Two years ago (!) we at Daddy Dialectic had a very good, substantial discussion about whether kids need religion. (The original post was written by contributor Chip, who is now "retired" from blogging.)
The discussion continues. A fellow named Wes stopped by and posed some interesting questions: How do agnostics best approach the Christmas season and traditions with their children? At what age would you begin cultivating that appreciation of the differences between the faiths? At Jewish Community Center preschool (which my gentile son attends), if asked by another child if he is Jewish, what would your child say? And so on.
I confess that I've only given Wes some half-baked responses; I'm too distracted by holiday activities to come up with something coherent. But perhaps you, dear reader, have intelligent things to say? You can leave them here or revisit that discussion thread.
Showing posts with label Religion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Religion. Show all posts
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Monday, August 25, 2008
"God calls you a bum..."
Something I found via Here Goes Everything:
Stay-at-home dads are going to hell! Hot damn!
Sorry, I couldn't resist.
Stay-at-home dads are going to hell! Hot damn!
Sorry, I couldn't resist.
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
Sunday School for Atheists?
We have a running discussion here at Daddy Dialectic about how to raise moral kids without religion.
This week, Time magazine tells us that there are Sunday schools for the children of atheists:
I don't have much to say about this, beyond pointing out that such institutions are not new: free-thinking children's camps go back to the 19th century, and perhaps earlier. In America, one usually sees them spring into existence when religious fanaticism seems about to overwhelm society.
This week, Time magazine tells us that there are Sunday schools for the children of atheists:
An estimated 14% of Americans profess to have no religion, and among 18-to-25-year-olds, the proportion rises to 20%, according to the Institute for Humanist Studies. The lives of these young people would be much easier, adult nonbelievers say, if they learned at an early age how to respond to the God-fearing majority in the U.S. "It's important for kids not to look weird," says Peter Bishop, who leads the preteen class at the Humanist center in Palo Alto. Others say the weekly instruction supports their position that it's O.K. to not believe in God and gives them a place to reinforce the morals and values they want their children to have.
The pioneering Palo Alto program began three years ago, and like-minded communities in Phoenix, Albuquerque, N.M., and Portland, Ore., plan to start similar classes next spring. The growing movement of institutions for kids in atheist families also includes Camp Quest, a group of sleep-away summer camps in five states plus Ontario, and the Carl Sagan Academy in Tampa, Fla., the country's first Humanism-influenced public charter school, which opened with 55 kids in the fall of 2005. Bri Kneisley, who sent her son Damian, 10, to Camp Quest Ohio this past summer, welcomes the sense of community these new choices offer him: "He's a child of atheist parents, and he's not the only one in the world."
I don't have much to say about this, beyond pointing out that such institutions are not new: free-thinking children's camps go back to the 19th century, and perhaps earlier. In America, one usually sees them spring into existence when religious fanaticism seems about to overwhelm society.
Friday, October 19, 2007
More kids vs. religion
Former Daddy Dialectic blogger Chip (who is now retired from blogging, alas) wrote a number of posts on raising kids without religion--posts that, not surprisingly, provoked quite a lot of discussion.
Though I am every bit as atheistic and philosophically materialist as Chip, I often disagreed with him about the need for secular social structures that can connect people to something larger than themselves and reinforce moral behavior.
A new study published in the journal Psychological Science finds that thoughts about God do indeed encourage people to share what they have. But researchers also discovered that secular concepts of civic responsibility and social justice do just about as much to promote altruism.
In two related experiments, University of British Columbia Associate Professor Ara Norenzayan and Ph.D. graduate student Azim Shariff divided 125 participants into three groups.
In the first group, researchers asked participants to unscramble sentences that contained words like spirit, God, and sacred. The second group played the same word game, but with non-religious content. The third played the game with words like court, civic, jury, and police—thereby priming them with thoughts of secular moral authority.
Then each participant was given 10 one-dollar coins and asked to make a decision about how much keep for herself and how much to share with another person--this is a standard laboratory test for altruism called the Dictator's Game.
The results: The religious group offered to share an average of $4.56 with another person, the secular group shared $4.44—and people who were not primed with any moral thoughts at all shared only $2.56.
Researcher Azim Shariff told me that their experiment shows how important it is for people to be reminded of their social responsibilities, but stresses that faith in God is optional. “We added the secular institutions as an afterthought in the second study, mostly because we wanted to demonstrate that religion wasn’t the only thing that could do this," Shariff said. "In our history, we’ve developed a lot of cultural institutions designed to reign in our selfish behavior. One of the earliest and most effective ones, we believe, was religion. But that’s certainly at this point not the only thing that does it.”
Not only did secular thoughts do almost as good a job at priming altruistic behavior as God thoughts, but people who described themselves as religious did not behave more altruistically than godless counterparts--a finding that a lot of other studies have echoed. (In one study that had different groups of Princeton seminary students walk by a man slumped and groaning on the sidewalk, researchers discovered that their willingness to help depended on one variable: how late they were for their next appointment.)
“Our study adds to a growing body of evidence to suggest that there has been all these cultural institutions that have evolved either purposely or through some blind process of cultural selection that serve to reign in our selfishness so that we can live in larger social groups harmoniously," said Shariff. "We evolved to live in much smaller groups, with more limited range of prosocial behavior, but we’ve developed rituals, beliefs, practices that allow us to overcome our more base natures and cooperate more, which has allowed us to build civilization.”
