That's right. SUCK IT, curmudgeons.
Seriously. Have you interacted with adults lately? Because I have. And a great many of them do not exhibit any characteristics I think deserve respect.
I'm not just talking about the adults who are murderers, sexual deviants, politicians, and other ostensibly untrustworthy folks.
I'm talking about normal adults. Egocentric, environmentally abusive, and materialistic. Maybe not most of them. I sure hope not MOST of them. But a lot of them. A LOT. Probably most.
I commute with them, they're our clients at work, I see them in the grocery store.
I have absolutely no reason to respect them, except in the sense that they are fellow humans, which is certainly worth something. But, children are also humans.
And children happen to be innocent, curious, and genuine humans. THOSE are qualities I respect.
If I ask myself what possible reason there is to respect grumpy, jerk hole adults over sweet, energetic children, I can think of only one. Because adults are in control, and they say so.
Eff that. Hard. It is so transparently wrong and self-serving that it makes my heart pound and my Irish skin turn red.
Because I don't see much morality here on adult street. Now, I don't think our species is a lost cause or anything. I mean, I saw the Buzzfeed that will restore your faith in humanity. And this one, too.
But, if we need our faith restored, that's a pretty good indication that something shook our faith in the first place. Something like valuing money, power, and things WAY too much. And something like valuing the earth and fellow humans not NEARLY enough.
I'm not teaching my kid to respect adults with values like those.
Because that's how you get Nazis.
Sounds crazy? If only.
Hitler didn't inject his subordinates with genocide juice. He capitalized on an allegiance to obedience. And obedience is little more than respect for authority. And if we tell our kids to respect all adults BECAUSE ADULTS, that doesn't help them distinguish authority that should be obeyed from authority that should not.
And if they don't learn to make that distinction, they might end up like Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi in charge of expediting death, the average guy who had a normal family life and was declared sane by six psychologists at trial. Or like Rudolf Hoss, commandant of Auschwitz, who had a similar upbringing. They and a lot of Germans were students of obedience-centric indoctrination, at home, in school, at church.
Yes. Nazis were regular people who valued obedience more than anything else. And then sh*t got crazy. And so did they.
Scary, yes? Stanley Milgram thought so, too. And so he tried to prove that Americans were different from Germans. And he found that we weren't so much.
And before you lunatics accuse me of defending Nazis, I'm not. I'm not responsible for judging them or anyone else, but I'm a big fan of accountability. And that's precisely why this is so important to me.
I'm not saying that every obedient kid will fail to recognize evil and to slam on the brakes. But, I am saying that there is an inherent danger in emphasizing obedience. And, I am saying that obedience is a shortcut, easier and more concrete than cultivating morality in your child. And, I am saying that you should invest the time and trust in cultivating morality instead.
Look, no one saw Hitler coming. So, just in case.
Finley, I know you have a good heart. You will know right and wrong. That is enough.
You do not always need to be obedient. Just considerate. And loving. That is enough.
You do not need to give your elders more respect than any other life. Like a plant. That is enough.
No comments:
Post a Comment