I am aware that an earlier monologue was called "Parenting," but it was written a number of years ago, and with an eye toward parenting toddlers to early teens. Furthermore, I am not sure that I have added it to this collection yet. So I have full reign to say what I want about raising children.
First of all, and least important, I think my kids are and have been great. They have tested my patience, my capacity for tolerance, and my every bias and prejudice since they passed the earliest years of adolescence.
Often through these diatribes, I have tended to focus, or at least reference, the propensity for stupidity that prevails among humans. Consequently, I intend to at least touch on my and my wife's least intelligence moments or decisions.
For instance, I decided when my oldest son hit teenager-hood that I would allow him to delay his entry into the ranks of the formally employed. The deal was that he could avoid a regular job so long as he was invested in his sport - lacrosse - and his academics. Now I need to clarify that he often went to work. For instance, he served as a waiter at a catering establishment that my brother owned, commencing after his sixteenth birthday. However, he worked only sporadically, and his bills were my bills.
Why, you might ask, did I make such a decision? Well, I expected him to hit the weight room three times per week, during the school year and in the summer. I also expected his participation in summer, winter, and fall league and tournament play. I didn't know if he would be good enough to play the game in college, but he had expressed an interest in that direction, and I wanted to support the quest.
(As it turned out, he was good enough to play at the next level, but to sustain the quest after the high school opportunities expired, he would have had to reconcile himself to being a specialist, a face off guy who wouldn't be on the field throughout the action, unless he was able to make a great deal of improvement during his college career.)
The foolshness of this decision had nothing to do with the pursuit of a sports career
or anything. The stupidity was this: the work ethic that he needed to develop, the one that would have enabled him to pursue a goal of collegiate athletics, was the very one I was squelching by giving him an out. I personally played two high school sports, trained for each of them, and held down various part time jobs from thirteen years old on. While it’s true that I wasn’t on a program, and that the sports I played were not as demanding thirty years ago.
Why would I have not sent the message that the boy should find a way to work his ass off to do all of the things he wanted? True, maybe I was deluding myself that I might have been a better college athlete had I been able to devote more time to the craft. But really, I know that my limitations weren’t caused by a lack of opportunity to train and play. I simply wasn’t that good. I had/have no resentment toward my parents in that I had to follow a frenetic pace and schedule. I don’t bemoan the fact that I had to pay my own way through school. I resent my parents for a set of reasons that have nothing to do with these subjects. My point is that of course I knew better. Why didn’t I simply send the message that I had personally learned and benefitted from? Stupidity.
Oh, and by the way. Even with my bonehead decision, my kids found plenty of opportunities to develop a work ethic. The circumnavigated my errors. Isn't it great that sometimes these mistakes don't quite come back to haunt?
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Let's Pass Laws That Excuse Parents From Parenting - Not!
I read the local paper today, and learned about pending legislation that will limit the number of passengers that a young driver may carry in his/her vehicle. I also read in the same paper a comment from a parent bemoaning the public displays of affection witnessed in front of a local high school at dismissal time.
I am sick of the trend this country is taking. Everybody wants somebody else to be in charge of parenting our children. Of course, younger drivers should limit the number of passengers they carry. Of course, every driver should wear his set belt. Of course, school children should not turn displays of affection, which ought to be private no matter the age of the participants, into public enterprises.
If a law is passed that limits the number of passengers, or if the school does a better job of pollicing the kissers, will enything have really changed? The missing ingredient isn't the clarity or completeness of the legal code, or even the level of supervision at the school. The missing engredient is the set of values that curbs the questionable behaviors.
Parents need to acquaint their children who are younger drivers with the set of values that say a car is a potentially lethal weapon, and that every trip in a motor vehicle may end in tragedy. Also, parents need to convince their kids that showing affection toward their boyfrineds or girlfriends - in public venues - is simply in bad taste. If the children don't appreciate the value, the parents can demonstrate their point by having a gropefest right there in front of the children. Middle school and high school students will invariably find their parents' behavior disgusting, and after they vomit, the point will have been made.
My wife shared with me a conversation she had recently with a parent whose school had just adopted a uniform policy. The parent was ecstatic about the adoption of the policy, but not because the effect might be a better school environment, a cost-effective way to outfit the children, or an improvement in the relative appearance of the student body. No, this parent and others were ecstatic because they no longer had to fight with their children about their clothes choices. They were happy that a school dress code had precluded them from having to educate and influence their children.
The impetus for the Pennsylvania House Bill regarding passneger limitations is the same. Legislators crafted the bill because their constituant parents will support it. The parents will support it because they will need to have one fewer argument with their children. Many parents and studnets will refrain form carrying large numbers of passengers the minute the law is passed. That will be a positive side effect of POOR LEGISLATION.
Why poor legislation, you may ask. The answer should be obvious. The passage of the law will not eliminate the instances where young drivers carry too many passengers. You know, sometimes young drivers will BREAK the LAW! Sometimes, these young drivers fall prey to the distractions that plague young drivers, and they will sometimes have accidents. The negative side effect is that parents will be having one fewer conversation with their children about the way they should conduct themselves as they make their way through life.
Again, the complainant regarding the PDA episodes is motivated by the same faulty reasoning. If the school supervises and reduces the visible incidents, will the behavior really be changed? No, the adoption of a set of values that promotes self-discipline, and which encourages youngsters to be aware of the propriety of their behavior, will promote a resuction of the behavior.
In both cases, the most effective method for promotion of the positive behavior is the parent and all adults with whom the student comes into contact.
We will never be successful in legislating human behavior. Every adult must be responsible, to obviously different degrees, for the behavior of all younger people. The lady in the car who witnessed the PDA should have voiced her displeasure to the offenders. No, she shouldn't have confronted these people she didn't know, but she shouldn't have done nothing except go home and find a way to blame someone else.
My own three children have made it to young adulthood. Along the way, they have each crossed the boundaries that my wife and I have set, and I would guess that would have to do with both qualtiy and quantity. However, I am pretty sure they knew where we stood on each issue, and I am farily certain they crossed those boundaries with a sense that they were traviling outside a comfort zone. My wife and I worked pretty hard to advertise and edcuate about our set of values. Our kids tested those values - sometiems with impunity, and sometimes with definitive negative consequences. I don't want legislation to mitigate that process. I don't want to blame school officials when young people test boundaries.
Parents need to parent.
I am sick of the trend this country is taking. Everybody wants somebody else to be in charge of parenting our children. Of course, younger drivers should limit the number of passengers they carry. Of course, every driver should wear his set belt. Of course, school children should not turn displays of affection, which ought to be private no matter the age of the participants, into public enterprises.