So can we raise moral children outside of structures of supernatural belief? I believe the answer is yes, and there is evidence to support my belief. But I don't think individual parents can do it alone--and there's evidence to support that contention as well. To curb selfish behavior and cultivate meaning in our lives, we need to be constantly reminded of our interdependence with other people and the natural world. So do atheists need a church? I'd say they do.
Though I am every bit as atheistic and philosophically materialist as Chip, I often disagreed with him about the need for secular social structures that can connect people to something larger than themselves and reinforce moral behavior.
A new study published in the journal Psychological Science finds that thoughts about God do indeed encourage people to share what they have. But researchers also discovered that secular concepts of civic responsibility and social justice do just about as much to promote altruism.
In two related experiments, University of British Columbia Associate Professor Ara Norenzayan and Ph.D. graduate student Azim Shariff divided 125 participants into three groups.
In the first group, researchers asked participants to unscramble sentences that contained words like spirit, God, and sacred. The second group played the same word game, but with non-religious content. The third played the game with words like court, civic, jury, and police—thereby priming them with thoughts of secular moral authority.
Then each participant was given 10 one-dollar coins and asked to make a decision about how much keep for herself and how much to share with another person--this is a standard laboratory test for altruism called the Dictator's Game.
The results: The religious group offered to share an average of $4.56 with another person, the secular group shared $4.44—and people who were not primed with any moral thoughts at all shared only $2.56.
Researcher Azim Shariff told me that their experiment shows how important it is for people to be reminded of their social responsibilities, but stresses that faith in God is optional. “We added the secular institutions as an afterthought in the second study, mostly because we wanted to demonstrate that religion wasn’t the only thing that could do this," Shariff said. "In our history, we’ve developed a lot of cultural institutions designed to reign in our selfish behavior. One of the earliest and most effective ones, we believe, was religion. But that’s certainly at this point not the only thing that does it.”
Not only did secular thoughts do almost as good a job at priming altruistic behavior as God thoughts, but people who described themselves as religious did not behave more altruistically than godless counterparts--a finding that a lot of other studies have echoed. (In one study that had different groups of Princeton seminary students walk by a man slumped and groaning on the sidewalk, researchers discovered that their willingness to help depended on one variable: how late they were for their next appointment.)
“Our study adds to a growing body of evidence to suggest that there has been all these cultural institutions that have evolved either purposely or through some blind process of cultural selection that serve to reign in our selfishness so that we can live in larger social groups harmoniously," said Shariff. "We evolved to live in much smaller groups, with more limited range of prosocial behavior, but we’ve developed rituals, beliefs, practices that allow us to overcome our more base natures and cooperate more, which has allowed us to build civilization.”
So can we raise moral children outside of structures of supernatural belief? I believe the answer is yes, and there is evidence to support my belief. But I don't think individual parents can do it alone--and there's evidence to support that contention as well. To curb selfish behavior and cultivate meaning in our lives, we need to be constantly reminded of our interdependence with other people and the natural world. So do atheists need a church? I'd say they do.
Thursday, September 06, 2007
The Objects of My Affection
In the first months after my son was born, I experienced an emotional response to my dealings with other people that was truly new to me. It occurred to me, in the forceful and almost physical way that the most fundamental truths come home to us, that everyone was, once, a baby. The UPS guy at the door this morning. The rather unhealthy-looking guy behind the wheel of the semi that just passed me. The wheelchair-bound lady in the park that afternoon. The gang banger with a gun. My mother. My father.
Further reflections arose from this first, bracing realization. Having all started out as children, more or less like mine, doing the things that babies and toddlers do, how did we all become so different? The languages, the accents, the ways of moving, of thinking, the patterns of belief and action -- where did all of it come from? And if all of it expressed such variation, what hope was there of any connection among us? Here I am, almost a middle-aged man, and having just had a child, I am asking childlike questions myself.
This new mental state, almost an altered state of consciousness, didn't last long. I'm not sure what would have happened if it had. In any case, being cut off from humanity while shepherding an infant through a Chicago winter went a long way towards dampening my reflections. But the original realization did leave traces, and I try to summon them back once in a while. It seemed valuable and worth preserving, like the early sensation of falling in love. Perhaps it was like an emotional molting, the growth of a new sensibility that overwhelmed everything else as it outgrew a more constraining psychic shell. Or maybe, it was really just a passing illusion.
If one kept this idea on our minds, that we were all once babies, then it seemed to be the kind of idea that could radically alter one's behavior in life. It seemed that caring for an infant brought out something virtuous in a person that shouldn't be shared only with those who can't walk, who soil themselves regularly, and who have yet to know language. But how do you translate that love for a small, dependent creature into an ethical framework for dealing with the clamoring, boisterous and often disconcerting variety of other people?
The overwhelming sense that we all share the same lot, and even more importantly, we all in some way or another need others is more pronounced in some people than in others. I am convinced, for example, that a highly developed sense of this interdependency is at the root of the most admirable qualities of deeply religious people. The concept of "humanity," with all of its obligations and expectations, is one of its secular derivatives, and can be equally motivating for people of different political outlooks.
But the question still remains: what to do with this impression and the emotional awareness that comes with it? It seems that something of what we learn in caring for small children ought to carry over into other relationships. But for most of human history children have existed in a special world that was left behind upon entry into adolescence. The multitude of rites of passage into the world of sexuality, power, and self-control in different cultures all worked to draw firm lines between the world of the child and the world of the adult. Caring for children, historically, was something that was animal, material, feminine, and as such needed to be separated from the world of the spiritual, abstract, and masculine. Much depended on this segregation. As one of the most familiar passages of the New Testament goes, "When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things." There's no clearer dividing line than that.
