Conformity

Ah, the parenting catch-phrase for a new generation. Not forcing their children to "conform" seems to be the new excuse for creating a belligerent, unintelligent generation.

I love one thing my mother has always said. She felt it was her job to raise adults. In other words, she wasn't there to coddle us and hide us from the truths of the world, but she also wasn't there to scare us into submission with tales of boogey-men who would kidnap us at any moment. Life at home wasn't so wonderful that we wanted to stay there and allow mom to make our dinner or do our laundry well into our thirties, but it wasn't so bad that we felt the need to escape before graduating high school. Many of us stayed a few years after high school, in fact, in order to attend college. Not all of us finished, but we felt that we had the options, the possibility. We wanted to prove that we could do it on our own and it's a feeling of self-confidence I'm just not seeing often in the current generations.

Which brings me back to conformity. In a recent conversation, a single working mother was lamenting the fact that her son (Jane's age) has homework. Well, we never had homework in elementary school. It's the school's job to teach our children, not ours, she says, to which I agree. Last year, some of Jane's homework required me to teach her how to do things. It angered me because homework should, imo, be used to drive the points home, to practice, not so that I know what to teach her. It led to many contentious evenings of frustration. I love her, but there is a reason I did not become an elementary school teacher. I have not the patience! I don't want to spend the evening with my child helping him do homework. That's not my opinion of quality time, she adds. It is true that the schools try to push homework as quality time, but that's not their job and it's overstepping their bounds. Who are they to decide what quality time is? Arguing because I don't have the patience to help her understand something is not quality. Letting her read to me might be quality, but I actually take her places and sit down and have conversations with her so I don't need them to force this "quality" time. The parents who don't spend time with their children are not usually looking to ignore quality time - they're just too busy. It takes a lot of hours away from the family to make money if you're unskilled, you know. Money doesn't buy happiness, but happiness doesn't buy groceries! He might be suffering for it, but I refuse to conform, she declares, to which she restates and continually ends her arguments with "I will not conform".

Therein lies my problem. You will not conform to the school's attempt at educating your child? Instead of failing to turn in homework and then waiting until they call asking for it and saying it's not your problem (a scenario she described) you ought to be proactive. You need to go into the school and tell them what you think. If you don't like the system, speak out. Even if you don't change it, it's not fair for you to sit at home, screwing your child's education, and claiming you will not conform. Homework, a device used to teach good study habits and to reiterate those things taught in school is, imo, a good idea. Homework which they bring home and don't understand deserves, at the very least, a note attached when it is returned to school the next day informing the teacher that he/she should spend a little more time teaching the particular subject.

Don't get me wrong here. I'm not a conformist. I'm not a non-conformist. Fact is, I despise labels and refuse to wear them. I make every effort (and while it's impossible in every aspect of life, I do attempt) to shun the labels people try to give me. I struggle, of course, with the ones that play on particular insecurities. (I am not stupid. I am not stupid. I am not stupid.) I struggle with these labels every day, but isn't that what we are really hoping for when we are raising our children to be "non-conformist"? I am a mother, but I do hate being categorized with mothers. I stay-at-home, but I hate being lumped into the group of stay-at-home mothers. The fact that I am married and have a child is, at times, a struggle for me to accept because it's just so... normal. The argument then becomes this; if you are intentionally not doing something just because it is normal, isn't that conforming? Conforming to the idea of what non-conforming is? In the end, what we really want is not to conform or not-conform. It is to be honest about who we are, what we like, and not hide that from the world.

This is also something I have been trying to do all my life, but it is also something I'm realizing is nearly impossible. Whether you want to or not, you put on a mask to face the world. Whether you are protecting yourself from getting hurt or you are reacting to your surroundings, you will catch yourself wearing -at least a partial- mask.

I hope that Jane questions authority. I hope that she questions everything. "Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly."~Dalai Lama. How will these kids know what questions to ask if they haven't learned how to ask them? If everything to a child has no boundaries, they will lust for borders instead of trying to break them down.

On another note, we're also talking about options and success. Now her child is in need of special help at school - most likely because of this hands-off approach to his education. We want our children to become anything they want to be. Do these parents not see that if the child fails in school, is unable to get along with other people, is a distraction to other students (because we should not forget about those who suffer with your self-indulgent parenting style), and does not learn basic respect that he or she will have limited options when they reach adulthood? Getting into a decent college will be difficult if they even have a desire to go and without the study skills and respect for others necessary, they won't last until graduation.

Weigh your options. Don't disobey the rules just for the sake of belligerence and disobedience. Break the rules that are worth breaking, but don't damage your child's future just to be the coolest kid in school - or the coolest parent on the block.