February 16, 2004
Parents as Peers
It’s painful to watch parents who act like peers to their children, essentially pretending that the playing field is even and forgetting their role as parents.
Recently a young man in one of the mentoring programs was dropped off by his parent. Upon arrival the parent blurted out to the room in general "Ask (young man) what he did last week with his money for the program,” then left the room without any social graces such as "hello " or "good evening.” I understand the frustration (the son had spent the money on drugs) but, do we parents understand the consequence of setting someone up for public humiliation?
The parent was "tattling" on the son. The son tried to save face with a few mumbled comments about how parent dearest was crazy, tripping, lost their mind, etc. but their relationship had slid from a parent child exchange to one that might happen between siblings.
It is helpful in raising young men that we do so by example. Self-discipline is the easiest way to gain the respect of our children. Authoritarianism is the most difficult. If we parents expose our children to our emotional outbursts too often we will be showing them that we are self-centered and inconsiderate of how we impact the people around us. We will be creating an opportunity for them to learn that emotional outbursts are a good way to try and get what they want. Worse is that they will see that becoming emotionally reckless is a means of punishing people for not getting their way. Public humiliation in this instance is a tool to control others and make them suffer with us.
What might be another way to work together as adults for the benefit of the young man who had clearly made a poor choice? To address the issue directly by telling the truth... calmly, like this for example:
“Please excuse me I want to apologize for not having your money. You see my son took the money I gave him and gave it to a friend and they spent it on POT! Can we make arrangements to get you the money another time?”
It would be really great if we parents could stop taking it personally when our young men do goofy, dishonest, sneaky stuff just to get their way. When we as parents are telling the truth to each other we begin to create a peer group of adults. We can let go of the pressure of being a part of our child’s peer group.
For children, a peer group has the pressure of status and security, as well as the hope of acceptance, popularity, and risk taking. For adults a peer group provides security, planning, relaxation, comraderie, and community. In a child’s peer group the truth is found out, whereas in an adult’s peer group the truth is revealed. Let’s trust each other enough to reveal the truth.