But now that those binary oppositions are eroding, it would seem that the pairing of the child-adult might also become more complex. The emotional capacity to care for small children -- or for any dependent individual -- certainly isn't limited to females, just as the capacity for abstract, adult functionality is not limited to males. Likewise, the set of emotional sensibilities that can emerge in a parent might not be limited in their extension to children only, but might positively infuse our relationships with other adults. I'm not sure yet just how, and it may take a while for me to figure it out. But I'll check back in if and when I do.
Further reflections arose from this first, bracing realization. Having all started out as children, more or less like mine, doing the things that babies and toddlers do, how did we all become so different? The languages, the accents, the ways of moving, of thinking, the patterns of belief and action -- where did all of it come from? And if all of it expressed such variation, what hope was there of any connection among us? Here I am, almost a middle-aged man, and having just had a child, I am asking childlike questions myself.
This new mental state, almost an altered state of consciousness, didn't last long. I'm not sure what would have happened if it had. In any case, being cut off from humanity while shepherding an infant through a Chicago winter went a long way towards dampening my reflections. But the original realization did leave traces, and I try to summon them back once in a while. It seemed valuable and worth preserving, like the early sensation of falling in love. Perhaps it was like an emotional molting, the growth of a new sensibility that overwhelmed everything else as it outgrew a more constraining psychic shell. Or maybe, it was really just a passing illusion.
If one kept this idea on our minds, that we were all once babies, then it seemed to be the kind of idea that could radically alter one's behavior in life. It seemed that caring for an infant brought out something virtuous in a person that shouldn't be shared only with those who can't walk, who soil themselves regularly, and who have yet to know language. But how do you translate that love for a small, dependent creature into an ethical framework for dealing with the clamoring, boisterous and often disconcerting variety of other people?
The overwhelming sense that we all share the same lot, and even more importantly, we all in some way or another need others is more pronounced in some people than in others. I am convinced, for example, that a highly developed sense of this interdependency is at the root of the most admirable qualities of deeply religious people. The concept of "humanity," with all of its obligations and expectations, is one of its secular derivatives, and can be equally motivating for people of different political outlooks.
But the question still remains: what to do with this impression and the emotional awareness that comes with it? It seems that something of what we learn in caring for small children ought to carry over into other relationships. But for most of human history children have existed in a special world that was left behind upon entry into adolescence. The multitude of rites of passage into the world of sexuality, power, and self-control in different cultures all worked to draw firm lines between the world of the child and the world of the adult. Caring for children, historically, was something that was animal, material, feminine, and as such needed to be separated from the world of the spiritual, abstract, and masculine. Much depended on this segregation. As one of the most familiar passages of the New Testament goes, "When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things." There's no clearer dividing line than that.
But now that those binary oppositions are eroding, it would seem that the pairing of the child-adult might also become more complex. The emotional capacity to care for small children -- or for any dependent individual -- certainly isn't limited to females, just as the capacity for abstract, adult functionality is not limited to males. Likewise, the set of emotional sensibilities that can emerge in a parent might not be limited in their extension to children only, but might positively infuse our relationships with other adults. I'm not sure yet just how, and it may take a while for me to figure it out. But I'll check back in if and when I do.
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Mother Talk Blog Tour
Parenting Beyond Belief: On Raising Ethical, Caring Kids Without Religion
by Chip
A few months ago, in a post entitled "Kids vs. Religion," I argued that kids don't need religion. Then a few weeks ago I was asked to take part in the Mother Talk blog book tour on the book Parenting Beyond Belief: On Raising Ethical, Caring Kids Without Religion, edited by Dale McGowan. The book looked interesting so I agreed.
The book has its good points, and the pieces in the anthology are all very readable. There are some useful suggestions, and a few thought-provoking pieces. But I have to say that overall, I was disappointed. And since the other reviews of the book on the blog book tour have all been pretty much positive, let me express some of the problems I had with the book.
First, on a positive note, a few of the chapters directly illustrate why it's so important for a strict separation between church and state, and for tolerance of all beliefs and disbeliefs. Most striking to me in this regard was the piece by Margaret Downey on the experiences of her child in different Boy Scout troops, where he was bullied into declaring a religion for his family. When they refused, he was expelled from troops less tolerant than the one he'd belonged to in New Jersey. This has certainly clarified for me why the Boy Scouts should not be receiving any kind of government assistance, including the use of public school facilities.
The book seems however to have several themes that strike me as problematic.
One of them is the strong fear expressed by a number of authors that children of nonbelievers will be "indoctrinated" into believing in God. This fear seems to be misplaced.
My wife and I are not believers, though we were both raised in religious traditions -- her family was Episcopalian, mine was Catholic. As I blogged before, for various reasons when the kids were little we nevertheless started going to the local Catholic church and sending them to Sunday school. Yet despite this, and although we did not present ourselves to them as nonbelievers, both of my kids have ended up as nonbelievers. The best indoctrination efforts of the Catholic church -- in my case seven years of Catholic school plus several more of religious ed -- failed to indoctrinate me or my children.
My point is that I don't think it is quite so easy to indoctrinate children into beliefs contrary to their parents' belief systems. The fear that children are so easily indoctrinated by outside forces seems overplayed. Even my mom, a very religious Catholic, sent two of my siblings off to Baptist summer day camp, secure in the knowledge that any "indoctrination" they received wouldn't really have much effect. And it didn't.
In my own case, not only did my Catholic schooling not produce a believer; my nonbelief was absolutely not the result of indoctrination -- where I grew up, there was no such thing as an atheist or even an agnostic. I just never believed all the stuff I was taught.
