Chapter III. Family, love and marriage
The upbringing of children
Naturally, the upbringing of children has particular importance in family-marriage relations. It has been said already that a real family consists of mother, father and children. Parents find their continuation in succeeding generations. Marriage in this case introduces to the family a system of mutual obligations between parents and children. The state, in theory at least, must stand on guard for the whole family, including special protection for children. There exists a whole system of coded and non-written rules which parents and children must follow in their relations with each other. They vary widely from country to country[1]. Nonetheless, many think justifiably that the most important thing is not bringing the child into the world – it is bringing him up (in actual fact, both are of top importance). In my opinion, the optimal ways for bringing up children have been developed in Japan. Some will agree with this opinion, and some will not. The judge is the ultimate result: Japan has the world’s highest average lifespan combined with moderate population growth. There is no way to discuss the systems of upbringing in Western countries, since these systems are different for different classes and strata of the population.
Be that as it may, the essence of bringing up children in any state boils down to the requirement that by the age of majority the children possess the qualities of citizens that conform to the interests of their state. Naturally, the citizen qualities of different states may vary substantially. For example, higher education as an element of “quality” may not be needed for the average citizen of, say, Burundi or Papua New Guinea, just as the ability to start a campfire or shoot arrows may not be needed for a citizen of the United Kingdom. With this example I only wish to stress that there is no such thing as universal upbringing; there is a certain “basket” of upbringing, specific to each country. Still, this “basket” must contain several elements that are necessary to each country, i.e. such elements that reflect the universal.
I would put in first place the physical health of children, without which all other “elements” would lose meaning. It depends not so much on the general system of health care as on the cultural-educational level of the parents themselves. A telling sign of the parents’ illiteracy is, for example, the rocking of the baby to sleep, including rocking the stroller (characteristic of Russians). This peculiar method of “shaking out the brains” leads to disturbances in the functioning of the vestibular apparatus and produces unnatural stimulation of energy bio-flows in the brain’s core. As a consequence, a need develops for artificial doping that can be expressed through many negative manifestations in the future. Or take pacifier use up to “school age” (common in Western Europe): it not only deforms the tooth-jaw construction of the mouth, but, most importantly, it slows down in general the development of the child’s thinking abilities; this conclusion can be made by any reasonable person for himself based on elementary logic. Parents have the duty to learn basic science-based knowledge in the areas of nutrition, hardening and physical conditioning. The children’s physical and psychic state reflects the education level of the parents themselves.
The second “element” is a certain level of knowledge that conforms to the standards of this or that country. It is the volume that enables the person who reached majority to start life on his own without leaning on his parents. Parents who keep fostering their children whose hair is turning grey should be considered failures.
The third “element” is morals. Those parents should also be considered failures who failed to develop in their children a set of moral qualities that enables them ultimately to tell clearly good from evil, to see “what is good and what is bad.” This is what Kierchner called “cultivating true humanity.” Failure to understand the criteria of morality will ultimately inevitably result in crimes against society.
The fourth “element”, in my opinion, is esthetical cultivation which enables one to tell the beautiful from the ugly. Strangely enough, children who are not yet burdened by false ideas feel better than adults the differences between “pretty” and “not-pretty,” [2] until they are led to believe that so-called abstractionism or constructivism has something to do with art (as a kind of artistic activity, not as craft).
Oscar Wilde claimed in his time that esthetics is higher that ethics, beauty is higher than goodness. In actual fact this is not so. I can prove through a number of logical steps that esthetics and ethics are one and the same. Anyone who can’t tell beautiful from ugly is also incapable of telling good from evil. It means that his education is false, and therefore his life and activity is harmful to society.
Thus physical health, knowledge, morals and esthetics are the four pillars that determine the summary result of the quality of child rearing.
Of course, the summary result depends not only on the parents, but also on the state in which the family lives. The share of the state’s responsibility depends on the type and form of the state, which likewise varies from country to country. Besides, states can belong to different formations: feudalism, capitalism and socialism (all three exist in the world today). In this connection it is fitting to quote one interesting passage from Diogenes Laertius, who wrote that “… Xenophiles, the Pythagorean, when he was asked what was the best way for a man to educate his son, said: ‘That he must first of all take care that he was born in a city which enjoyed good laws.’”[3] The question of which state is the best place for bringing up children is a topic for a separate research work. However, the answer can be given based on the criteria of progress – the life delta – which were discussed in the very beginning. These criteria, I repeat, are population growth and average lifespan.
