There used to be a general understanding of how Nature worked, and it was called “Common Sense”. However, beginning with the “boomer” generation, we began to depart from the accepted principles of Natural Law, and the new communication technologies have exponentially accelerated the pace of change so much so that our grandchildren’s generation lives a separate life from either their parents or grandparents. Small wonder then that there is minimal transfer of wisdom from those earlier generations to the new. In other words there is a rapidly diminishing supply of “Common Sense”, and today’s children are at greater risk than ever because of it.
To gain a perspective on the impact, imagine the apprentice knowing more about how to hitch up a team of horses than the master farmer. You can’t! But today the kids know infinitely more about the new communication technologies than anyone older. They are the modern apprentices! So, from their standpoint, if you don’t know how to program a VCR or how to use Facebook, Twitter or an I-Pad II without their help, what would you, as an adult, know about almost anything, including how to raise them? This generational disconnect is historic, unprecedented and very scary for our society!
It is a fact that our grandchildren speak a different language than their parents and grandparents, and the older generations have no clue how to use the new technology. Moreover, they probably would not understand what the grandkids are texting and tweeting anyway because of the short-hand language they use. On top of this, today’s parents worry more about their children’s self esteem than did the grandparent’s generation. Modern parents have a penchant for bestowing self esteem on their kids by rewarding every little event regardless of the level of performance, rather than having the child earn it. This makes the child feel that he or she is more invulnerable than a typical teenager would feel which places them at greater risk than any generation that preceded them.
The grandparent generation was exposed directly to Nature including germs without penicillin, poorly set broken limbs from a horse kick, the unsanitary conditions of having no indoor plumbing, unheated bedrooms and the out door toilet. We used to know how Nature worked because we lived close to the land and had first-hand knowledge of it. We also knew that self esteem had to be earned, and that one did not bring a wild animal into the house to live and then expect it to be able to survive if we turned it loose.
Today we award self-esteem to our children, even when they fail, and our government provides unending financial assistance via food stamps, unearned tax credits, and low cost Section 8 housing, even to the indolent, thinking that we are doing a good thing, no matter how contrary to Nature it may be. By the way, recent research is showing that many of those children who were given unearned rewards to protect their self esteem are now in their thirties and in the psychiatrists’ offices. The real world is not rewarding them, and they are confused. I’m shocked!
Three generations ago when current grandparents and great grandparents were kids, most of the US population lived in rural areas. During that time most of the farms were powered by horses, mules or oxen. It was rare for a farmer to own a tractor. Kids, even kids whose parents were not farmers, were taught how to hitch up a team of horses, and it was common for them to actually drive the team to do farm work as they worked along side their farm kid playmates. If you think about it that was the way that farming was done for centuries. And there was common knowledge about how to do this as well as how to live without electricity, telephones, central heating or indoor plumbing. There was a right and wrong way to do almost anything from hitching the horses, to using the outdoor “bathroom” to how to avoid the hazards associated with inappropriate behavior. And the understanding of all of this was held in common at virtually all levels of society.
By contrast, today’s children are exposed to none of this. They live in a bubble protected from the direct impact of raw Nature starting with inoculations at the cradle against virtually any disease you can think of and broken bones that can be set almost as an out-patient and living with all the modern conveniences. But in addition to being exposed to the normal idiosyncrasies of Nature, kids today are surrounded by drugs, alcohol and promiscuous sex starting from the age of middle school. The grandparent’s generation was rarely exposed to these new risks, and use of them was verboten. Anyone caught doing it was ostracized and often severely punished.
I once had an experience that epitomizes how new technology can cause us to abandon all the principles learned from centuries. As a DuPont salesman I was promoting a polymer used to make a water-based paint. One day I called on the Technical Director of a paint company in South Bend, Indiana. On his desk lay a sheet of white material he told me was paint made from our product that blew off a house in South Bend. I rubbed my thumb on the surface of the sheet and it came up white from the old paint. We agreed that since the public believed that the new paint was a “miracle” paint, so easy to use etc., that they felt free to abandon the centuries of knowledge about what one must to do to apply a satisfactory and durable coating of paint. It took a decade for the public to learn that this principle applied to the water-base paints as well as the oil base ones.
So, can we regain a “Common Sense” about how Nature works? I am not sure in this Nanny State Society with Political Correctness changing all the definitions and dominating the language that we can, but here are a few guidelines that might help.
