Monday, May 19, 2014

What do we do when people try to indoctrinate our children?

Instead of teaching both sides of the story, many schools are teaching global warming as though it is a fact, instead of just a theory. So, when your kid comes home talking about how man his destroying the planet, what are we, as parents, supposed to do?

In other words, what do you do when you know your kids are being taught things in school that you don't believe in? Personally, it's not that I don't believe in global warming, I just want it to be taught to my kids as though it were a theory, which it is, to be respected, and not a proven fact.  

That's my dilemma.  And I know if I simply tell my kids my thoughts, if I simply respond to what my son is telling me, my wife will make me out to be an idiot.  So how do I, how do we, approach situations like this? 

Of course there's the other dilemma, because if you take out your frustration on the teacher, or the principal, they will take it out on your child with bad grades.  So, you're kind of faced with a double edged sword.  

And then there's the third angle, which is the top angle for me, and this is that you want to make your kid feel like you're nagging him, or forcing him to believe what you believe, because I don't want to do that either. So, there's that angle too. 

My whole goal with my kids is to have them think independently and not just accept what I think or anyone else and to challenge it and dig for the truth as best you can. So their not fully in agreement, certainly, with that movies like The Inconvenient Truth or man-made climate change.

But I get the feeling they're trying to indoctrinate my children, and it makes me feel very uncomfortable.  So what can I do?  What can we do?   I mean, if I go to the school, I'm just going to face a whole bunch of people who are indoctrinated, and they're going to make me out to be the bad guy.  These people are going to be as closed minded as anyone.

You could throw all the facts at them in the world, and all the facts could be on your side, and all they are going to do is make you out to be the blind one; the idiot.  Heck, they might even call you an idiot for not being a sheep. That's never happened at the school, I'm just saying.

Now, you cannot approach the people advocating theories such as the global warming theory with facts.  When you're dealing with idealist theories, facts don't matter.  You could speak the evidence: "There has been no increase in global temperatures since 1997."

You could say, "Global warming activists went to Antarctica looking for evidence that there were fewer glaciers, and they got stuck on one."

It doesn't matter.  The facts won't work.  Their theories are their religion.  So you have to use something else.  But it's not even that.  Your job is not to convince the sheep, your job, my job, is to convince your children to consider all the evidence and to think for themselves.

So, how do we do that?

The problem with movies like the Al Gore movie, "The Inconvenient Truth," is that kids watch it and then they go home and they blame their parents for destroying the planet.

The best thing you can do as a parent is... well, you can't just hope for the best. You have to do your best to set a good example for your children, and hope that when they set off into the world you did a good job. However, you can't just hope, because hope is an excuse for failure.

Hope never solves anything.  You, as a parent, have to say something. So, what do you say.  On this, I heard a good quote the other day, a quote that I found to be perfect.  One that I haven't even used yet, but I know other dad's, uncles, aunts, friends, have... they have used it on their kids, nephews, etc.

The quote is this:
"Open-mindedness is great, but coming to the wrong conclusion isn't."
At 10, 13, 15 years old, our kids are in the formative years. This is the best chance you're gonna have until life experiences take over for them. 

Parents constantly disagree with the propaganda their kids are being hit with. But they feel powerless, just like we do. So we, as parents, have to say something.  

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