I’ve been
focusing a lot on women’s issues recently.
As expressed in the last post, I see this as an issue implicating
Christianity because women have traditionally been a segment of the population
who have been denied basic civil rights and have been viewed as second class
citizens. Such treatment is incompatible
with Christ’s model when he walked this earth.
However,
another reason I have been so focused on women’s issues recently is that such
issues are so intertwined with family and children. Women in our society have long been the
primary caregivers of children. Whether
paid as school teachers, nannies or babysitters, or unpaid familial caregivers
(e.g., full-time moms), women still tend to be primarily responsible for and
thus have the most impact on child-rearing.
Issues impacting women thus have a huge impact on families and on children
in particular. Christians tout family
values. And in the Gospels, Christ
demonstrated a particular concern and sensitivity towards children, who were the
most inconsequential persons in the pecking order of their society. As I understand, their status was even lower
than women in first century Palestine.
So, with this
perspective, I was intrigued by the article below, which I came across last
summer:
The article discusses the notion that American kids are
very indulged relative to children in other cultures and that outside the
United States children help do household chores at an early age.
The article quotes a sociologist, Allison Pugh who notes
that a child in another such culture isn’t “born chipping in; she was
taught.” Ms. Pugh also notes the impact
of the “demands of the American workplace” that lead to American children not
being similarly taught. She explains:
“Americans
work more hours than anyone else in the universe. There’s a drive for efficiency. It’s more efficient to do chores yourself or
outsource them rather than teaching children to contribute. That’s a shame, but I don’t think it’s a
children’s shame, and it’s not just the parents’ fault. There are only so many hours in the
workday.”
The article also quotes a writer and mother of five,
Meagan Francis:
“Frankly,
expecting kids to pull their weight—and enforcing those rules day in and day
out—is tough. When I had ‘just’ two
kids, the daily trade-off hardly seemed worth it; It was better to just do it
myself than try to oversee a pair of rambunctious, clumsy, pint-sized
employees.”
The author of the article summarizes, “This seems like a
practical, rational conclusion: We don’t discipline our kids because it takes time, and we often quite literally don’t
have the time.”
In the United States we are often fairly callous to
issues involving the challenges of child-rearing. Often the attitude is: “You chose to bring
that kid into the world, he/she is your problem to deal with.” Personal responsibility is paramount; so many
people are unsympathetic to the difficulties facing American families.
I admit I used to feel like that before I was a parent
myself. If I were on a plane or in a
restaurant where a kid was loud or kicking my chair, my attitude was to think
poorly of the parents: “Why don’t they do something, their brat is bothering
me.” I was focused on my own annoyance
and inconvenience. I never thought about
how difficult it is to completely control another energetic little person who
does not have the same sorts of self-control and societal filters as an adult.
When I became a parent, I absolutely ate crow. I began to realize how difficult it is to
raise kids. I find it a joy, but you never
get a break. You’re always on. It is just exhausting. So many of my fellow working moms neglect
their own health by going years between check-ups. Some wonder aloud if the constant exhaustion
they feel is the sign of a serious health issue. But when so many other working moms have the
same symptom, it is easy to discount.
And no one is perfect when doing such a non-stop job, particularly if
you feel exhausted most of the time. At
some point, we’re all going to fail under such conditions.
It is also a challenge to be held responsible for
everything your child does, even when he/she is not with you. It is one thing to try to control their
behavior when they are in your presence; that is frankly tough enough. But it is another when they are not with
you. At such times, you have to hope
that the lessons you have taught have taken root and they behave appropriately
when they are not in close proximity.
That situation is difficult for every parent. But in my opinion, it is particularly tough if
you hold down a paying job and don’t actually get to spend much time with your
child. If most of your waking hours are
spent attending to workplace responsibilities, the little time you have at home
is often spent on the most pressing items like feeding hungry tummies and
trying to make sure folks walk out the door wearing relatively clean
clothes. Time permitting, parents with
paying gigs then attend to a sort of second tier triage which typically
includes items like making sure homework is done and getting kids to various
obligations from dental appointments, church services and/or soccer practice. Realistically, in many families, disciplining
and molding a child’s character become aspirational goals that are easily
compromised in the constant time crunch many parents experience. That is a horrible situation, but it
happens. It happens a lot.
I completely appreciate the need for efficiency and the
issue of supervising “rambunctious, clumsy, pint-sized employees.” My husband and I have seen that in our own
up-bringings, the raising of our own children and our friends’ experiences
raising their kids. Instead of inviting
a child to help with lawn care, laundry or toilet scrubbing, it is faster to do
it ourselves in the little time we have available for those tasks.
But as parents, we miss valuable opportunities to coach
and guide our kids on important life skills when we take that more efficient
route. My father-in-law is an amazing
amateur carpenter, but unfortunately he never passed those skills on to my
husband until he retired and my husband had his own family. When I have to bake for a church potluck or
other event, I try to incorporate my kids into the process. But invariably that prolongs the event
considerably. I have to fight the stress
I feel from the time pressure. I have to
suppress my inclination to discharge my “pint-sized employees” and do the
baking myself. Beyond teaching my kids
life skills in the kitchen, those are important bonding opportunities. And they
are invaluable opportunities to encourage my kids to work through
challenges. Just because the egg
cracking didn’t go smoothly the first time, doesn’t mean you throw a fit and give
up. Even if you don’t think you’ll ever
incorporate all the flour into the creamed sugar, you keep trying and see it
through until the end.
Proverbs
22:6
Train children in the way they should go; when they grow old, they won’t depart from it.
Train children in the way they should go; when they grow old, they won’t depart from it.
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