A friend of mine left this comment on another site:
I don't think our world will ever know peace in our lifetime. It's sad but true. We've taken away so may values that are needed for peace that my generation the one that's causing all the violence may never stop. We need to go back to the little things like opening the doors for strangers, saying ma'am and sir. Put things like prayer and the pledge of allegiance back in school. All opinions set aside the fact is the generations before mine weren't as violent, I hate to see what kind of people come out of younger generations. It just seems like when we said prayer's and the pledge of allegiance, when we didn't have violent video games, when our parents could spank us for being bad, when we had to earn/work for the money that bought the newest set of legos the world was a better place.
Here's my comment on her comment:
Peace in our lifetime? You're right. It won't happen. I fear it is part of the human condition for violence to exist somewhere in the world at all times. However, I would not put the lack of peace at the feet of your generation. Violence has existed in some form or fashion since Cain killed Abel.
It has nothing whatsoever to do with whether there is prayer in schools or the Pledge of Allegiance is said daily.
To put things into perspective, when I was growing up, the war in Vietnam was escalating and the Cold War was really heating up. In the early 60's, there was a very real concern that global thermonuclear war would break out to the destruction of all humanity. When I was a teenager, there were several protest groups who chose to use violence as a way to get their message across - American terrorists, if you will. Hijackings were happening left and right. Serial killers whose rampages were televised across the nation, and the first of the school shooters, Charles Whitman, killed 16 people and wounded 31 at the University of Texas in 1966. (Oh! and btw, we had a prayer/devotional and said the pledge daily.)
It seems to me that part of the sense of escalating violence in the world today is due to the ubiquitous nature of the public news system which exists 24/7. If you must find something to televise or fill your website around the clock, then even the first hint of a violent situation ends up filling hours of airtime, over and over again. The technology, and the fact that there were only 3-4 broadcast stations for so many years, did not lend themselves to "all the news, all the time". Even so, when something like the serial killer who came through Beaumont in the early 80's and raped and killed the mother of two of the children at the day care center where I worked, it was carried on the news with breaking news updates as new information was available, up to and including the final minutes when the police trapped him at the Canadian border and killed him when he wouldn't surrender.
As a result, those mentally ill individuals who perpetrate such violent acts as what happened at Virginia Tech this week take advantage of the situation to gain their few minutes of fame, even to committing suicide in a national forum. From their deluded point of view, they will live on in infamy and will leave this life at the pinnacle of their notoriety. Just look at all of the copycat attempts which began to pop up across the country this past week. In this environment of heightened awareness, even a failed attempt gains a visibility which the attacker would not otherwise have.
As to prayer in the schools, it still exists. Just think of all the frantic praying which happens as the test you've not prepared adequately for is handed out or the presentation you're uncertain about is about to start! What has changed is that the schools no longer sponsor the prayers of a particular religion. Look at it this way, what if you (or your child) were Christian in a system where every day the prayer of the day was Buddhist or Hindu or Islamic? That was the concern of our founding parents when freedom of religion was established in our Constitution. Our country has never been completely one religious faith (note that Thomas Jefferson included a Koran in his library) and is designed to honor the faiths of all her peoples.
I'm of the opinion that our behavior tends to operate on a long, slow pendulum and goes from periods of limited violence to extreme violence over time. If you do some historical digging, you'll find that even in colonial times, the adults were concerned about the deteriorating behavior of the younger generation, noting coarse language and coarser behaviors occurring. In time, the behavior gets out of hand and society begins to apply correctives.
As to spanking children, I believe that violence begets violence. What is of significance is that inappropriate behavior receive appropriate consequences. Spanking teaches that it is all right for a significantly larger, more powerful person to inflict damage on the smaller and weaker.
Violent video games are a whole 'nother kettle of fish. I truly wrestle with this one. There's this part of me which says playing these games inures one to the actual harm being inflicted on another, if such action were to happen in real life. Yet if such were so, my generation would be equally involved in the same level of violence as yours (and probably is if you take a measured look at the violence in our world globally), since we were exposed regularly to the violence of cartoons, westerns, the Three Stooges, and war movies. We seem to believe that the same media which advertises in order to get us to buy various and sundry products is not capable of influencing our behavior when it comes to inflicting harm on others. The jury's still out on this one.
Helping others, treating others with respect, living within our means and treating ourselves with respect, well, I think those are part of that pendulum swing I mentioned earlier. I believe there will come a point (and I think we're getting close to reaching it) when the majority of people will be fed up with the way we treat each other and a new level of respect and building community will be started. It won't look quite exactly the way it did 60, 80, 100 years ago, but it will fit our time and our situation. If each of us keeps doing our part toward making the world a better place, the pendulum will swing a bit faster. Nope, we won't achieve peace throughout the world, but our little corner of it will probably become a bit nicer.
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2 comments:
I think the truth is somewhere in the middle of these two points of view. Violence of one form or another has always been a part of the human condition, and each 'adult' generation laments the erosion of moral values in their children.
But without a doubt, the decay of the traditional family structure is taking a toll on our society. (Single)Parents are too stressed and over-worked to set firm standards and insist on certain behavioral expectations from their kids. The result is children who don't give a flying flip about personal achievement, respect for authority, compassion, or accepting responsibility. Weak parenting skills are why I see over 200 EACH YEAR children come before the discipline supervisor at the school board where I work.
These children are not being taught the interpersonal skills that will enable them to co-exist peacefully in society. They don't have coping skills, they aren't taught responsibility, and they don't care! The schools have tried to compensate with "character education", but without parental support, I fear it is all for naught.
Peace? Not in our lifetime.
I don't deny that there are weak parenting skills out there. Far too many in each generation never had the foggiest idea of how to parent or had lousy parenting as they grew up, and our culture kind of assumes that parenting skills are gained by osmosis.
While 200+ children coming to see the discipline supervisor each year is more than anyone would like it to be, what percentage of the total district enrollment is that? I think that would be an enlightening statistic. My guess is that it's probably between 5-10% of enrollment, and that, regardless of parenting skills and involvement, there will always be a percentage of students who spend a fair share of time in the disciplinary system.
I also don't deny that parental involvement in education appears to be on the decline; however, I've also heard teachers speak in frustration for decades that their children's parents don't come to teacher conferences or participate in their children's education. *sigh* And, often, these parents are people who have prospered as a result of their own education. *double sigh*
As a pastor, I've had the opportunity to get to know the stories of many of my members, especially the older ones. It has always amazed me to learn how large a percentage of them never had the traditional family of dad working, mom staying at home and raising the children. Most of the older women (70 and 80 years+) in the congregations I've served have also been part of the workforce through most of their lives. These women have been teachers, nurses, secretaries, store clerks, and a wide variety of professions, all during an era which has stereotypically been identified as 'men working, women home'.
Divorce also seems to have been a bit more prevalent than the stereotypes imply; although, certainly the stigma attached to divorce has lessened in the past 30-40 years. There are also a fair number of single parents who do a damn fine job of raising respectable, respectful, caring children who are compassionate and accept responsibility, just as there are a fair number of couples who truly suck as parents.
I think, to a certain degree, the negatives you've mentioned have simply become more visible in the intervening years. And I certainly wish that we could find a way to impact that incorrigible percentage who seem to insist on heading down the negative path. All in all, it's not a pretty picture, and won't be in our lifetime...or the next 3-4 dozen lifetimes.
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