How to get your kids to respect your authority if you are an anti-authoritarian —
My wife and I both share this problem: we like to question authority, challenge it, reject it — and in my case, mock the stuffing out of it. My favorite cultural icons are iconoclasts: those whose life’s work seemed devoted to challenging all our preconceptions about society and how it’s supposed to function.
I am not referring to political figures here, like Jefferson, or King, or Ghandi, though my political views often find me in clashes with my parents. I am here simply referring to those who have contributed to what we call the world of culture who have made us re-think on a cultural/aesthetic level but also a social one.
Two cultural icons stand out for me as I write this, but others surely lurk in their shadows. One is Monty Python, the British comedy team that produced about thirty hours’ worth of sketch comedy for the BBC in the late sixties and early seventies, as well as numerous records and films (and now a Broadway musical). While their cultural references are often UK-specific, I understand enough of them to appreciate their humor, and of course throughout the series and films there is an unrelenting assault on television conventions and how government and business operate. Religion too is mercilessly attacked, with sketches like “the Church Police” and “Every Sperm is Sacred.”
The other is the Marx Brothers, clearly an inspiration for the Pythons, whose surrealistic anarchy tore up high society, college culture, the opera, and even government itself. Groucho remains the great anti-authoritarian hero – shooting down clichés, mocking theater and film genres, and playing with words to reveal the utter uselessness.
I could go on forever about both of these two groups. But I won’t, at least not in this blog. The interesting thing about being a parent is that you are an authority figure to your child, and you have to be, but how do you teach them the values that are important to you in relation to authority when you want them to trust you as an authority figure?
We try very hard not to let “BECAUSE I SAID SO!” be the only explanation, but sometimes it has to be. As those with experience, we need to help children to learn from what we know. Yes, it can be very effective to learn not to touch a hot pot by getting burned by it, but we all know that we’d rather our children not learn to be careful in the kitchen by getting hurt.
As I said, my wife and I challenged our parents and their ideas. We both rejected our common religious upbringing because there were too many questions unanswered, and because the rules seemed incredibly backward-minded. I vividly remember fighting with my mother over politics, shouting at each other about it (some of these discussions actually had to do with politics, but of course many of them were really about other issues, to be sure). And we wonder how come it’s so easy for our children to say NO to us????
For me, it’s about explaining explaining explaining. I want my children to understand how a movie or tv show works. I want them to understand matters of spirit without having to latch on to a dogma that says this IS and this IS NOT. I want them to be participant-citizens and challenge the leadership to be its best and not to sell out to special interests. But is there a way I can still get them to do their homework when I tell them it’s time to do it?