If a law is passed that limits the number of passengers, or if the school does a better job of pollicing the kissers, will enything have really changed? The missing ingredient isn't the clarity or completeness of the legal code, or even the level of supervision at the school. The missing engredient is the set of values that curbs the questionable behaviors.
Parents need to acquaint their children who are younger drivers with the set of values that say a car is a potentially lethal weapon, and that every trip in a motor vehicle may end in tragedy. Also, parents need to convince their kids that showing affection toward their boyfrineds or girlfriends - in public venues - is simply in bad taste. If the children don't appreciate the value, the parents can demonstrate their point by having a gropefest right there in front of the children. Middle school and high school students will invariably find their parents' behavior disgusting, and after they vomit, the point will have been made.
My wife shared with me a conversation she had recently with a parent whose school had just adopted a uniform policy. The parent was ecstatic about the adoption of the policy, but not because the effect might be a better school environment, a cost-effective way to outfit the children, or an improvement in the relative appearance of the student body. No, this parent and others were ecstatic because they no longer had to fight with their children about their clothes choices. They were happy that a school dress code had precluded them from having to educate and influence their children.
The impetus for the Pennsylvania House Bill regarding passneger limitations is the same. Legislators crafted the bill because their constituant parents will support it. The parents will support it because they will need to have one fewer argument with their children. Many parents and studnets will refrain form carrying large numbers of passengers the minute the law is passed. That will be a positive side effect of POOR LEGISLATION.
Why poor legislation, you may ask. The answer should be obvious. The passage of the law will not eliminate the instances where young drivers carry too many passengers. You know, sometimes young drivers will BREAK the LAW! Sometimes, these young drivers fall prey to the distractions that plague young drivers, and they will sometimes have accidents. The negative side effect is that parents will be having one fewer conversation with their children about the way they should conduct themselves as they make their way through life.
Again, the complainant regarding the PDA episodes is motivated by the same faulty reasoning. If the school supervises and reduces the visible incidents, will the behavior really be changed? No, the adoption of a set of values that promotes self-discipline, and which encourages youngsters to be aware of the propriety of their behavior, will promote a resuction of the behavior.
In both cases, the most effective method for promotion of the positive behavior is the parent and all adults with whom the student comes into contact.
We will never be successful in legislating human behavior. Every adult must be responsible, to obviously different degrees, for the behavior of all younger people. The lady in the car who witnessed the PDA should have voiced her displeasure to the offenders. No, she shouldn't have confronted these people she didn't know, but she shouldn't have done nothing except go home and find a way to blame someone else.
My own three children have made it to young adulthood. Along the way, they have each crossed the boundaries that my wife and I have set, and I would guess that would have to do with both qualtiy and quantity. However, I am pretty sure they knew where we stood on each issue, and I am farily certain they crossed those boundaries with a sense that they were traviling outside a comfort zone. My wife and I worked pretty hard to advertise and edcuate about our set of values. Our kids tested those values - sometiems with impunity, and sometimes with definitive negative consequences. I don't want legislation to mitigate that process. I don't want to blame school officials when young people test boundaries.
Parents need to parent.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Why Philly Sports Fans are Infuriatingly Stupid.
This is the second attempt at responding to the rampant stupidity of Philly fans. The first approach was doomed to be too long and circuitous at getting to its point, so I will try again to take the direct approach.
Philly fans are too busy being passionate, loyal, and hungry to use their brains before they react. The Eagles just concluded another disappointng season by losing for the third time in a year to the Dallas Cowboys, who demonstrated that they are simply the better team this year.
Now they are calling for the release, trade, or sale of Donovan McNabb, the best QB in franchise history, who just completed the second best season of his career. They watched the Cowboys demonstrate the superiority of the Cowboys on both the offensive and defensive lines. They saw the coaching staff of the Eagles look under-prepared and ineffective. They saw the inferiority of the Eagles' linebakcers and secondary, and they concluded that the best way to respond to those observations was to call for the head of the quarterback.
If you think I am saying that the fans are wrong, I am. However, I don't have a problem with their being wrong, and I don't object to their opinion, though I disagree, that McNabb should be shown the door. They are entitled to their opinions. They are not allowed to be so blindly stupid that they disregard the obvious failings and focus their umbrage on NcNabb. I realize I am now going to make a comparison between Tom Brady and McNabb, and that to do such a thing will infuriate the McNabb haters, but I am nothing if not thoughtful and objective.
I watched the golden boy Brady, almost uniformly seen as the greatest QB of the decade becasue his team has won three Super Bowls, look disarmingly like McNabb against the Baltimore Ravens. And Brady looked mostly awful for the same reasons that McNabb looked awful: his receivers weren't consistently good enough, and he spent too much time dodging pass rushers who disrupted his sight lines or his footwork.
Brady finished 23-42 with four turnovers on his dance card. McNabb's stats were eerily similar. 19-37 and 1 turnover. Brady did throw for 2 TD's but he more than compensated by throwing three INT's. He also lost a fumble. McNabb, by contrast, had 1 TD and 1 INT. McNabb also won the total yardage race.
No one in New England will be calling for Brady's dismissal. No one in New England will be wishing for the return of Matt Cassel, who actually put up good numbers last year while Brady recovered from an injury. By contrast, Philly fans will largely be happy with just letting McNabb leave, paving the way for Kevin Kolb, a COMPLETE unknown entity. Furthermore, they would probably approve of a plan to let McNabb walk and to name Michael Vick, whose season was mostly awful when it wasn't non-existent, as the heir apparent. I will go farther. Philly fans would support the idea of bringing Jeff Garcia back to play QB, even though the entire NFL agreed this year that Garcia's career is over.
Please don't think that I am excusing McNabb for his poor play. He wasn't good enough, the same way that Brady wasn't good enough. However, Brady is sharper in some ways than McNabb when it comes to addressing the media. Brady minimized his own part in the debacle to some extent, and told reporters that he would have booed the Patriots' performance too. McNabb was baited, by contrast, into talking about whether or not he will return next year, and into avoiding any mention of what caused the loss, because he made the mistake stating a fact after the season ending loss to Dallas - that the Eagles showed their youth in the game.
If Philly fans were SMART, and if they were as KNOWLEDGEABLE as they claim to be, they would be hoping that the off season has the following highlights. 1. The Eagles sign a quality LB from the free agent pool, AND they draft a quality LB like Rolando McLain. [Yes, McClain will cost draft choices or players if the Eagles wish to move up, but they have bait in Kolb and Vick, who are worth something on the open market to the right team.] 2. The Eagles find a quality right tackle via free agency or the draft. 3. The Eagles find a quality safety via free agency. 4. The Eagles extend Sheldon Brown's contract after disclosing that he has been injured more seriously than they have let on for the past six weeks. 5. The Eagles announce a genuine expectation that their most significant injured players - Stewart Bradley, Jamaal Jackson, Kevin Curtis, and Cornelius Ingram - will be able to return at full strength for the 2010 season.
