From: s36376m@puukko.hut.fi (Erkko Airo)
Subject: Re: What do you do when your child thinks Metallica is cool?
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1992 23:58:50 GMT

In article <1992Nov18.220241.11013@galileo.physics.arizona.edu> krueger@galileo.physics.arizona.edu (Ted Krueger) writes:

I have deleted a lot of the stuff - the parts i mostly agree.

>In my experience (I have been both a Christian and public school teacher), 
>rebellion nearly always occurs in children.

I am no one's father but i have got one. And being only 23 i am quite close
to the rebellion years - though sometimes i feel like being more rebellious
now than what i was when 15... 8) 

I believe some kind of "rebelling" and trying the borders is natural
part of groving up.

>  As little 
>children, their parents must make all decisions for them.  As eighteen 
>year-old, nearly high school graduates, they should likewise make many 
>decisions themselves. (something deleted here)
> While children are very small, parents should be something 
>like dictators, yet by the time children are ready to leave home the role 
>of the parent should be nearly completely that of advisor.

Being parent means educating - and in my opinion dictating things is not
educating. How about teaching the children to use their own brains?
For amazingly young persons are able to understand quite a lot about
(basic) moral. I totally agree that parents have to make certain limit
clear to children and not let them rule the family but the word "dictator"
somehow sets me off...

There is a song "On children" by Sweet Honey in the Rocks which
goes like this (This is a music group though): "Your children are not
your children. They are the sons and the daughters of the lives longing
for a top. They come through you, but they are not from you and though
they are with you they belong not to you. You can give them your love but
not your thoughts - cause they have their own thoughts. You can house
their bodies but not their their souls for their souls dwell in the place
of tomorrow which you can not visit, not even in your dreams. You can
start to be like them but cannot make them just like you."
This song contains a big message very beautifully espressed - and it is
very Christian also.

>  It is not at 
>all profitable for parents to be controlling (or attempting to control) 
>every aspect of an eighteen year-old's life.  It is, however, essential 
>that older children be held personally responsible for decisions that they 
>make. 

Right - though i would lower the "age limit" - concerning both control
and responsibility. But i do not talk about treating children as little
adults. Children are children and they absolutely should have a right
to live as children.

>Now back to the main question.  It should be acceptable for a parent of 
>a five year-old (or perhaps a ten or twelve year-old) to expressly forbid 
>their children to listen to certain kinds of music.  At this age, children 
>expect, no need, boundaries to be set.
>use your parental influence to the fullest extent, attempting to train up 
>your children in the way that you desire them to go.  But, if it is your 
>desire to teach your children that listening to Metallica is wrong, and 
>they do not agree with you by the time they are seventeen, you are too late, 
>and forbidding them to listen to that band will have undesired effects.  
>(Such as, going to someone else's house whose parents will allow them to 
>listen to such music, or hanging around with the wrong crowd simply because 
>they listen to this music.)

I agree about the boundaries - but at any age should them be understandable(?)
to the child. I do not believe that forbidding or allowing things functions
if the orders are arbitrary. Only thing a parent can do is to make
his own life so consistent in its direction that it show the child the
path you want him follow.

>The bottom line is, if you, as a parent, are still acting dictatorial when 
>your children reach the age of, say fifteen to seventeen, then you are too 
>late.  The only constructive thing you can do at that point is to talk at 
>length with your child, and see if you can get them to get into some serious 
>prayer with you.  You are most likely not going to be able to reason 
>with your children.  Only the Holy Spirit can teach them the things that 
>you were remiss in teaching them.

Same again.

Well - i am not a native speaker/writer of English but i hope you 
understand what i want to say - if not, ask!
And for this reason i use someone else's words another time.
I type here another song which also comes quite close to the topic:

Inheritance
Mother, Father, I'm doing OK / Other side of the country / Far away
And though I know the things / You want to hear me say /
Sometimes these things are hard / 
Mother, Father, I am your son / Right down to the long thin pointed
face / And this muddled up and twisted tongue / And now I find that
I'm doing all those things you would've done / Sometimes these thing
are hard.
Ch: So do I thank you / or do i curse you? / These tracks stretch
before me / The ones you left behind / What i want and what i feel /
It's yours, yours, not mine.
Mother, Father, all those battles that have been / And the long, long
silences that lay in between / Please do not tell me all those were in
vain / Sometimes these things are hard / 
We line up in the wedding / In rows of deep set eyes / In our finest
formal dresses / Yes, and proper suits and ties / Like family of
Munsters / In a really bad disguise
Ch: So do I thak you...

Lyrics for this song are made by Justin Sullivan who has written
lots of other good secular songs which make me think about what
is going on around me and about being christian. I know that the
parents of JS are/were strict christians and that christiany of 
theirs was a significant part of his childhood - and the song
tells us quite clearly what is their relation now. I am not
telling that the parents have done something wrong - I don't know
the case so well. But those lines really make me think and ponder.

>Ted
		Erkko Airo - s36376m@puukko.hut.fi
		Istemukvsouik jvaad dssiooosiiniat
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