It takes a lot of living to understand fully how Nature works. Ergo, children do not know more than their elders, and the elders need to understand this.
Children unguided by their elders are vulnerable and exposed to the dangers present in Nature. Evil and the hazards of living exist and someone has to teach the young how to live safely.
The underlying principles of Nature should be taught at home and at school beginning at an early age.
We can sympathize with modern parents who try to raise this “new child” because the four pillars that supported the grandparents generation when they were raising children are no longer there. These were:
Parents knew that the parents job was, namely to be a parent not a pal, and that the primary job was to build a “conscience” into their children so they could be a responsible citizens by age eighteen.
The neighbor believed that they could be and should be a partner with the parent. If the neighbor caught a child about to make a mistake, the neighbor felt free to stop the child and bring the child to the parent. Usually the parent would reward the neighbor with a cup of coffee or tea.
The school felt that they were a full partner with the parent and handled the child as the parent would want. If the child got into trouble the parent backed the school and usually added punishment to whatever the school had imposed..
Most of the children went to Sunday School where the lessons of right and wrong, how to behave and how to become a responsible citizen were reinforced.
In one generation all four pillars have disappeared. The parent thinks he/she should be a pal, the neighbor stands aside for fear of being sued by the parent, the school knows it will be sued if it does anything that upsets the parent and hardly any child goes to Sunday School on a regular basis. Since the grandparents do not usually live in the same town as the grandchildren and since the grandparents are not fluent in the new communication technologies, there is little if any everyday contact. Moreover, should there be gatherings where children and adults are present, the grandchildren are busy texting friends or are listening to their music via their I-Pod. So, there is little if any communication between the generations even in family gatherings.
Is it possible for the adult generation to share information with the child that will provide some protection as they enter the larger world? Unfortunately, many parents overwhelmed by their own problems, have abandoned the job, and are letting the children fend for themselves. This means the children are getting their information from their peers, who incidentally are as ignorant of how Nature works as the child itself.
Many, including writers such as Anthony E. Wolfe, Ph.D., feel that the child will have to find out how things work for themselves. His book, titled, “Get out of My Life, But First Drive Me and Cheryl to the Mall” provides a “Parents Guide to the New Teenager”. In this book Wolfe suggests that the parent should “let go”. He recognizes that the dangers the teenagers are exposed to are real, and he has many helpful suggestions for how to communicate with teenagers. However, Wolfe’s position is that the teens are out there in the real world on their own, and parents should accept this. How a parent is to do this is challenging and very scary! They would not let their pet out of the house if they knew that there were predators out there who would love to have it for lunch. Yet we are leaving the children out there where there are real predators and real hazards.
The question I am raising is how can the idea of being safe at all times and in all places be burned into their brains? We have seen that the grandparents are not there to do it and the parents have either abandoned their post or cannot find a way to communicate with their teenagers. So, can anyone communicate with the teenager about safety?
I believe that there is a way! Most companies these days stress safety. They have programs and regularly scheduled meetings with their employees to emphasize the importance of safety on the job, and they go beyond that to include discussions about the everyday safety issues related to the car and home. Persons present at these meeting will share real live risks they have experienced.. The group will then discuss possible ways to foresee and identify these risks afore hand and then they will talk about appropriate defensive actions that can be taken.
The reason for this dedication to the subject and use of Company time is to create a safety state-of-mind in their employees. They want the employee to think how to be safe at all times and in all places. And it works! Persons who experience this training will attest that being exposed to regularly scheduled safety discussions has armed them with knowledge that helps them to avoid impending danger for the rest of their lives.
So perhaps we can create a safety program for our teenagers. The schools should be able to help, and parents should talk to the school administrators to see what they can offer. Whenever there is a party or a sleepover at a person’s home, perhaps a parent or a teenager who is a leader could lead a discussion about an issue of safety the teenagers may be currently experiencing. If the child and his friends are embarrassed to speak in front of the parent, the parent should excuse him or herself, and let the kids go at it. Another possibility is to have routine safety messages texted to their phones by someone the child respects and would listen to. That person might be a coach, teacher, movie star or respected peer. How to set this up needs to be explored.
We must do something to help struggling parents who want their children to grow up safely in this strange new world, and we desperately must do something for the sake and safety of the children! And maybe, just maybe, there will come the day when the sense about how Nature really works will once again be held in common.