The Eagles have a lot of work to do, but their future does not look as cloudy as Eagles fans will say it is. They have two talented young receivers. They have the best QB in franchise history. They have a reasonalbe chance to use both McCoy and Westbrook as a running tandem. They have Leonar Weaver and Brent Celek, who made themselves conspicuous by their qualtiy play through most of the season.
However, I expect four months of McNabb and Redi bashing. I expect more lamenting the departure of Brian Dawkins, who happens to be the first veteran they have let go about whom they were short term wrong. Dawkins may not have many more seasons left in him, but this is the first time they have let someone go becasue they thought his skills were diminishing, and he proved them wrong. Good for him. I miss him too.
I also expect more radio hosts to invent reasons to object to McNabb. He's pointing fingers at his teammates. He's too aloof on the sidelines. He chokes under pressure. He can't bring them back in the fourth quarter (Oh that's right: he did that three weeks in a row during the six game win streak.)
Philly fans are too busy being passionate, loyal, and hungry to use their brains before they react. The Eagles just concluded another disappointng season by losing for the third time in a year to the Dallas Cowboys, who demonstrated that they are simply the better team this year.
Now they are calling for the release, trade, or sale of Donovan McNabb, the best QB in franchise history, who just completed the second best season of his career. They watched the Cowboys demonstrate the superiority of the Cowboys on both the offensive and defensive lines. They saw the coaching staff of the Eagles look under-prepared and ineffective. They saw the inferiority of the Eagles' linebakcers and secondary, and they concluded that the best way to respond to those observations was to call for the head of the quarterback.
If you think I am saying that the fans are wrong, I am. However, I don't have a problem with their being wrong, and I don't object to their opinion, though I disagree, that McNabb should be shown the door. They are entitled to their opinions. They are not allowed to be so blindly stupid that they disregard the obvious failings and focus their umbrage on NcNabb. I realize I am now going to make a comparison between Tom Brady and McNabb, and that to do such a thing will infuriate the McNabb haters, but I am nothing if not thoughtful and objective.
I watched the golden boy Brady, almost uniformly seen as the greatest QB of the decade becasue his team has won three Super Bowls, look disarmingly like McNabb against the Baltimore Ravens. And Brady looked mostly awful for the same reasons that McNabb looked awful: his receivers weren't consistently good enough, and he spent too much time dodging pass rushers who disrupted his sight lines or his footwork.
Brady finished 23-42 with four turnovers on his dance card. McNabb's stats were eerily similar. 19-37 and 1 turnover. Brady did throw for 2 TD's but he more than compensated by throwing three INT's. He also lost a fumble. McNabb, by contrast, had 1 TD and 1 INT. McNabb also won the total yardage race.
No one in New England will be calling for Brady's dismissal. No one in New England will be wishing for the return of Matt Cassel, who actually put up good numbers last year while Brady recovered from an injury. By contrast, Philly fans will largely be happy with just letting McNabb leave, paving the way for Kevin Kolb, a COMPLETE unknown entity. Furthermore, they would probably approve of a plan to let McNabb walk and to name Michael Vick, whose season was mostly awful when it wasn't non-existent, as the heir apparent. I will go farther. Philly fans would support the idea of bringing Jeff Garcia back to play QB, even though the entire NFL agreed this year that Garcia's career is over.
Please don't think that I am excusing McNabb for his poor play. He wasn't good enough, the same way that Brady wasn't good enough. However, Brady is sharper in some ways than McNabb when it comes to addressing the media. Brady minimized his own part in the debacle to some extent, and told reporters that he would have booed the Patriots' performance too. McNabb was baited, by contrast, into talking about whether or not he will return next year, and into avoiding any mention of what caused the loss, because he made the mistake stating a fact after the season ending loss to Dallas - that the Eagles showed their youth in the game.
If Philly fans were SMART, and if they were as KNOWLEDGEABLE as they claim to be, they would be hoping that the off season has the following highlights. 1. The Eagles sign a quality LB from the free agent pool, AND they draft a quality LB like Rolando McLain. [Yes, McClain will cost draft choices or players if the Eagles wish to move up, but they have bait in Kolb and Vick, who are worth something on the open market to the right team.] 2. The Eagles find a quality right tackle via free agency or the draft. 3. The Eagles find a quality safety via free agency. 4. The Eagles extend Sheldon Brown's contract after disclosing that he has been injured more seriously than they have let on for the past six weeks. 5. The Eagles announce a genuine expectation that their most significant injured players - Stewart Bradley, Jamaal Jackson, Kevin Curtis, and Cornelius Ingram - will be able to return at full strength for the 2010 season.
The Eagles have a lot of work to do, but their future does not look as cloudy as Eagles fans will say it is. They have two talented young receivers. They have the best QB in franchise history. They have a reasonalbe chance to use both McCoy and Westbrook as a running tandem. They have Leonar Weaver and Brent Celek, who made themselves conspicuous by their qualtiy play through most of the season.
However, I expect four months of McNabb and Redi bashing. I expect more lamenting the departure of Brian Dawkins, who happens to be the first veteran they have let go about whom they were short term wrong. Dawkins may not have many more seasons left in him, but this is the first time they have let someone go becasue they thought his skills were diminishing, and he proved them wrong. Good for him. I miss him too.
I also expect more radio hosts to invent reasons to object to McNabb. He's pointing fingers at his teammates. He's too aloof on the sidelines. He chokes under pressure. He can't bring them back in the fourth quarter (Oh that's right: he did that three weeks in a row during the six game win streak.)
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Tiger and his Tail, er, Tale.
I have to lay out a few items - reveal the writer's biases - before commencing with the commentary suggested by the headline. I have never been a Tiger fan. I have always tended to favor Phil Mickelson, quite possibly because Phil has so publicly displayed his humanity, whether it involved melting down at Winged Foot, or suspending his season to tend to his cancer-diagnosed wife. On the other hand, I have no problem acknowledging that Tiger Woods is the best golfer on the planet, and quite possibly the best of all time. My wife, by contrast, is a huge Tiger fan, and so our mutual enjoyment of golf has been enhanced by the friendly conflict.
I am not surprised, nor outraged, nor betrayed by the developemnt that has put Tiger in the spotlight. I offer no apologies for Tiger's behavior, but I also know that women are shallow and stupid when in the presence of money and fame, and so I suspect that beautiful women have been throwing themselves at Tiger for most of his adult life. So, no, I'm not surprised. Neither am I outraged, partly due to the premise stated above, but also because I believe that everyone can falter, abandon his values, provided the circumstances present themselves in the ideal manner. [I think that those who have never strayed are rarely better or truer people than some others who have; rather, the opportunities have not presented themselves when that person was most vulnerable.] I don't feel betrayed because I have never invested in the media created icon that is Tiger Woods. I remember telling my wife years ago that I just had a sneaking suspicion that Tiger is not a nice person, despite the carefully regulated persona that he has masterfully built.
