Parents are no longer able to control their kids because they feel uncomfortable exercising their authority in today’s world. Leonard Sax, a lifetime physician and psychologist, makes this claim about childhood disobedience as he has seen a disturbing trend of children becoming more and more unwilling to listen to their parents. Sax, is actively speaking out about some of the issues that parents and children are facing. Over recent decades in his professional observations, Sax has seen a shift of cultural values shift from one where children respect parents, to today’s culture where parents might feel like they have to obey their children.
“When parents abdicate their authority, they set their children adrift,” writes Sax. “Kids need firm guidance. When their parents don’t provide it, they look to peers or social media or the Internet. What they find is Miley Cyrus, Justin Bieber, Akon, Eminem, Nicki Minaj, Kim Kardashian, and Lady Gaga. It’s a confusing mélange of sex, selfies, and the endless striving for popularity and attention.”
The effect of children not spending time with their family leaves them without many learning moments that previous generations have had access to. From crucial discipline moments to healthy compliments and rewarding behavior, kids are missing out on some of the most important things that they need from their parents.
The lack of parental discipline places children and adults in vulnerable positions. Parents are susceptible to being less connected to their children, and children are not surrounded by the positive and negative reinforcement that they should be receiving.
Robert Putnam has recorded that the youngest generation is no longer involved in sewing circles, church groups, and other social circles as groups of prior generations once were. Instead, kids are doing things alone, with themselves, or with their own age group. When children are not being taught and influenced by their parents, grandparents, and other older friends, they are not learning many of the social teaching skills that have been taught by parental figures for generations.
“America’s children are immersed in a culture of disrespect: for parents, teachers, and one another,” writes Sax. “They learn it from television, even on the Disney Channel, where parents are portrayed as clueless, out-of-touch or absent. They learn it from celebrities or the Internet. They learn it from social media.”
Different types of media, including movies, television, and social platforms are actively portraying negative attitudes towards authority. Sax studied the morals of different movies and television shows across centuries. Older films often portrayed a sense of respect towards parents and other authority figures. Over the last thirty years, this has completely shifted with disrespect and disobedience being the most prominent theme in recent types of media.
As children spend more and more time on social media, parents are able to have even less control on the behavior of their children. Consistent stimulation prevents children from being able to think clearly and act respectfully because they are consistently surrounded by negative behaviors.
Today’s culture is moving more and more towards a sense of disruption; mainly driven by different types of social media. Parents should read to their children stories to their children that have positive moral lessons to counteract the influence of modern media.
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