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Good evening. This is Radio
Free Beszel. I am
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Alphonse. Tonight: consequences.
So there's
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a trope I've seen a lot,
which is if someone
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does something that you
think is wrong you try
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to punish them with consequences
- as in, "there's
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free speech, but speech has
consequences." And the
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consequences, as I say,
are usually punishment,
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like trying to destroy someone's
job or career.
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And I have two big concerns
here. First,
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this doesn't work for
adults. And second,
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probably more important,
it doesn't work
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for kids either. And
I'm worried that we
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have a lot of adults
running around who
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might treat kids in
a really bad way.
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Iou see punishment really
doesn't work for kids.
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Almost never does. I'm a
father. I have a son.
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And I rapidly discovered that
if i tried to punish
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him he would just ignore
me, or he would he would
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fight against it, or he would
go along for now but
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then he'd do whatever it
was that I didn't want
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again another time. It
just didn't change his
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behavior. There is one
circumstance under which
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punishment works - and that
is if there's prior
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agreement. And this is
what all the parenting
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books recommend. You sit
down with your child and
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you say these are the limits,
and if you do this
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then iIm going to send
you to your room. And
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then if the child goes
and does that thing,
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you catch him and you
say, well, you
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did that thing so
off to your room.
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You know what he does? He
trundles right off to
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his room. That's my experience.
You know they say
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that kids crave boundaries.
And I thought that
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was a self-serving thing
that parents would say,
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but in fact it's true.
They do. They
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do want boundaries,
and if there are
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boundaries they want them
to be enforced, so
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they actually appreciate
it if you enforce
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fair reasonable rules, that
they knew ahead of
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time about what's acceptable
and what's not.
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But the key thing here
is that there's an
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agreement ahead of time.
The child agrees that
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that behavior is out of
bounds. That's not the
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case with these adults handing
out consequences.
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There is something else that
can work, something
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that can work when there
isn't a prior agreement,
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something that can work
when the child actually
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doesn't agree that whatever
he did was wrong.
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And I'm saying he because
again I have a son.
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And that's disappointment.
You know, I found this
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simply because my son would
do something that
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I thought was bad and he
thought was trivial,
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and I'd get quite upset about
it and he wouldn't
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respond. And I think, What
can I do? You know,
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I can punish him, but what
difference is it going
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to make? You know, I'd
found that whenever I
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focus on the punishment
or I punish him then
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the focus becomes the
punishment, and we end
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up arguing about the punishment
and the substance
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of whatever he did is forgotten.
So I just say,
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well, I'm really disappointed
but I don't know
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there's anything I can do
to change your behavior.
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And he would come back
and he would apologize
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and I would forgive him and
we'd put it under the
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bridge and we'd move on. Now
that works, I believe
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because of three things: trust,
respect, and love.
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I must emphasize the
trust. I strongly
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believe one should never
lie to a child.
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I mean, about Santa Claus
and the Easter Bunny
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if you like, but about
something significant,
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no. There are lots of times
as a parent when it
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would save a lot of pain
to simply tell a lie
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to pass over something
difficult. But imagine the
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cost if you lose that trust.
Then all of a sudden
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you have no leverage on
the child when you need
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him to cooperate on something
that really matters.
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But imagine this from
the child's point of
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view: if you have someone
whom you trust
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because they never
lie to you, whom
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you respect because
they respect you,
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and who loves you
unconditionally, and you do
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something and that person
is disappointed in
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and sad, how are you
going to respond?
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Of course you're going
to at least want
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to find out what happened.
And then once you
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do, you may develop empathy
and understand
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why that person is upset.
And even if you don't
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completely agree, change
your behavior. You know,
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I'm not saying this
is like a tool I
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set out to use. It
wasn't. It's just
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something that happens
as a parent sometimes.
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Sometimes one really is
just disappointed.
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and I noticed that it really
made a difference
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when he knew that. But look
at the other effect
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of punishment, and I think
I've mentioned this
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elsewhere, with the example
of spanking. The
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reason we don't spank is
not because we're going
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to hurt the child - which
we probably won't -
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it's because of what
it teaches.
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Say my son strikes
another child.
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And I say, You hit that
kid, and I'm going to
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spank you for it. Well, he
probably won't hit the
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kid again while I'm watching.
But what lesson does
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he learn? Does he learn
that hitting is wrong?
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Absolutely not. Because I'm
hitting him, he learns
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that hitting is right. He
learns that it is a way
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to solve problems. You know,
as a parent, this
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should be really clear to
us. When you start out
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as a parent it's all new.
Nobody's taught you how
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to do this stuff. And you've
got this big problem
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that's taking most of your
time with a child
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who's behaving in all sorts
of difficult ways.
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And you're stuck in some
situation - maybe your
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kid's throwing a tantrum,
he's jumping up and
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down. You think he's going
to break things. You
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think he might hurt himself.
Maybe you think he
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might hurt you. What do
you do? There's nobody
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around to ask for help.
You don't have time to
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go to the Internet or a book.
So you look back on
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what your parents did when
you were growing up.
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And that's what you do.
And hopefully it
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works. You know the key
way that kids learn
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from us is not from what
we tell them to do
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or not to do, it's not
from the punishment,
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it's from being role
models. They see
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what we do and we
learn from that.
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Are adults really that
different? I doubt it.
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When we punish adults,
or attempt to punish
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adults, all we end up with
is a power struggle,
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just like we do with kids.
Only in this case,
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the power struggle is
even less one-sided.
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And we set an example for how we
think problems should be solved.
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I think one of the great
flaws in our society
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is that we've segregated
people by age.
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We don't have a lot of contact
with people who are
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a lot older or a lot younger
than us, in general.
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And a lot of people
who don't actually
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have kids themselves
don't have a lot of
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experience spending
time with children
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or dealing with their
difficulties.
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And the result is, I think,
we learn. We lose touch.
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You know, we teach our kids,
but it's amazing how
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much we learn from them.
Not necessarily about
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them individually, although
that's true that
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too, but we also learn
a lot about ourselves.
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We learn about things
that turn out to be
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pretty much built into
people. Sometimes
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we learn about the sorts of
things that people learn.
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The experience of being
a parent is incredibly
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educational about what
it is to be human:
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not just what it is to be
a child, not just what
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it is to be a parent, but
who we are as a species.
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And if we don't have that
experience around us,
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I think we're losing something
out. Now I'm not
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suggesting that if you're
not a parent
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that there's something
wrong with you,
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or that everybody should
have kids. Absolutely
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not. I don't agree with
that. But I do think
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that the separation we have,
where we don't spend
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time with kids, has consequences
for us as a
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society. I mean, there are
a lot of people who
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don't have kids because
they can't afford them,
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because the the economy and
the social structures
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don't support it, and I think
that's a real shame.
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But I think it has other
consequences, in the sense that
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because we haven't learned
to deal with
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children, it seems to
an extent the result
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is we don't have know how
to deal with adults
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either. For Radio Free Beszel
this is Alphonse.
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www.beszel.ca. Good night.