I am disappointed though. I wanted Tiger to prove my instincts or hunches wrong. I wanted to find out, some day when he closes in on Jack Nicklaus's major tournament vicories record, that he is as upright, true, and exemplary as the fawning media people have made him out to be.
In fact, the fawning media are responsible for my general distaste for Tiger. Toward the end of this past season, I watched more than a few tournaments where, in the final round, Tiger had failed to make a run. Nevertheless, his name was the most oft-repeated pair of nouns in the broadcast. Think of it, TIGER WOODS was uttered more often than BIRDIE PUTT or PAR SAVE or any other combination. "He's not even in the running!" I yelled at the TV, to which my wife replied, "and yet he is still the most interesting thing to talk about."
Honestly, I wanted Tiger to be better than Jordan, another likeable icon who proved himself to be much less than his image. I was reminded of Dr. J., a boyhood favorite and probably the early model for Jordan and Woods' public image, when he issued his apology for fathering a child who turned out to be a pro tennis player. I don't recall why the young lady identified Dr. J. as her father at that time, but I remember being similarly dismayed that Dr. J. wasn't what I thought him to be.
I suppose I shouldn't be dismayed that the pedestal that the media and Woods' built has proven to be as tarnished as his image, but if not Tiger, who? I don't need for any of my sports figures to be perfect, but I want one or two to be awesome in character. I want someone to be bigger and better than the rest. I want someone who can at least keep it in his pants when his drop-dead gorgeous wife and young children are counting on him to be as large as life will let him be.
I can't ask such a thing of Phil Mickelson, who is endearing to me becasue of all of his foibles and limitations. Phil is a phenomonal golfer with whom I can identify, because I can easily see myself making some of the same miscalculations, or falling short of a goal when the time seems ripe. Phil can be my favorite golfer, but he can't be larger than life.
Perhaps I can look to someone like Peyton Manning, who doesn't cast quite the same shadow as Tiger, but who seems to be at least reminiscent of his own image.
I do know this, I will be cheering for the Mickelson's and the Y.E. Yang's with just a little more zest. And I will be hoping that Nicklaus's record remains painfully out of reach. And I will also hope that the media does as Tiger has asked and allows the Woods family enough privacy and dignity to figure out where to go from here. I know the media won't, but I can keep wishing, can't I?
I am not surprised, nor outraged, nor betrayed by the developemnt that has put Tiger in the spotlight. I offer no apologies for Tiger's behavior, but I also know that women are shallow and stupid when in the presence of money and fame, and so I suspect that beautiful women have been throwing themselves at Tiger for most of his adult life. So, no, I'm not surprised. Neither am I outraged, partly due to the premise stated above, but also because I believe that everyone can falter, abandon his values, provided the circumstances present themselves in the ideal manner. [I think that those who have never strayed are rarely better or truer people than some others who have; rather, the opportunities have not presented themselves when that person was most vulnerable.] I don't feel betrayed because I have never invested in the media created icon that is Tiger Woods. I remember telling my wife years ago that I just had a sneaking suspicion that Tiger is not a nice person, despite the carefully regulated persona that he has masterfully built.
I am disappointed though. I wanted Tiger to prove my instincts or hunches wrong. I wanted to find out, some day when he closes in on Jack Nicklaus's major tournament vicories record, that he is as upright, true, and exemplary as the fawning media people have made him out to be.
In fact, the fawning media are responsible for my general distaste for Tiger. Toward the end of this past season, I watched more than a few tournaments where, in the final round, Tiger had failed to make a run. Nevertheless, his name was the most oft-repeated pair of nouns in the broadcast. Think of it, TIGER WOODS was uttered more often than BIRDIE PUTT or PAR SAVE or any other combination. "He's not even in the running!" I yelled at the TV, to which my wife replied, "and yet he is still the most interesting thing to talk about."
Honestly, I wanted Tiger to be better than Jordan, another likeable icon who proved himself to be much less than his image. I was reminded of Dr. J., a boyhood favorite and probably the early model for Jordan and Woods' public image, when he issued his apology for fathering a child who turned out to be a pro tennis player. I don't recall why the young lady identified Dr. J. as her father at that time, but I remember being similarly dismayed that Dr. J. wasn't what I thought him to be.
I suppose I shouldn't be dismayed that the pedestal that the media and Woods' built has proven to be as tarnished as his image, but if not Tiger, who? I don't need for any of my sports figures to be perfect, but I want one or two to be awesome in character. I want someone to be bigger and better than the rest. I want someone who can at least keep it in his pants when his drop-dead gorgeous wife and young children are counting on him to be as large as life will let him be.
I can't ask such a thing of Phil Mickelson, who is endearing to me becasue of all of his foibles and limitations. Phil is a phenomonal golfer with whom I can identify, because I can easily see myself making some of the same miscalculations, or falling short of a goal when the time seems ripe. Phil can be my favorite golfer, but he can't be larger than life.
Perhaps I can look to someone like Peyton Manning, who doesn't cast quite the same shadow as Tiger, but who seems to be at least reminiscent of his own image.
I do know this, I will be cheering for the Mickelson's and the Y.E. Yang's with just a little more zest. And I will be hoping that Nicklaus's record remains painfully out of reach. And I will also hope that the media does as Tiger has asked and allows the Woods family enough privacy and dignity to figure out where to go from here. I know the media won't, but I can keep wishing, can't I?
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Establishig Priorities (Get Over Yourself)
Some recent events have provoked a bit of thought, and vitriol, and so have become the subject of this latest one-sided dialogue.
I will start with an objection to posturing. You all know the situation to which I am referring. You engage some group of people in a conversation, and one bombastic grunt immediately grabs the imaginary megaphone and overstates his case, solely for the chance to be in the limelight for a few seconds. In a recent instance, an acquaintance adopted his most stentorian tone and pontificated on the outrage of Adam Lambert's performance on the American Music Awards.
Now, while I object to the tastelessness of the performance, and its obvious success in generating buzz, I am equally offended by the feigned outrage and maybe even moreso by the response generated by Adam Lambert. For years, the public has gradually accepted the pantomiming of sexual acts under the pretense of artictic performance. Be honest, how far removed is Janet Jackson's misguided decision to flash her breast [No, I don't believe it was a wardrobe malfunction] and what millions of viewers watch on "Dancing With the Stars" every week? Don't think so? Watch the dance show with a dirty mind. The only reason for the absence of backlash is that we have become inured to the tasteless mimickry. The dancers, as attractive and fit as most of them are, are wearing little clothing and preforming dances that hace been deliberately choreographed to simulate sexual movements.
