If we continue to pile the blame for rising crime in our society on parents; many are led to believe that babies come with manuals and that every parent should know how to raise the perfect child. But this is certainly not so.
Just about every parent of today is raising his/her child just how their parents raised them, merely leaving out the areas they did not appreciate their parents doing to them. Few of them have read widely on the matter; even less has taken any classes and none can teach their children what was not taught to them. Many leave the raising of their children to maids nannies, or teachers.
And if this applies to mothers, it applies even more so to fathers who are often not present and when present, they leave this role to the mothers almost entirely. When we consider that young mothers are trying so hard to raise children in an environment that has changed considerably from the one in which they were raised, it is not surprising that they are struggling. Many present day parents have grown up without a TV, a cell phone, designer sneakers, or even without electricity much less having a fridge in the house.
Without making excuses for any parents, we know the sense of guilt mothers feel when they have to be out working all day and find little time to spend with their children. When they do get home, they must also attend to cooking, washing and cleaning, what happens then? They try to overcompensate. They want their children to like them so they buy material things for them and attempt to buy their love.
Sadly, in many cases they bend over backwards to please their children, and in so doing the child finds ways of easily preying on the mother’s desire to please them – also compensating for the absence of a mother’s love.
Let us shift from the blaming each other and let’s see what we can do to create an ideal society for our children.
I have to say that a manual and maybe even continuing education classes on child rearing would be a welcome addition in my book. Blame is a by product of responsibility. If a parent has a responsibility to raise the child then they must also bear some of the blame for the effect of their child rearing process. Of course, all children are individual human beings who will ultimately be responsible for their own decisions and it is for this reason that as children become adults, parents, bear less responsibility and more blame. There is no such thing as an ideal society because we all have different concepts of child rearing – I don’t have a television in my house and do not believe that it does children any good to watch a vast majority of the programs that are produced. That may seem unreasonable to another parent. Is this the best way to parent – for me yes, for others no. Sometimes, life is hard and yes mothers and fathers have to make choices that do not necessarily lend themselves to parenting in the way they would like but they do not need my help. What they need to know is that they did the best they could with what they had and ultimately the responsibility for being a good productive member of society rests on the child who will become the adult.