A second problem I see with the overall approach of the book is the degree to which the church model seems to be the one being emulated. Nontheistic congregations such as some Unitarian Univeralist (UU) churches are held up as a model. On the one hand, this is understandable. Church-going is one form of American sociability. Yet on the other hand, this seems forced.
Plenty of Americans, even religious ones, get along just fine without attending church services. At least 40 percent of Americans – including many believers -- never attend church, or go only once a year. In other developed countries, the figures for church attendance are drastically lower.
Given these numbers, it is clear that one can live a full life with social connections and have nothing to do with a church. So I am not sure why nontheistic writers feel the need to emulate Christianity by focusing on weekly services, especially since doing so reinforces the claim of religionists that religious communities are vital to being a full human being. This seems like a message we wouldn't want to send our children.
As I've written before, I do believe that for cultural reasons alone our kids need to be familiar with religion and religious texts, and even be comfortable in church services. And it's probably best to learn about religions from their believers; this is a problem I had with the UU Sunday school that my children briefly attended, where other religions were explained and described in ways that I can only describe as unintentionally condescending. This isn't addressed by the authors, many of whom would probably see believers providing information about their religions as endangering their children.
Finally, there seems to be a need among a number of the authors to establish a "free-thinking" identity. Again, this is perhaps an understandable reaction in a society where religious identity is often foregrounded. But it also seems, ironically, to put way too much emphasis on God, to define oneself with reference to a deity -- in this case denying that deity -- thereby reinforcing a theistic framing.
And one small additional point: the label "free-thinking" is so reminiscent of the all-too-many holier-than-thou (so to speak) upper middle class liberals who populate the region where I live, who, whether they realize it or not, exude a class-based elitism or snobbery.
Perhaps I am spoiled. I am raising my kids in a town in the Northeast USA where religion is not really an issue. Most of the people we know don't attend church, and many are probably nonbelievers. And none of it is a big deal. We don't discuss it, it's not part of our identities, it's just not really significant or relevant to our lives. Perhaps if one is living in a town surrounded by fundamentalists, where you are an embattled minority, this book will provide solace and even some ideas.
Overall though, I feel that unintentionally the book is reinforcing a religionist way of identifying and of seeing the world.
Cross posted at daddychip2
A few months ago, in a post entitled "Kids vs. Religion," I argued that kids don't need religion. Then a few weeks ago I was asked to take part in the Mother Talk blog book tour on the book Parenting Beyond Belief: On Raising Ethical, Caring Kids Without Religion, edited by Dale McGowan. The book looked interesting so I agreed.The book has its good points, and the pieces in the anthology are all very readable. There are some useful suggestions, and a few thought-provoking pieces. But I have to say that overall, I was disappointed. And since the other reviews of the book on the blog book tour have all been pretty much positive, let me express some of the problems I had with the book.
First, on a positive note, a few of the chapters directly illustrate why it's so important for a strict separation between church and state, and for tolerance of all beliefs and disbeliefs. Most striking to me in this regard was the piece by Margaret Downey on the experiences of her child in different Boy Scout troops, where he was bullied into declaring a religion for his family. When they refused, he was expelled from troops less tolerant than the one he'd belonged to in New Jersey. This has certainly clarified for me why the Boy Scouts should not be receiving any kind of government assistance, including the use of public school facilities.
The book seems however to have several themes that strike me as problematic.
One of them is the strong fear expressed by a number of authors that children of nonbelievers will be "indoctrinated" into believing in God. This fear seems to be misplaced.
My wife and I are not believers, though we were both raised in religious traditions -- her family was Episcopalian, mine was Catholic. As I blogged before, for various reasons when the kids were little we nevertheless started going to the local Catholic church and sending them to Sunday school. Yet despite this, and although we did not present ourselves to them as nonbelievers, both of my kids have ended up as nonbelievers. The best indoctrination efforts of the Catholic church -- in my case seven years of Catholic school plus several more of religious ed -- failed to indoctrinate me or my children.
My point is that I don't think it is quite so easy to indoctrinate children into beliefs contrary to their parents' belief systems. The fear that children are so easily indoctrinated by outside forces seems overplayed. Even my mom, a very religious Catholic, sent two of my siblings off to Baptist summer day camp, secure in the knowledge that any "indoctrination" they received wouldn't really have much effect. And it didn't.
In my own case, not only did my Catholic schooling not produce a believer; my nonbelief was absolutely not the result of indoctrination -- where I grew up, there was no such thing as an atheist or even an agnostic. I just never believed all the stuff I was taught.
A second problem I see with the overall approach of the book is the degree to which the church model seems to be the one being emulated. Nontheistic congregations such as some Unitarian Univeralist (UU) churches are held up as a model. On the one hand, this is understandable. Church-going is one form of American sociability. Yet on the other hand, this seems forced.
Plenty of Americans, even religious ones, get along just fine without attending church services. At least 40 percent of Americans – including many believers -- never attend church, or go only once a year. In other developed countries, the figures for church attendance are drastically lower.
Given these numbers, it is clear that one can live a full life with social connections and have nothing to do with a church. So I am not sure why nontheistic writers feel the need to emulate Christianity by focusing on weekly services, especially since doing so reinforces the claim of religionists that religious communities are vital to being a full human being. This seems like a message we wouldn't want to send our children.