This acquaintance pointed his intellectual finger and bemoaned the sad state of affairs that made it even a consideration that pretending to perform a homosexual act might make it past the censors. What a load of crap! Just as ridiculous was Lambert's contention that he was exercising artistic freedom in carrying out the maneuver. Artistic freedom? Are you kidding me? The calculated move was designed to offend and to garner attention. That he succeeded says only that our culture hasn't quite gotten to the point where anything goes without comment. I object to the performance too, but I won't go so far as to channel outrage. I find it sad and distrubing, but since we have few standards anymore, I can't summon up even surprise, let alone anger. How can anyone pretend genuine disgust when the airwaves are littered with similar displays of filth?
Get over yourself, EVERYBODY. One may object as I do, and one may find a performance or the public display of any questionable material offensive, and he may announce his evaluation to all the world. But please don't take that tone with me?
The adoption of the flamboyant posture, whatever it is, is an exact replica of the performance or act to which you are objecting. Think about it. Lambert does something over the top, on purpose, so that everyone will look at him. The posturer's answer is to overreact in hopes of making an impression that will draw the attention to himself. Want to make a genuine statement? Turn off those programs that traffic in pushing the decency envelope. If those efforts didn't win an audience, the ubiquity of tastelessness would diminish. Tasteful would rule the day because tasteless has been rejected.
One very funny thing happened as a result of Lambert's maneuvers though. After being upstaged by Kanye West on an earlier music awards show whose name I can't remember at the moment, Taylor Swift - a very pretty girl who cannot sing a lick - was upstaged again on an awards show. Seriously, Taylor Seift's success is further proof of the deterioration of taste. From what I can tell, she is a sweet kid whose success I do not begrudge a whit. Good for her. But for crying out loud, shouldn't our decorated singers have good voices, not just a pretty face and a good marketing strategy? I would go on, but I realize that the popularity of Taylor Swift is no different than the 70's popularity of the Monkees, a musical group comprised of four charismatic guys who hadn't the capacity to craft a musical composition until some marketing group invented them.
Which brings me to the conclusion and what seems to be a unavoidable point: people are remarkably stupid. The collective consciousness can be created, led, and retained in whatever direction the marketing people decide. Only a small percentage of people have a solid sense of taste, decency, and propriety, and they haven't the voice to make much of an impact. I know this makes me something of a self-righteous bastard, but I won't succumb to the stance to which this entire piece is objecting.
I will start with an objection to posturing. You all know the situation to which I am referring. You engage some group of people in a conversation, and one bombastic grunt immediately grabs the imaginary megaphone and overstates his case, solely for the chance to be in the limelight for a few seconds. In a recent instance, an acquaintance adopted his most stentorian tone and pontificated on the outrage of Adam Lambert's performance on the American Music Awards.
Now, while I object to the tastelessness of the performance, and its obvious success in generating buzz, I am equally offended by the feigned outrage and maybe even moreso by the response generated by Adam Lambert. For years, the public has gradually accepted the pantomiming of sexual acts under the pretense of artictic performance. Be honest, how far removed is Janet Jackson's misguided decision to flash her breast [No, I don't believe it was a wardrobe malfunction] and what millions of viewers watch on "Dancing With the Stars" every week? Don't think so? Watch the dance show with a dirty mind. The only reason for the absence of backlash is that we have become inured to the tasteless mimickry. The dancers, as attractive and fit as most of them are, are wearing little clothing and preforming dances that hace been deliberately choreographed to simulate sexual movements.
This acquaintance pointed his intellectual finger and bemoaned the sad state of affairs that made it even a consideration that pretending to perform a homosexual act might make it past the censors. What a load of crap! Just as ridiculous was Lambert's contention that he was exercising artistic freedom in carrying out the maneuver. Artistic freedom? Are you kidding me? The calculated move was designed to offend and to garner attention. That he succeeded says only that our culture hasn't quite gotten to the point where anything goes without comment. I object to the performance too, but I won't go so far as to channel outrage. I find it sad and distrubing, but since we have few standards anymore, I can't summon up even surprise, let alone anger. How can anyone pretend genuine disgust when the airwaves are littered with similar displays of filth?
Get over yourself, EVERYBODY. One may object as I do, and one may find a performance or the public display of any questionable material offensive, and he may announce his evaluation to all the world. But please don't take that tone with me?
The adoption of the flamboyant posture, whatever it is, is an exact replica of the performance or act to which you are objecting. Think about it. Lambert does something over the top, on purpose, so that everyone will look at him. The posturer's answer is to overreact in hopes of making an impression that will draw the attention to himself. Want to make a genuine statement? Turn off those programs that traffic in pushing the decency envelope. If those efforts didn't win an audience, the ubiquity of tastelessness would diminish. Tasteful would rule the day because tasteless has been rejected.
One very funny thing happened as a result of Lambert's maneuvers though. After being upstaged by Kanye West on an earlier music awards show whose name I can't remember at the moment, Taylor Swift - a very pretty girl who cannot sing a lick - was upstaged again on an awards show. Seriously, Taylor Seift's success is further proof of the deterioration of taste. From what I can tell, she is a sweet kid whose success I do not begrudge a whit. Good for her. But for crying out loud, shouldn't our decorated singers have good voices, not just a pretty face and a good marketing strategy? I would go on, but I realize that the popularity of Taylor Swift is no different than the 70's popularity of the Monkees, a musical group comprised of four charismatic guys who hadn't the capacity to craft a musical composition until some marketing group invented them.
Which brings me to the conclusion and what seems to be a unavoidable point: people are remarkably stupid. The collective consciousness can be created, led, and retained in whatever direction the marketing people decide. Only a small percentage of people have a solid sense of taste, decency, and propriety, and they haven't the voice to make much of an impact. I know this makes me something of a self-righteous bastard, but I won't succumb to the stance to which this entire piece is objecting.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Passing the Torch
I don't know where the benchmark is, but sometime in all of our lives we face the dubious prospect of passing the torch on to someone else. If one is an athlete, this happens at a relatively young age, as the fresher legs and stronger drive make it obvious that someone will inevitably take one's place in the larger scheme. Some people experience the milestone on the job, as they become sometimes painfully aware that the new and improved version of themselves is poised to take over a pedestal. However, I think the weirdest passing of the torch occurs between fathers and sons, and maybe mothers and daughters.
