Parental authority and correction

IN our time when children and adolescents are increasingly among the casualties in the government’s war against drugs, one wonders why the media seldom mention the importance of parental discipline and correction. As they say, prevention is better than the cure.

Some of the parents of juveniles, who were caught or killed, admit that they are aware that their children are drug addicts or pushers. Reporters seldom ask them: “What did you do about it?” They are just shown mourning and howling for justice. Some of them even admit they only came to know about the death of their children when they saw it on television. Imagine, they don’t even know where their children are!

Law and order are priorities of our government. But these cannot be achieved if one of the bastions of law and order in society—parental authority—is not exercised. The authority of parents follows from their indispensable function in maintaining peace and order within the family. When that function is weakened, assaulted, or displaced, the obedience, respect, and allegiance of children are transferred to other more powerful entities in society.

Magnify what’s happening in the family and you will see the dismal state of authority in our country. With our minds marinated daily in endless news about murder and mayhem, we lose our anchoring in legitimate authority; and our desire for law and order becomes a relentless demand for security. Thus, we unwittingly aquiesce to the government’s use of brute force, however ugly its manifestations.

History shows that the fragmentation of traditional authority, especially in the family, breeds social strife which is the prelude to social anarchy and despotism. When parents abandon their authority to supervise their children’s activities, the latter look to the media, peer group, or social network for guidance and direction.. Worse, if their parents put them to work at an early age because of poverty, working becomes an excuse to stay outside the home. Parents become uninvolved in their children’s lives, giving the latter very little emotional support and firm rules for behavior.

Here is a cautionary tale about the dismal lack of parental correction prevalent in many families today. In a department store, one day, I saw a boy and his sister playing what looked like a “scream-all-you can” game. They ran and yelled at each other without regard to the people around them, while their mother shopped, unmindful of her children’s noise. Suddenly, the boy forcibly pushed his sister, causing her to fall, nearly hitting the floor with her head. The mother pulled the boy aside and asked: “What’s wrong with you?” Then she continued shopping while the girl cried and the boy laughed at her.

If all children who misbehave are treated that way by their parents, they would probably grow up thinking that it’s all right to misbehave because there’s something wrong with them, anyway. They are not accountable for their actions because they can’t help it. Besides, whatever they do, they will not be punished.

It is now, more than ever, when parents must take seriously their task at disciplining and correcting their children. Our gospel today reminds us that community crises begin as problems of individuals. A timely fraternal or parental correction is indispensable because, once a child grows up to be a man, it is almost impossible to unlearn what he has learned, undo what he has done, and unknow the bad things that he has known.