As I've written before, I do believe that for cultural reasons alone our kids need to be familiar with religion and religious texts, and even be comfortable in church services. And it's probably best to learn about religions from their believers; this is a problem I had with the UU Sunday school that my children briefly attended, where other religions were explained and described in ways that I can only describe as unintentionally condescending. This isn't addressed by the authors, many of whom would probably see believers providing information about their religions as endangering their children.
Finally, there seems to be a need among a number of the authors to establish a "free-thinking" identity. Again, this is perhaps an understandable reaction in a society where religious identity is often foregrounded. But it also seems, ironically, to put way too much emphasis on God, to define oneself with reference to a deity -- in this case denying that deity -- thereby reinforcing a theistic framing.
And one small additional point: the label "free-thinking" is so reminiscent of the all-too-many holier-than-thou (so to speak) upper middle class liberals who populate the region where I live, who, whether they realize it or not, exude a class-based elitism or snobbery.
Perhaps I am spoiled. I am raising my kids in a town in the Northeast USA where religion is not really an issue. Most of the people we know don't attend church, and many are probably nonbelievers. And none of it is a big deal. We don't discuss it, it's not part of our identities, it's just not really significant or relevant to our lives. Perhaps if one is living in a town surrounded by fundamentalists, where you are an embattled minority, this book will provide solace and even some ideas.
Overall though, I feel that unintentionally the book is reinforcing a religionist way of identifying and of seeing the world.
Cross posted at daddychip2
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Kids vs. religion
No.
It really isn't necessary or possible to force children to believe in "god," in either a general or particular way. Moreover, morality, ethics, and being a good person don't depend on religion or belief in god.
I myself was raised in a religious family. I went to church every Sunday from birth until I left home to go to college. I went to a religious elementary school, and went to religious education classes when I was in public middle and high school. I took courses in theology as an undergraduate at a religiously-based university.
But I never felt like I actually believed that any of the stories I was told were literally true. I could see that they were parables and lessons, that they were stories that made philosophical, ethical, and moral points -- not all of which were very moral or ethical (for example the numerous genocides commanded by the Yahweh).
As for the theology, I never actually believed that there is a "god" somewhere out there micromanaging or even watching over humanity, much less having "personal relationships" with individual humans.
But then came kids. My wife was raised in a different Christian faith tradition, but she feels much the same way as I do about religion. We talked a lot about what to do. We ended up having both kids baptized at the church I was raised in -- largely for the sake of my parents and grandparents. And it gave us an excuse to have the extended family get together.
When my daughter reached kindergarten age, we began going to church, and she went to Sunday school, as did my son when he reached that age. My daughter made her first penance and first communion. I think that we both felt it would be good to do this, despite our own non-belief.
But I found this position increasingly untenable. I didn't believe, I had never believed, yet I was asking my kids to go through the motions.
We tried other churches, but we didn't feel comfortable in them either, mainly because they were so religious and were talking about god all the time (of course, what did we expect?).
So we decided that it was best to be honest with ourselves and with our kids. We stopped going to church, and stopped trying to get our kids to go through the motions.
They had early on proclaimed their atheism -- I'd had to ask them not to argue with the Sunday school teachers about this -- which was one of the issues that led us to this decision.
Unfortunately, in this society, I need to add this: My kids are moral and ethical, they have very strong senses of right and wrong, and though they are not perfect, they are great kids and will be wonderful adults.
(Of course, the very fact that I feel like I have to say this indicates how our society views nonbelievers. If I was religious and a believer, I wouldn't even have to tell you about my kids' morality and ethics...)
Morality and ethics do not come out of religion. We all know people who are immoral and unethical who were also believers. And there are plenty of nonbelievers who are moral and ethical.
The sense of ethics, the belief that there are right and wrong ways to treat other people, comes, I believe, from how we see our parents and significant others act as we are growing up. Adults model behavior to kids, regardless of religious belief. As they grow up, children absorb the values of the people raising them. Kids learn by being told, and talked to, and having things explained to them: Why some things are right, and why some things are wrong; why some people do bad things; why others are selfless.
Kids also learn by watching what their parents and care givers do, how they act, how they live their lives, apart from the words.
But I also believe that there is an innate sense of morality and ethics. I know plenty of people whose parents were awful, yet who themselves turned out to be great people.
To me that indicates that there is some level of morality that is part of the package of being human. Perhaps these people also were lucky enough to have other adults in their lives who reinforced their inner moral senses.
Given this, I believe that morality and ethics don't come from believing in god, or from being attached to a particular religious community. Those values come from within, and they are reinforced by the way adults explain what's right and wrong, and how those adults themselves behave.
When I was talking to my 15-year old daughter CB about this, she said she thinks that nonbelievers are actually more moral: they do the right thing not because of a fear of punishment in the afterlife, but just because it's the right thing to do. I wouldn't say that all believers do the right thing only out of fear; but for those who do, I think CB's reasoning is right on target.
That said, I do believe it is important for my kids to be familiar with the various religious mythologies that are part of our cultural heritage. My kids know the Bible stories, are familiar with the Jesus stories, the saints and other aspects of Christian religious belief. They are also familiar with other religious traditions, as well as the basics of the mythologies of ancient Greece and Rome.
I see this knowledge as important for purely cultural reasons. You cannot understand a large part of European literature and art if you don't know the background stories coming out of Christianity and Judaism. You cannot understand the politics of large parts of the US if you don't have some basic knowledge of Christianity.
But kids don't have to believe that the stories of Christianity are actually true, any more than they need to believe the ancient Roman or Greek myths.
Of course we're lucky to live in a community that is pretty progressive, which is not dominated by Christian fundamentalism, and in which my kids know other kids who are also not believers. But given the outright hostility to atheists in US society, I have also had to warn my kids to be careful, to not discuss their beliefs with people unless they know them.