The is not destined to be a bittersweet account in any way. In fact, I think it's kind of a pleasant moment because of the category of torch passing involved. Yesterday, my oldest son texted me to ask the name of the goddess of memory in Greek mythology. You see, for all of their lives I was the repositor of all kinds of useless, trivial information. Not that the name of mythological figures is always necessarily useless, but the information the boy wanted was for no significant purpose in this case. I spelled out what I could recall, Mnemone or something similar. I added the comment that I really had no idea, but I thought I was dancing in the right direction. Dutifully, I hit the send button.
WIthin seconds I received the response. I was wrong, and what was more, my other son had texted the right answer MINUTES before me. Now I know we each received the same query at about the same cyber time, and the boy bested me by MINUTES. How the hell long was I thinking about it. In my mind, I answered as quickly as possible.
I long ago bestowed the mantle of music trivia to my older son. When he was younger, I would quiz him on title and artist for any song that came on the radio. Through most of his life, I was pretty good. If the object in question was a song that received redio play, I probably knew the title and artist. When I didn't, it was rarely because I didn't remember; it was usually because I really wasn't familiar with the tune. Unfortunately, my range of silly knowledge was limited to rock and roll from the late fifties to middle eighties. Having been born in 1986, and having been trained almost from birth, my son expanded the range up to and including the present. While it's true that he is not quite so strong at the earliest limits of that range, he far surpasses me because he knows music from a much wider range of genres, and his identification abilities cover about ten more years than he has been alive.
This 'skill' served him well when he did a brief stint as as DJ at a neighborhood bar. He had managed to amass one heck of a library of music because he new which songs to look for. I remember about three years ago, I think, when he scolded me for not including much of Bob Dylan in his mental archives. It was an oversight I still feel apologetic about.
But back to the mythology example. My younger son never had a course in mythology; he encountered the subject on his own, and with some push from his brother, who was interested for awhile, and whom I directed to read some cool texts designed for whatever age group he was in at the time. I immediately texted the younger son to announce his acension to the throne of arcane factoids, and he was not even remotely impressed. My text said explicitly that the torch was passed, and the older son responded with a text that didn't even acknowledge my concession. He has known for quite awhile that he has caught and passed me in areas well beyond the recognition of musical compositions. The other son was even less impressed, as he didn't think the ceremony warranted any acknowledgment at all.
I asked them both to include me in this game of odd queries at least for a few more years. However, I don't know that they intend to do anything of the kind. Having demonstrated my incapacity, they will probably not think to send the quesiton my way, since the immediacy of the answer is the point, and they will be able to get what they want elsewhere. Whe needs a piece of information that takes the old man an hour or two to remember. By that time, they will have visited any number of cyber sources.
Again, I feel a mild pleasure that they play the game, that they like to house the information and have it at the ready. I am smiling. Oh, and for those of you cursed with the same trivia disease, the name of the goddess is Mnemosyne.
The is not destined to be a bittersweet account in any way. In fact, I think it's kind of a pleasant moment because of the category of torch passing involved. Yesterday, my oldest son texted me to ask the name of the goddess of memory in Greek mythology. You see, for all of their lives I was the repositor of all kinds of useless, trivial information. Not that the name of mythological figures is always necessarily useless, but the information the boy wanted was for no significant purpose in this case. I spelled out what I could recall, Mnemone or something similar. I added the comment that I really had no idea, but I thought I was dancing in the right direction. Dutifully, I hit the send button.
WIthin seconds I received the response. I was wrong, and what was more, my other son had texted the right answer MINUTES before me. Now I know we each received the same query at about the same cyber time, and the boy bested me by MINUTES. How the hell long was I thinking about it. In my mind, I answered as quickly as possible.
I long ago bestowed the mantle of music trivia to my older son. When he was younger, I would quiz him on title and artist for any song that came on the radio. Through most of his life, I was pretty good. If the object in question was a song that received redio play, I probably knew the title and artist. When I didn't, it was rarely because I didn't remember; it was usually because I really wasn't familiar with the tune. Unfortunately, my range of silly knowledge was limited to rock and roll from the late fifties to middle eighties. Having been born in 1986, and having been trained almost from birth, my son expanded the range up to and including the present. While it's true that he is not quite so strong at the earliest limits of that range, he far surpasses me because he knows music from a much wider range of genres, and his identification abilities cover about ten more years than he has been alive.
This 'skill' served him well when he did a brief stint as as DJ at a neighborhood bar. He had managed to amass one heck of a library of music because he new which songs to look for. I remember about three years ago, I think, when he scolded me for not including much of Bob Dylan in his mental archives. It was an oversight I still feel apologetic about.
But back to the mythology example. My younger son never had a course in mythology; he encountered the subject on his own, and with some push from his brother, who was interested for awhile, and whom I directed to read some cool texts designed for whatever age group he was in at the time. I immediately texted the younger son to announce his acension to the throne of arcane factoids, and he was not even remotely impressed. My text said explicitly that the torch was passed, and the older son responded with a text that didn't even acknowledge my concession. He has known for quite awhile that he has caught and passed me in areas well beyond the recognition of musical compositions. The other son was even less impressed, as he didn't think the ceremony warranted any acknowledgment at all.
I asked them both to include me in this game of odd queries at least for a few more years. However, I don't know that they intend to do anything of the kind. Having demonstrated my incapacity, they will probably not think to send the quesiton my way, since the immediacy of the answer is the point, and they will be able to get what they want elsewhere. Whe needs a piece of information that takes the old man an hour or two to remember. By that time, they will have visited any number of cyber sources.
Again, I feel a mild pleasure that they play the game, that they like to house the information and have it at the ready. I am smiling. Oh, and for those of you cursed with the same trivia disease, the name of the goddess is Mnemosyne.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Parenting
*****This was written more than ten years ago, when my children were in that preteen period of existence. I think, however, that it is still relevant, so I am recalling it because I can.
Let’s face it, generally speaking, we suck as parents. That is not to say that all of us parents are similarly sucky in all areas. No, we all have carefully nurtured, over time, our own specialized area of ineptitude. Kids in general know more than they ever have before, yet they are less skilled when they grow up - according to the completely unbiased view of our leading pollsters - and they are more spoiled than we were when we were kids. Ask any parent.
Where have we gone wrong? Our kids get each other pregnant, convince each other to use and abuse drugs, shoot and kill and stab each other on a much more regular basis, and we do more and more to combat this trend with little or no success.
Perhaps a ‘shoot from the hip’ observation might explain some of the causes of our collective parental ineptitude. Your parents and my parents were bastards, and now that we are older, we love them for most of the bastardry. But rather than emulate them in significant ways, we opt to avoid making the ‘same mistakes’ our parents made. My only question is: according to whom? If I ask my dad if he’s sorry that he nailed me with a belt in the back of the knees when I was ten years old, he’ll say what?
