My six-year-old son came home from school
the other day saying that he had been in trouble for fighting in yard and had
been put on the steps. I asked him why he had been fighting, and he said
‘because I love it!’
Now, the other kid may not have loved it,
and of course the school were right to take the action that was in line with
their rules and principles. I do not dispute that. But, it did make me wonder,
have we taken too much of the rough-and-tumble out of our children’s lives?
These days, if children begin an
altercation – over a toy, a game, some name-calling, whatever – every available
adult in the vicinity seems to immediately rush forward and diffuse the
situation, urging them to ‘use your words.’ Equally, if a child complains that
another child has done something mean – and children can do very mean things to
each other – there is a good chance the complaining child will be encouraged to
look at the situation from their aggressor’s point of view and consider whether
that child might have had a bad day or be upset about something. They may even be
asked ‘but what did you do to him? (Or her)’
Now, this might mean that we are raising a
bunch of highly empathetic, soul-searching, ‘Indigo’ kids who will view all
sides of a situation and merrily walk a mile in each other’s shoes. (And of
course it might not – children can be notoriously perverse about efforts to
mould them).
But, we may also be weeding out the natural
urge to push back, to grab back the toy that was taken, or say ‘so are you!’ to
the kid who calls them an idiot.
We may be teaching them to be afraid of
their own aggression – so busy forcing them to empathise with others, that they
are losing sight of their own entirely natural responses.
Of course the spectacle of small children
attacking or insulting each other is not an edifying one, and as a society we
have done tremendous work in taking violence out of the playground, and
encouraging our children to find other ways of expressing dissatisfaction and
upset. This is a good thing. But, I wonder, have we perhaps gone a little too
far? Is there a place for aggression that we are not acknowledging? Are we now
too quick to make them use their words, rather than react physically?
When adults attend self-defence courses,
the very first thing they are taught is to respond with aggression to an
attack. To yell – loudly! – and do something;
hit, shove, throw. Often, it takes a while to get this response out of them, because
by adulthood, we have all spent so many years suppressing those reactions, squashing
down the instinct to greet like-with-like because ‘its rude to shout,’ or ‘ we
don’t hit,’ that they are deeply buried and cannot be activated without a
struggle. When the world takes a toy away from us, or pushes us, instead of
demanding it back or shouting 'stop!', we tie ourselves in verbal knots, telling
the world how that makes us feel and trying to second-guess why the world would
want to do such a thing to us.
This might be a mistake. Life is a long and
difficult business, that needs to be treated delicately, sympathetically and
empathetically at times. And at other times given a good shove and told to back
off!
Now, I am not suggesting that we raise our
children to be monstrous Wall Street trader types, who think they are Masters
of the Universe and that the world is a jungle they must fight their way
through. Of course I’m not. Those are the people who destroyed financial
stability for millions through their greed and arrogance. And they are generally
not known for their subtlety of mind or sense of humour, either.
But, I do think the ability to swing a
punch where absolutely necessary, or at the very least to know that we could if
we had to, is vital.
And I believe this for girls too, who are
even more likely than boys to be discouraged from giving physical expression to
their feelings of anger, hurt and humiliation. Boys aren’t allowed to hit girls
(despite the fact that we are ostensibly an equal-opportunities society, and little
girls are often just as strong as little boys) and girls aren’t allowed to hit
each other. Which means no hitting at all for girls.
I grew up, second eldest of six, cheerfully
fighting my brothers and sisters. I fought the boys in my class, when that
seemed necessary, up until the age of 11 or 12. I don’t mean King of the Travellers-style
bare-knuckle boxing in a ring of whooping spectators, just the odd thump or
kick. There were never any hard feelings, in fact those exchanges were usually
perfectly good-natured and swiftly concluded. So it is difficult for me to feel
properly outraged when I hear that my son has been fighting. There is a part of
me that thinks, ‘well so what?’ And a part of me that, when my daughter cries
and says ‘he took my dolly,’ thinks, ‘well take it back!’ even as I rush
forward busily to say ‘now children, no taking people’s things, that’s not
nice. You made your sister feel sad. How would you like it if someone took your
things…?’
Mumsnet Blog of the Day 7/03/2014
http://www.mumsnet.com/bloggers/blog-of-the-day
