What Are We Doing to Our Children

Being a mother of four children, grandmother of three, having enjoyed the pleasures and survived the sometimes ordeal of parenthood, I am concerned with what we are doing to our children.1

We are in an age of 'experts' and 'children's rights' but we seem to have lost our direction; we have forgotten what our children's rights are. We have forgotten that we are the parents; they are the children. Our job is to teach and theirs is to learn.2

There are so many different experts telling us how to act, how to think, and how to raise our children that we no longer rely on our instincts, our experience, our selves. We depend on the experts. We cannot do this. They are not perfect, not infallible. But we should learn from them, and then take this knowledge, combine it with our own experience, our instincts, and give our children their rights. If Helen Keller's teacher had not done this, had not combined her instincts with knowledge, had depended solely on the experts, would we have been privileged to have had the Helen Keller we did have, or would we have had a wonderful mind trapped in a body that would not cooperate.3

After watching one segment of The Human Animal on television and listening to the way one expert is teaching how to have "better babies", I wonder. Are we right in trying to have academically superior babies? I am not against learning. We put far too little demand on our children's minds. It is extremely important to make available to our babies, our children, every means possible to develop their minds, especially during the formative years from birth to six years of age. But let us not forget that this is the time to start teaching them their rights. Let our children learn more about themselves before we try to teach them about the world. 4

Childhood is such a short period of time. Here and gone before we can wipe away the tears of joy or forget the pain of childbirth. Why then, are we in such a hurry for them to grow up?5

Before our little girls know how to comb the pigtails out of their hair, before our little boys learn how to throw a baseball, before they learn about themselves, we are sending them out the door on a date telling them to "have a good time children." 6

Children are exactly what they are. Still learning still exploring. Before we have taught them their rights, before they have finished being children, we give them the responsibility of being adults. Then we ask ourselves why. Why are our children having children? Why are our children disrespectful? Why are our children lazy? Why are our children getting into trouble? The only question we should ask is of ourselves. Why haven't we taught our children?7

We take them off their bicycles and without teaching them of other's rights, we put them behind the steering wheel of a car and let them believe it is their right and not their privilege to drive.8

We give them money to buy records and go see movies with words that would make our proverbial "sailor talk" sound like a Sunday school sermon, and then wonder where they learned that language.9

Some experts tell us our children should be free to express themselves. If we smack their hand when they are bothering something they shouldn't we are inhibiting their growth. If we give them a spanking we are physically abusing them and if we scold them it is mental abuse.10

We should never hit our children but there is a difference between hitting a child out of anger and spanking a child out of love. Just as a newborn baby feels insecure when left naked, exposed, with nothing to touch, no loving arms around him, a child must also have limitations to feel secure, feel loved. If we protect them with playpens, gates and fences because we love them, shouldn't we also protect them with discipline because we love them, because we want to teach them their rights? 11

I have a friend who instilled in her children a truth which we should all learn. "People are not for hitting." She never spanked her children yet she did discipline them. Grown now, her children are responsible, compassionate and loving adults. Our methods are different but our philosophy should always be the same. We must by discipline, give our children guidelines, limitations, responsibilities, and always tempered with love.12

My sister-in-law has two teenage daughters. Working a full time job, she comes home to a sink full of dirty dishes, mountains of washing, a messy house and supper to prepare. When asked why they don't help out, her reply was, "they don't do it right." Who's fault is that. As children did they refuse to learn responsibility and consideration for others, or did she fail to teach them because it was easier not to?13

We are all guilty, at times of taking the easy way out. Certainly it is easier to let our children do what they want rather then teach them. It is easier to let the experts tell us what to do then to think for ourselves. By depending on someone else we are not to blame for the end result. By not being the cause we are not responsible for the effect.14

We have to remember that as parents, our job is to teach our children their rights. They have the right to grow up loved, the right to learn compassion for others, the right to accept the consequences of their actions. They have the right to learn all of this with love and understanding so that when they grow up they can, in turn, teach those same rights. With love and understanding.15

Parenting is the hardest job in the world, but it is a commitment which we can not take lightly. We must take responsibility for our future, and our future is our children.16

Darlene Sperber
May 1987