In the interest of science, I asked him. He said he was very sorry for nailing me in the back of the legs with a belt when I was ten years old; he had been trying to leave a good, solid three inch welt on my behind. The legs heal faster, he said, although the initial injury is much more painful.
So I found out that mein papa was a quantity man, rather than quality. He wanted a punishment that would stick with me as long as possible, not one that actually had to hurt like the dickens. The point is that he completely ignored the question of whether or not he should have belted me in the first place. The idea that belting me might have been improper or harmful had escaped him.
And now that I’m raising kids, I think he’s right.
My mom had the biggest trouble with my younger brother, though I’m not quite sure why. My older brother and I had taught the young’un that most of mom’s yelling and screaming and gnashing of teeth was just for effect. Her theatrical barks were worse than her thespian bites, you might say. Then again, you might not say anything of the sort. That’s why I’m writin’ all this stuff down and you’re just lookin’ at it.
Anyway, my mom was much stricter and gnash-ready where my younger brother was concerned, and her bite proved to be more formidable than I thought, especially the night she discovered a more effective weapon than my father’s belt or the back of her hand.
For years my mom had tried to discipline me by whacking me with her hand, but my behind was much more resilient than her hand, especially after years of her putting laundry through a wringer-washer in a damp, cold basement. She would wind up and swat away, and I would smile, and she would wince. And to be perfectly honest, I think my self-assessment was altered forever; I thought I was a good kid because I didn’t get smacked. But I didn’t get smacked, mainly because my mom couldn’t hit me hard enough to hurt me.
So one night my younger brother was in the middle of ignoring her bark, when my mom hit upon the idea of whacking the unsuspecting lad over the head with a heeled shoe (I think it was my sister’s). The youngster dared her, with far too much arrogance, to discipline him. And my mom got two good wallops to his noggin.
But then he bled.
As my mom tried to nurse him and punish him at the same time, the injured boy whined and screamed, more out of shock than out of pain, that he was going to die, and that it served my mom right. He asked piteously, “How do you know I’m not going to die? How do you know that I will be fine? Look at all the blood!” And then, after a brief interlude to check on the quality of the bloodletting, he issued the strongest condemnation. “It’ll serve you right if I do die. Then you’ll be sorry!”
I swear to God all this happened – (yes, the dialogue, has been fudged a bit.)
And the point of it all is simple. My Mom and Dad swatted and smacked and belted with some degree of regularity, though being the middle child I tended to escape more than not. Their nine kids, raised with a fairly healthy dose of love and domestic violence, all turned out all right. I mean, we ALL turned out more right than wrong.
I honestly believe that part of the problem with the way we’re parenting is that there isn’t enough corporal punishment going on in households across the country. I know that there are parents who disdain the rod, so they mostly spoil the child. But they also manage to maintain some degree of discipline in their houses. These parents are the exception though. It’s not so much that every kid needs to be beaten regularly, although I think it should be discipline method number one or two at all times before the offspring’s teen-hood. More specifically, the problem is the general consensus that kids shouldn’t receive this brand of punishment.
I am here to announce that all those namby-pamby psychologists are WRONG! - every one of them. One of the worst things the field of psychology ever did was to tell people that they were monsters if they used the rod to instill a healthy fear in their children. Fear is a natural reaction, and one that should keep humans from engaging in all kinds of dangerous behaviors. However, these pantywaist psychologists have told parents that they’ll damage psyches and self-esteem and all of that garbage.
Before I go any further, you should know that I am not in favor of beatings. Overpowering your child and throttling him or her - this is a great way to create a monster. It’s common sense. If I learn that people who say they love me are going to knock me senseless, then I am definitely going to get some screwed up ideas, not to mention some pent-up hostility toward others in general. The brand of corporal punishment that I’m talking about is reasoned, calm, and never spontaneous. In fact, if a parent is ever under great stress, he or she should send the offending child to his or her room. Then he should schedule time for a good solid lickin’ when he or she is calmer.
Why spankings? Reinforcement of the fear instinct. People should learn and relearn that they have every reason to be afraid of things in the world. Fear is probably the primary motivator and inhibitor of human behavior. We go to work because we’re afraid of being poor. We try to be nice to our neighbors because we’re afraid they’ll turn on us. We stay out of lightning storms. Many people act with morals and values and ethics because they are afraid of going to hell. And if hell is only a theological concept to some, then prison should substitute nicely in a pinch.
Fear is good. The world is not a kind place, and the parent’s job is to instill the mechanism for fear in his/her children. We should teach children not to consort with strangers, not to hitch hike, to avoid certain places after dark, never to use credit cards to accumulate high interest debts. You know - all the regular things.
But we as parents should also be teaching our kids to fear the repercussions of their rudeness, their irresponsibility, their smart mouths, their boldness, and their disrespect. They should be afraid of getting whacked immediately upon report of the performance. Eventually, the parent can attempt to explain why politeness, responsibility, courtesy, restraint, and respect are desirable. Before the age of fifteen, children should learn to display the behaviors of these traits for fear of punishment. If they learn the benefits of these virtues before that, that is great. In the meantime, they should know how to present the appearance of all these things.
Now, this may sound silly to you, but it isn’t. You, if you’re in your thirties or above, probably acted with respect and courtesy because you had abject fear of your parents’ reaction to the alternative. If you went to Catholic grade school, as I did, you learned to display the traits the sisters demanded, for fear of having a yardstick broken upon your behind. I was very afraid of the nuns until sixth grade, at which time I developed mere concern.
And if parents would whack their kids a little more, what major change would be wrought? None.
The truth is that none of this will help entirely unless parents and the adult community as a unified front hold our youths responsible for their behaviors.
If you, the grown up, see a child, any child, behaving in an inappropriate fashion - say, breaking bottles in the roadway, it is your responsibility to correct him. And don’t be dismayed or surprised if the kid shows you no respect at all. For awhile, you’ll be the first adult, maybe including his parents, to attempt to redress his behavior. However, if all the grownups of the world would fulfill their duties, the kid would be reminded consistently, and he’d start looking over his shoulder.
Before I conclude this portion, let me present a qualifier/disclaimer. If this sounds remotely similar to Hillary Clinton’s It Takes a Village, please forget I said anything. I certainly aspire to more wisdom than the wife of a horse’s pitoot.
Let’s face it, generally speaking, we suck as parents. That is not to say that all of us parents are similarly sucky in all areas. No, we all have carefully nurtured, over time, our own specialized area of ineptitude. Kids in general know more than they ever have before, yet they are less skilled when they grow up - according to the completely unbiased view of our leading pollsters - and they are more spoiled than we were when we were kids. Ask any parent.
Where have we gone wrong? Our kids get each other pregnant, convince each other to use and abuse drugs, shoot and kill and stab each other on a much more regular basis, and we do more and more to combat this trend with little or no success.
