They don't feel they have the right if they see a kid doing something wrong to step in."
Educators feel helpless, too: Nearly 8 in 10 teachers, according to the 2004 Public Agenda report, said their students were quick to remind them that they had rights or that their parents could sue if they were too harshly disciplined. More than half said they ended up being soft on discipline "because they can't count on parents or schools to support them."
And that, Dr. Rosenfeld said, strikes at the heart of the problem. "Parents are out of control," he said. "We always want to blame the kids, but if there's something wrong with their incivility, it's the way their parents model for them."
Sadly, they are right. Teachers could (and probably would) be sued in many instances in which discipline was handed out to children. Parents are out of control. Kids must be held accountable for their own actions, but it largely stems from their parents, long having abandoned a system of standards deemed a sham by society, who fail to shape the minds and hearts of their children.
What's the moral of this story? All of the talk about the importance of a biblical worldview on this and other blogs is not just a suggestion or option for our culture. We have seen over and over again, in many different places, that when that society was built upon the principles laid out in Scripture and according to a social order with God as its Head, it and it's people thrived. It just does. Likewise, societies built on other systems or that abandon their Christian roots, inevitably fail.
Today, nearly 3 million Americans live in a Country in which that abandonment is nearly complete. Some who are reading this right now currently live in countries where that abandonment has long been completed and could give testimony to the consequences in the lives of their people.
The United States is not completely there yet, but we're making up ground every day.
For more, read Kids Gone Wild in the New York Times, TV, No Homework Can Turn School Suspensions into Vacations in the Washington Post, and Poor Grades Aside, Athletes Get Into College on a $399 Diploma, also in the NY Times.
Labels: David C. Price
We are making our annual pilgrimage to our home-away-from-home. I look forward to visiting old friends and colleagues from our many years there, to be capped off by my wife's company Christmas party Saturday night. That's always a fun black-tie event in one of the ritzy hotels downtown. 
We are making our annual pilgrimage to our home-away-from-home. I look forward to visiting old friends and colleagues from our many years there, to be capped off by my wife's company Christmas party Saturday night. That's always a fun black-tie event in one of the ritzy hotels downtown. 
Dinner shared by a group of friends at a well-appointed Greenwich Village apartment featured eggplant Parmesan with a salad of mixed greens and avocado dressing. The guests already had snacked on hors d'oeuvres of smoked mozzarella and crackers. 