While I have no problem with other people believing whatever they want to believe -- as long as they don't try to force it on me -- I also think it's important to recognize that kids don't need to have a belief in god, anymore than they need to believe in santa claus or the easter bunny. They need to have parents who instill in them their values, a sense of responsibility and empathy towards other human beings, and who walk the walk as well as they talk the talk.
So if you're feeling uncomfortable raising your kids in an atmosphere of religious belief, act on your own beliefs and instincts. Kids are just fine without god or religion.
Crossposted at daddychip2
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
How the Sun Rose
Early morning. Liko goes to the window and sees the light spilling over Mt. Diablo.
"What are you doing, Liko?"
"The sun. I want to hold it."
"What will you do with the sun?"
"Put it in the sky."
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
God vs. Stay-at-Home Dads
God hates stay-at-home dads:
No evidence offered, Scriptural or otherwise. Surprised? Probably not.
And evangelical Christians wonder why they've become so marginal to mainstream discourse.
Actually, most of this post is spent pushing an idea that I agree with:
Do they even allow kids in bars? That aside, it's interesting to explore the common ground that progressives might have with evangelicals on family issues, which are normally seen as divisive. Might we work together to win more family-friendly workplace policies?
In other news, the Ottawa Citizen covers a new book, Do Men Mother?, by Carleton University professor Andrea Doucet:
The article includes an excerpt from the book. I'll definitely be reading Do Men Mother?; I'll review here when I do.
Men and women were created by God for specific roles and when men start giving up their responsibility to be the primary provider for their household, they’re falling short of the goal. Men should be out there doing whatever it takes to insure that mom can spend as much time as possible with her family because she is uniquely equipped by God for the role of managing the household and the kids on a daily basis.
No evidence offered, Scriptural or otherwise. Surprised? Probably not.
And evangelical Christians wonder why they've become so marginal to mainstream discourse.
Actually, most of this post is spent pushing an idea that I agree with:
Turn down that promotion. Give up some money. Do what it takes to be there for your family. People speak of quality time, but I remember that any time I spent with my dad was cool. Even if he just took me to the bar with him so that he could drink. Hey, we were still hanging out together.
Do they even allow kids in bars? That aside, it's interesting to explore the common ground that progressives might have with evangelicals on family issues, which are normally seen as divisive. Might we work together to win more family-friendly workplace policies?
In other news, the Ottawa Citizen covers a new book, Do Men Mother?, by Carleton University professor Andrea Doucet:
Many fathers who opt to stay home with their children do so as a fallback when they need a career change or are seeking a break from work, according to new Canadian research.
And once they are at home with their children, they are likely to combine paid work with child-rearing and offset the time at home with an eye to an eventual return to work rather than immerse themselves in the social world of parenthood.
The author of a new book about fathering says men’s reality is at such a remove from the conventional image that she wonders whether the term “stay-at-home dad” is even relevant anymore.
“So many do keep a hand in the labour market, whether through a bit of part-time work or through some studying/retraining, because so much of male identity is tied to earning or achieving or simply doing something apart from caregiving,” said Andrea Doucet, author of Do Men Mother?
“I think that men do not face the same fatherload because they do carve out time for themselves, even when they are at home with the kids. Perhaps there are some interesting things that we can learn from men.”
Her book, which is the result of four years of conversations with men who are primary caregivers for their children, charts the many differences in the way men and women view stay-at-home parenting, from their motivations for doing it to the way they shape their at-home experiences.
The article includes an excerpt from the book. I'll definitely be reading Do Men Mother?; I'll review here when I do.
Friday, October 06, 2006
Red Families vs. Blue Families
Good news:
Despite their packed megachurches, their political clout and their increasing visibility on the national stage, evangelical Christian leaders are warning one another that their teenagers are abandoning the faith in droves....
“I’m looking at the data,” said Ron Luce, who organized the meetings and founded Teen Mania, a 20-year-old youth ministry, “and we’ve become post-Christian America, like post-Christian Europe. We’ve been working as hard as we know how to work — everyone in youth ministry is working hard — but we’re losing.”
Just to be clear: If kids want to get down with Jesus, that's fine with me. I'm against not against the faith; I'm against the political agenda that's been hitched to the faith. If the base that supports conservative movement political power is in a long-term demographic decline, hallujah!
You know, here's something for evangelicals to think about: as the power of the church grew in Europe, so did its corruption. There's quite a lot of evidence that weaving religion into government resulted in wholesale rejection of the faith by Europeans who were oppressed by the combination.
Are evangelicals digging their own graves, seeking secular power at the expense of their moral power?
Also: my buddy Abby sent me this fascinating essay on red-state families vs. blue-state families. Check it out.
Monday, October 02, 2006
Paddling vs. Waterboarding
Yesterday's New York Times contained an interesting piece on paddling in public schools:
As views of child-rearing have changed, groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics, the National Association of School Psychologists and the American Medical and Bar Associations have come out against corporal punishment.
“I believe we have reached the point in our social evolution where this is no longer acceptable, just as we reached a point in the last half of the 19th century where husbands using corporal punishment on their wives was no longer acceptable,” said Murray Straus, a director of the Family Research Laboratory at the University of New Hampshire.
Among adherents of the practice is James C. Dobson, the child psychologist who founded Focus on the Family and is widely regarded as one of the nation’s most influential evangelical leaders.
