Re: Helping kids be respectful
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My nearly 13 y/o is treated with respect and fully as a person by us. As he¡¯s grown and we¡¯ve more fully understood what this?means And looks like, I have realized how much this HASN'T been the case in our generational family. I don¡¯t remember feeling disrespected when I was young, but I DO VERY MUCH remember being treated as dramatic and often outright ignored for/when desperately trying to express my feelings. Later I was often reprimanded and even grounded for attempting to speak my (highly unpopular) truths about my step father, for instance.?
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Treating someone with respect doesn't necessarily mean accepting any behaviour without question. Some feelings are better not expressed, or at least in ways that are offensive and hurtful to the person you're expressing to.? Treating your son with respect could include treating him as someone intelligent and sensible enough to listen and understand if you tell him something is offensive. And it is a parent's job to coach a child in tact and social expectations.
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My son said ¡°if I respect someone I treat them as my equal¡± an excellent perspective. However this was his explanation while I tried to discuss his impulsively telling his best friends mom (also radical unschooling) ¡°to shut the fuck up Sally¡± over the boys Skype call.
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Part of treating someone with respect has to be trying to see things from their perspective. To understand how they feel when someone rudely swears at them. And to know that you are not 'treating them as your equal' by saying it,? unless they speak that way to you. If you have boundaries around what you are happy to have said or done to you, then being equal would mean respecting the boundaries of other people. At 12 your child is old enough to understand that shouting obscenities at adults is not, in any way, respectful. It isn't respectful to speak to peers that way either, even if they will tolerate it.?
Your son doesn't have the right to tell other people, in their own homes, to shut up, with or without swearing. When on a Skype call with a friend, he's talking to people in their own homes. And they have the right to talk, in their own homes, without being told to shut up by someone from outside.
I have told my children, quite plainly, that I don't consider it acceptable to swear at people. If they swear when they stub a toe, or if a game goes badly, that's up to them - although there are places where those aren't acceptable either -? but they don't swear at people. Not even their friends. It's hurtful, upsetting, makes people feel threatened or bullied, and doesn't help them like you more. If something will make you look like a jerk, don't do it. That's not how you want people to think about you.
Bernadette.
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