It is said that children need tough love to grow up as balanced, disciplined adults. The love has to be tempered by toughness when it comes to discipline. And toughness always needs to be tempered by love.
There ought to be BA’s in Parenting, much more useful than BA’s in Business Studies. Parenting is one of the most difficult undertakings I know. I count myself experienced, but with indifferent grades.
Maybe we can agree that children like to know what the boundaries are, what they are allowed to do and not allowed to do. They also need consistent affection and attention. As a society we are not very good at this tricky art, made rather more challenging where both parents work outside the home. It is exhausting policing the manners and behaviour of small children and takes infinite patience.
How do you think we are collectively doing?
I don’t think parenting can be taught. Its one of these things that is a combination of instinct, trial and error, and the gradual accumulation of wisdom and experience. Its also highly situational; what may be appropriate parenting in 21st century Britain may not necessarily have been so in 16th century Russia for instance.
I think there’s a lot of truth to the toughness-love dynamic. But its more complex than that. Many children choose to pursue activities that are healthy but expensive, such as music lessons, sport or dance. Should parents fund these activities unquestionably on the basis that they are good for the child? Or does carte blanche support to a child whose pursues such activities end up in practice as inadvertent spoiling, as well as favouritism if the child has a sibling who is less activity-inclined?
Parenting is also a question of values. When it comes to legal and political theory, I’m very liberal, preferring the government stayed out of our personal lives. But as to the morality of personal conduct, I’m somewhat more conservative. The question then becomes, should I enforce my morality on my children? Or should I refrain from doing so on the basis of my belief in their right to do as they please within a reasonable legal framework?
As to the performance of the world’s parents, I couldn’t possibly comment. There are too many of them to make a generalisation. In Britain, I don’t think we’re doing too badly. Teen pregnancy, abortion, alcohol consumption and drug use are all on the decline. People stay in school longer, and they now have more of an opportunity to go to university. Contrary to what they elderly generation and the conservative tabloid press may claim, most young people in Britain are intelligent, hardworking and ambitious people- more so in my view, than their ancestors, partly because of technology making us smarter.
Very good and balanced comment! Wellsaid! I was trying to be slightly provocative.