DuBose Ravenel, a North Carolina pediatrician who is the in-house expert on the subject for Mr. Dobson’s group, said, “I believe the whole country would be better off if corporal punishment was allowed in schools by parents who wish it.”
I also just stumbled across this essay by Randall Balmer, an evangelical Christian and professor of religious history at Barnard College, which I share as a follow-up to the previous two posts on conservative childrearing practices:
The torture of human beings, God's creatures — some guilty of crimes, others not — has been justified by the Bush administration, which also believes that it is perfectly acceptable to conduct surveillance on American citizens without putting itself to the trouble of obtaining a court order. Indeed, the chicanery, the bullying, and the flouting of the rule of law that emanates from the nation's capital these days make Richard Nixon look like a fraternity prankster.
Where does the religious right stand in all this? Following the revelations that the U.S. government exported prisoners to nations that have no scruples about the use of torture, I wrote to several prominent religious-right organizations. Please send me, I asked, a copy of your organization's position on the administration's use of torture. Surely, I thought, this is one issue that would allow the religious right to demonstrate its independence from the administration, for surely no one who calls himself a child of God or who professes to hear "fetal screams" could possibly countenance the use of torture. Although I didn't really expect that the religious right would climb out of the Republican Party's cozy bed over the torture of human beings, I thought perhaps they might poke out a foot and maybe wiggle a toe or two.
I was wrong. Of the eight religious-right organizations I contacted, only two, the Family Research Council and the Institute on Religion and Democracy, answered my query. Both were eager to defend administration policies. "It is our understanding, from statements released by the Bush administration," the reply from the Family Research Council read, "that torture is already prohibited as a means of collecting intelligence data." The Institute on Religion and Democracy stated that "torture is a violation of human dignity, contrary to biblical teachings," but conceded that it had "not yet produced a more comprehensive statement on the subject," even months after the revelations. Its president worried that the "anti-torture campaign seems to be aimed exclusively at the Bush administration," thereby creating a public-relations challenge.
I'm sorry, but the use of torture under any circumstances is a moral issue, not a public-relations dilemma.
Amen to that!
Lastly, I'd like to point readers - especially any readers who doubt the link between conservative childrearing practices and right-wing policy - to this dialogue between Focus on the Family and combat veteran Michael Gaddy about the Iraq War.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Toddlers vs. Conservatives
A friend of ours is studying child language development. She asked us to note down words and phrases that Liko uttered during a 12-hour period. Here's a random sampling, for your amusement and edification. (For parents anxious to make comparisons, Liko is 26 months old. )
Baby, baby singing.
Cold. Cold.
Hold it. Mommy hold it.
Dump. Dump it. Milk.
Thank you.
More - all gone.
Got it, raspberry.
Moon, moon, sun, sun, sun.
Too hot. Too hot.
Dip, dip, dipping, dip, dip things.
Play ball. Liko play ball.
Bye, fire.
Beepbeep. Horn.
Guy sing that.
Sound banjo makes.
Hold them, George.
Tangled.
Daddy don't go. Come.
School - Sasha crying.
I saw a didgeridoo!
The last two lines require explanations.
Back in July, we attended the Didgeridoo Festival in Reno, NV. A didgeridoo is an aboriginal Australian musical instrument. It made an impression on Liko, who excitedly cries out whenever he sees one in a book. I'm still amazed that he can pronounce "didgeridoo."
As for "School - Sasha crying": Sasha is a little girl in Liko's preschool who terribly missed her mommy, and cried and cried. Liko, who also cried and cried when I dropped him off, started talking with us about Sasha at night as he went to bed. After a few nights of this, he said, "Liko crying." Why? we asked. "Daddy left." We asked him if Sasha's mommy came back. "Yes." We said that his mommy and daddy would always come back too and take him home. "Yeah!" Did he have fun at school while daddy and mommy were away? "Yeah!" Did he have a favorite teacher? etc.
Here's what's incredible (to me) about this story: Liko is clearly relating his feelings to another toddler's, remembering things, verbalizing his memories, and using his memories to put things in perspective. I'm proud to say that this is fairly typical of my son, who is exceptionally empathic and compassionate for a toddler; he often tries to clumsily comfort crying babies on the playground (a gesture that is not always appreciated).
I thought of this as I was wasting time reading conservative parenting books - recall John Rosemond's words, quoted here on September 24: “One does not have to teach antisocial behavior to toddlers. They are by nature violent, deceitful, destructive, rebellious and prone to sociopathic rages if they do not get their way.”
My son is none of those things (not yet!) and I don't know any toddler who is as "violent" as Rosemond describes. Sure, Liko cries and stamps his feet when he is upset; sometimes he blindly hits and kicks. But when he does that, I don't see "sociopathic rages" - I see a confused growing boy who is still learning how to deal with and express his feelings. A true sociopath has no feelings. Sociopathology is a mental illness; toddlers are not mentally ill.
Discipline is necessary and so is punishment, but discipline is not synonymous with punishment. It's a distinction the conservative parenting gurus I've read fail to make. Worse, they see evil where there is none. Toddlers are not yet socialized, but the capacities for empathy, compassion, and cooperation are already there and blooming. Conservatives would say that I am merely beguiled by my child, but I see such qualities in all of the dozens of toddlers I know. They are beautiful. I love the way they run, with every part of their little bodies moving independently of the others, and the way they laugh and explore. Toddlers want to share and help; they don't always know how.
