Right VS Sides
As I raise my kids, it is important to me to point them towards what is right instead of holding myself up as being what is right.
I try to be a good example for them for sure, but when I’m not, when I miss the mark, it is important for me to point it out to them, explain it to them, and tell them I’m sorry. My goal with my children isn’t to protect my ego or gain compliance through an unquestionable authoritarian family dynamic. No. I want to teach them to be good, to know what is good, and love what is good.
The problem here, is that I’m not always good. This problem is compounded by the fact that young children subconsciously put their parents on a pedestal. This is one of the reasons why child abuse is so devastating – kids believe it is their fault because the children assume their parents are good and therefore they are to blame for all the suffering and chaos. So if I want my kids to learn to be good and love what is right, and they put me – who is not always good and right – on a pedestal, then I need to be honest with them when I get things wrong.
For some reason some parents might think that this approach would raise kids who are disrespectful to their parents, but that isn’t true at all. If I allowed my kids to be disrespectful, I wouldn’t be teaching them what is good and right. The difference here is that I call disrespect out not only when they are disrespectful to me – or heaven forbid their mother! – but also when they are disrespectful to each other or even if I am rude or disrespectful to them. This relationship of mutual respect doesn’t mean that parents and children have equal authority – they don’t, and for good reasons. It also doesn’t mean that I should abuse my authority by disrespecting them. There shouldn’t be one standard of what is good and right for those in authority and another for everyone else. That sort of relationship points to a “might makes right” ethic instead of a higher-law ethic.
So far, I think it is working. I love spending time with my kids (most of the time) and I love who they are becoming. They are people who I believe will love what is good and right, not because an authority figure tells them to, but because they see what is good and right is worth loving and pursuing for its own sake.
I bring this up, not to make a point about parenting – though I hope you find something helpful here. I bring this up to make a point about the moral dynamic I see in our country.
I don’t think it is breaking news for anyone in America today to hear that we are extremely polarized. This polarization has changed the moral question in our country from “What is right?” to “Whose side are you on?” There is an orthodoxy and a right-think to the sides on every issue imaginable and as people interact with each other they try to sort out whose side the other person is on. If you assume someone is on your side but expresses an idea that isn’t accepted orthodoxy, then you correct them to help them find their way and get in line. If you determine they are on the other side, you distance yourself from them however you can.
What is lost in all of this polarizing team sports, is an aspirational focus on what is right. Everyone likely believes that their team is the most right, but in the game of sides, what is good and right doesn’t matter as much as what are acceptable viewpoints and even acceptable questions for those on your side. Morality then becomes just another play-thing in the team-sports arena.
Can you think of ways your team or its leaders have failed to live up to what is good and right? Can you think of ways the other team and their leaders have done things that are good or right? How hard is it to answer these questions?
If we want to get ourselves out of this mess, we need to work to put what is good and right as the main thing. We need to flesh out shared moral ideals – or get as close as we can – and be able to be honest about when our team falls short of those ideals. In that world, the teams and sides would begin to matter less and less as we worked to articulate and live out together what is good and right.
May God help us to aim higher.
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