Perhaps a ‘shoot from the hip’ observation might explain some of the causes of our collective parental ineptitude. Your parents and my parents were bastards, and now that we are older, we love them for most of the bastardry. But rather than emulate them in significant ways, we opt to avoid making the ‘same mistakes’ our parents made. My only question is: according to whom? If I ask my dad if he’s sorry that he nailed me with a belt in the back of the knees when I was ten years old, he’ll say what?
In the interest of science, I asked him. He said he was very sorry for nailing me in the back of the legs with a belt when I was ten years old; he had been trying to leave a good, solid three inch welt on my behind. The legs heal faster, he said, although the initial injury is much more painful.
So I found out that mein papa was a quantity man, rather than quality. He wanted a punishment that would stick with me as long as possible, not one that actually had to hurt like the dickens. The point is that he completely ignored the question of whether or not he should have belted me in the first place. The idea that belting me might have been improper or harmful had escaped him.
And now that I’m raising kids, I think he’s right.
My mom had the biggest trouble with my younger brother, though I’m not quite sure why. My older brother and I had taught the young’un that most of mom’s yelling and screaming and gnashing of teeth was just for effect. Her theatrical barks were worse than her thespian bites, you might say. Then again, you might not say anything of the sort. That’s why I’m writin’ all this stuff down and you’re just lookin’ at it.
Anyway, my mom was much stricter and gnash-ready where my younger brother was concerned, and her bite proved to be more formidable than I thought, especially the night she discovered a more effective weapon than my father’s belt or the back of her hand.
For years my mom had tried to discipline me by whacking me with her hand, but my behind was much more resilient than her hand, especially after years of her putting laundry through a wringer-washer in a damp, cold basement. She would wind up and swat away, and I would smile, and she would wince. And to be perfectly honest, I think my self-assessment was altered forever; I thought I was a good kid because I didn’t get smacked. But I didn’t get smacked, mainly because my mom couldn’t hit me hard enough to hurt me.
So one night my younger brother was in the middle of ignoring her bark, when my mom hit upon the idea of whacking the unsuspecting lad over the head with a heeled shoe (I think it was my sister’s). The youngster dared her, with far too much arrogance, to discipline him. And my mom got two good wallops to his noggin.
But then he bled.
As my mom tried to nurse him and punish him at the same time, the injured boy whined and screamed, more out of shock than out of pain, that he was going to die, and that it served my mom right. He asked piteously, “How do you know I’m not going to die? How do you know that I will be fine? Look at all the blood!” And then, after a brief interlude to check on the quality of the bloodletting, he issued the strongest condemnation. “It’ll serve you right if I do die. Then you’ll be sorry!”
I swear to God all this happened – (yes, the dialogue, has been fudged a bit.)
And the point of it all is simple. My Mom and Dad swatted and smacked and belted with some degree of regularity, though being the middle child I tended to escape more than not. Their nine kids, raised with a fairly healthy dose of love and domestic violence, all turned out all right. I mean, we ALL turned out more right than wrong.
I honestly believe that part of the problem with the way we’re parenting is that there isn’t enough corporal punishment going on in households across the country. I know that there are parents who disdain the rod, so they mostly spoil the child. But they also manage to maintain some degree of discipline in their houses. These parents are the exception though. It’s not so much that every kid needs to be beaten regularly, although I think it should be discipline method number one or two at all times before the offspring’s teen-hood. More specifically, the problem is the general consensus that kids shouldn’t receive this brand of punishment.
I am here to announce that all those namby-pamby psychologists are WRONG! - every one of them. One of the worst things the field of psychology ever did was to tell people that they were monsters if they used the rod to instill a healthy fear in their children. Fear is a natural reaction, and one that should keep humans from engaging in all kinds of dangerous behaviors. However, these pantywaist psychologists have told parents that they’ll damage psyches and self-esteem and all of that garbage.
Before I go any further, you should know that I am not in favor of beatings. Overpowering your child and throttling him or her - this is a great way to create a monster. It’s common sense. If I learn that people who say they love me are going to knock me senseless, then I am definitely going to get some screwed up ideas, not to mention some pent-up hostility toward others in general. The brand of corporal punishment that I’m talking about is reasoned, calm, and never spontaneous. In fact, if a parent is ever under great stress, he or she should send the offending child to his or her room. Then he should schedule time for a good solid lickin’ when he or she is calmer.
Why spankings? Reinforcement of the fear instinct. People should learn and relearn that they have every reason to be afraid of things in the world. Fear is probably the primary motivator and inhibitor of human behavior. We go to work because we’re afraid of being poor. We try to be nice to our neighbors because we’re afraid they’ll turn on us. We stay out of lightning storms. Many people act with morals and values and ethics because they are afraid of going to hell. And if hell is only a theological concept to some, then prison should substitute nicely in a pinch.
Fear is good. The world is not a kind place, and the parent’s job is to instill the mechanism for fear in his/her children. We should teach children not to consort with strangers, not to hitch hike, to avoid certain places after dark, never to use credit cards to accumulate high interest debts. You know - all the regular things.
But we as parents should also be teaching our kids to fear the repercussions of their rudeness, their irresponsibility, their smart mouths, their boldness, and their disrespect. They should be afraid of getting whacked immediately upon report of the performance. Eventually, the parent can attempt to explain why politeness, responsibility, courtesy, restraint, and respect are desirable. Before the age of fifteen, children should learn to display the behaviors of these traits for fear of punishment. If they learn the benefits of these virtues before that, that is great. In the meantime, they should know how to present the appearance of all these things.
Now, this may sound silly to you, but it isn’t. You, if you’re in your thirties or above, probably acted with respect and courtesy because you had abject fear of your parents’ reaction to the alternative. If you went to Catholic grade school, as I did, you learned to display the traits the sisters demanded, for fear of having a yardstick broken upon your behind. I was very afraid of the nuns until sixth grade, at which time I developed mere concern.
And if parents would whack their kids a little more, what major change would be wrought? None.
The truth is that none of this will help entirely unless parents and the adult community as a unified front hold our youths responsible for their behaviors.
If you, the grown up, see a child, any child, behaving in an inappropriate fashion - say, breaking bottles in the roadway, it is your responsibility to correct him. And don’t be dismayed or surprised if the kid shows you no respect at all. For awhile, you’ll be the first adult, maybe including his parents, to attempt to redress his behavior. However, if all the grownups of the world would fulfill their duties, the kid would be reminded consistently, and he’d start looking over his shoulder.
Before I conclude this portion, let me present a qualifier/disclaimer. If this sounds remotely similar to Hillary Clinton’s It Takes a Village, please forget I said anything. I certainly aspire to more wisdom than the wife of a horse’s pitoot.
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