Not only does the conservative portrait of toddlerhood fly in the face of my personal experience, it also defies all scientific research into the topic. (I can feel the one or two conservatives who might be reading this shutting off; as the books I've read make clear, they see science as the enemy.) In a 2001 study, UC cognitive psychologist Alison Gopnik discovered that 18-month-olds understood that another person's tastes might be different, and shared foods if the other person demonstrated a liking for it, an important first step in developing empathy. Nancy L. Marshall at Wellesley College found that "when toddlers saw a teddy bear suffer an 'accident,' their faces showed distress and concern. They also responded by trying to help or comfort the bear."
Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany found "that preverbal toddlers as young as 18 months old understand when adults need their assistance and will do their best to help out, even for no reward." "The current results demonstrate that even very young children have a natural tendency to help other persons solve their problems,” says the study.
And so on and so forth. I found dozens of studies that identified prosocial qualities in toddlers, corroborating what most parents - those whose minds aren't warped by conservative ideology - know intuitively.
When people describe "Daddy Dialectic," they most often seem to use the word "thoughtful." I do try to see the other person's point of view and I try to play fair when disagreements arise, and my colleagues Chip, Tom, and Chris do the same.
And I believe that I'm remaining fair and thoughtful when I say that conservatives - who posit themselves the authorities on morality, family life, and parenting - are today promoting lies and half-truths about parents and children, in the service of an authoritarian ideology. At this point - with oceans levels rising, Iraq falling into the abyss, and evidence for evolution mounting, to name only three examples - it astonishes me that any thinking person, anywhere, would elevate their half-baked ideas over what science, reason, experience, and conscience have to say.
It's time for liberals and progressives, especially those of us who are parents, to stop retreating and take the fight to people who see us as their enemies. We're in a struggle we can't afford to lose.
[The photos that appear with this post are of my wife as a toddler, courtesy of my mom-in-law.]
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Conservative Parents vs. the New World Order
I think you should know that conservatives think you're a terrible parent. I know that it might hurt to hear this. But just listen to what they have to say with an open mind, OK?
Take talk-radio host Mike Gallagher. When he sees a kid pitch a fit in a restaurant and the parents (“well-heeled, well-dressed”) give in, there’s only one possible conclusion: the parents are liberals! Worse, they’re raising a liberal!
Such permissiveness will set that child up for a lifetime of disappointment and misery. Children want to be taught to do the right thing; they expect us to be in charge. Little Henry is going to grow into a person who figures that if he screams loudly enough, he’ll always get his way. He’ll develop into a person with an overwhelming sense of entitlement.
In other words, he’ll become a liberal.
Hearing from parents on my radio show all the time, there’s a clear distinction between conservative parents and liberal ones. Conservatives believe in the power of spanking….Liberals seem afraid to spank their children…I’ll bet anything that Henry’s parents were a couple of liberal New York Democrats.
Later on in his book, Surrounded by Idiots - I think he’s referring to his listeners, but that’s speculation on my part – Gallagher strikes out at “wacky mothers… who flaunt breast-feeding in crowded places, like restaurants, shopping malls or department stores.” I wonder if breasts are intrinsically liberal? If so, I’m glad Mike is doing something about them. Mike’s got the breast-beat covered for the conservative movement. He’s their breast man.
Betsy Hart, who has breasts but still boasts back-cover quotes from rock-hard conservatives like William J. Bennett and Laura Schlessinger, takes on the whole “parenting culture,” in which “parents are essentially encouraged to idolize their children, to marvel at their inherent wisdom and goodness…and that’s just for starters.”
In her book It Takes a Parent (as opposed to a village – villages are for liberals!), Hart attacks parents who give their kids choices. Choices are liberal and liberal, as we have established, is bad. “Children learn to make wise choices by having wise choices made for them,” she writes. She talks about just ordering food on behalf of all four of her kids in restaurants – no perusing the menu for them! Letting your kids pick items on the menu is liberal, and remember, liberal is bad. She spends a lot of time in her book criticizing bad parents who let their kids pick their own sno-cone flavors.
What’s a conservative parent to do when kids keep insisting on making their own choices? For anyone who reads the Bible literally, that’s an easy question to answer. You beat them.
Let’s say, for example, that your 2-year-old insists on getting out of bed after you’ve told him to stay put. “The youngster should be placed in bed and given a speech,” writes Focus on the Family’s James Dobson, one of the country’s most influential conservatives. “Then when (the child’s) feet touch the floor, give him one swat on the legs with a switch. Put the switch where he can see it, and promise more if he gets up again.”
In some cases, a switch might be too Rockefeller Republican, if you know what I mean. With especially liberal children, you’ll need to head down to Home Depot and buy some quarter-inch plumbing supply line or PVC Pipe.
"If you want a child who will integrate into the New World Order and wait his turn in line for condoms, a government funded abortion, sexually transmitted disease treatment, psychological evaluation and a mark on the forehead," writes pastor Michael Pearl in his book To Train Up a Child, "then follow the popular guidelines in education, entertainment and discipline, but if you want a son or daughter of God, you will have to do it God's way." Though PVC pipe is not specifically mentioned in the Bible, Pearl recommends such "chastisement instruments" as excellent expressions of the Lord's will.
Too extreme? Not with immortal souls at stake. Children, like liberals, are born demons. “As for thinking there is badness in children,” writes right-wing family psychologist John Rosemond, “yes, I most certainly do, and the evidence suggests I am correct… One does not have to teach antisocial behavior to toddlers. They are by nature violent, deceitful, destructive, rebellious and prone to sociopathic rages if they do not get their way.”
In other words, they’re liberals. That’s why you have to beat the little bastards. Keep hitting the rebellious brats until they vote Republican!
[Revised from a post at the Other Magazine blog.]
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