In connection with upbringing of children questions constantly emerge regarding the means and methods of upbringing, and among these questions the issue of punishment is always urgent. In this area the West left everyone in the dust, taking the solution to absurd extremes: the argument being that it’s wrong to punish children, that love and kindness is the only way to go. In some countries, for example the United Kingdom and Canada, there exists legislation that allows children to sue their parents in case they get punished. The results are there for all to see: one keeps reading in the papers how “affectionate” children kill their parents, or their teachers, or each other. The West, so proud of its belief in God, keeps ignoring for some reason the commandments of its Lord who reminds more than once in the Bible that the rod is a tool of love - for example: “The one holding back his rod is hating his son, but the one loving him is he that does look for him with discipline.” (Proverbs, 13:24). This is how this instruction is interpreted by Larry Christenson: “God’s discipline of us, His human children, is calculated to inspire fear. And this does not signify a failure or withdrawal of love. Fear acts as a catalyst of love. He who fears God most will love Him best. If God, the perfect Father, so disciplines His children as to inspire fear, then we should fallow the same pattern in dealing with our children.” (101-102) Religion thus sees punishment as interconnection of fear and love: the more fear, the more love.[4] However, since punishment of children is banned almost everywhere in the West, they apparently started losing their love for God. In actual fact punishment is cultivation of children’s responsibility for their actions. In the absence of punishment children develop the complex of permissiveness – the embryo of their subsequent crimes. The purpose of punishment is not cultivation of fear, be it even fear of the Heavenly King; its purpose is the forming of human morality.
Punishment, which can take on many forms, not just the “rod,” is the taming of nature that remains in the man, especially in his pre-conscious, i.e. childish, state. Therefore the goal of educational punishment is discipline, the adoption by the children of accepted forms of conduct in society and submission to society’s laws. Of course, in punishment, as in everything, measure is needed, and this measure is individual for each child. The parent’s task is to be clearly aware of this measure.
Finally, the keenest question of all: which one of the parents bears the greater responsibility for the upbringing of children? The dumbest answer: both share the responsibility in equal measure. The brightest answer is formulated in the Japanese saying: in the upbringing of children the mother has seven shares, the father only three.
The equality of parents’ rights became a topic of loud discussion after World War II. In the 19th and in the early 20th centuries, not to mention earlier periods, this topic caused no arguments; it was clear as day. However, as feminization made strides and emancipation of women progressed, men were made ever more involved in the upbringing of children, often in utterly twisted form. Men mastered the procedures of bathing babies, rocking them, taking them for a walk, laundering, etc. Many of them do indeed turn into “women-moms.” Bordering on idiocy is the new custom of “giving birth together”, when the husband is supposed to be present during birth, as if co-experiencing the wife’s suffering. In order to make the ordeal more bearable, all relatives and friends are invited to join in the suffering, together with their dogs and cats (I saw it myself on television).
The proponents of “mother-izing” the fathers don’t realize that the erasing of boundaries between the mother and father roles has a detrimental effect primarily on the children themselves. When the mother fights in the boxing ring and skydives, while the father does the dishes and bathes the kids, the children cease to understand what woman is and what man is. The trend is visible already, and many psychologists note that “girls and boys mix up their own roles.” However, this type of behavior is perilous to the parents themselves, since the natural differences between man and woman are violated, leading to the forming of some “it” creature, which is a dead end for mankind. On the contrary, the family must cultivate the differences between man and woman instead of ironing them out. These differences are not only natural, but also personality-related.
The mother, on the strength of her natural, psychic and psychological qualities, is obliged to devote much more time to the children than the father, especially in their very early years. This doesn’t mean that the father must remain in the observer role; on the contrary, he retains a role that is perhaps even more important: the role of coordinator and corrector of the mother’s mistakes. The mistakes are due to those same natural qualities of the woman: irrationality, greater sensitivity, unreasonableness (blind love), etc. – the totality of characteristics that impede optimal upbringing. The father must help the mother develop the optimal educational conduct with respect to the children, help avoid many foolish acts and inconsistencies. The father’s functions naturally increase as the children grow older. However, the father’s main educational effect is determined not by the time he spent with his children (which is necessary to do – within bounds of reason), but rather by the personality that he is, by his status in society, by his activity and its direction. Ultimately the father will be an example for the child – an example for imitation or for rejection. This is one of the aspects of the upbringing process.
Since the mother on the strength of her natural duties must spend most of her time with the child, there emerges the issue of the mother herself. Everything she says, everything she gives is absorbed by the child as a sponge. As the Japanese saying goes: a frog’s kids are frogs. Considering the not-so-simple conditions for the children’s adaptation in today’s society, it should be accepted that today’s mother must be a highly educated woman. In our day the old-fashioned upbringing along the lines of: feed him, clothe him or simply “set him on his feet” is clearly insufficient. The mother must teach the child many things already in his earliest years, and not so much give him practical knowledge as cultivate in him the craving for knowledge and for creativity. To that end, I repeat, she must know a lot herself. Moreover, it is she who has the duty of forming the child’s character, cultivating in him ethical norms and the esthetical idea of beauty. Her success determines whether the child grows up a philistine or a personality. As Kierchner writes, even though “women did not create any exemplary works of art, made no inventions or discoveries, they did bring up great and virtuous men and women, and that is an even greater service” (201). He is perfectly correct when he says that the great men of history owe their achievements to their mothers, mentioning Cromwell, Goethe, Schiller, and Wellington. Ever so many great names can be added to this list.
In this connection another question arises: in what proportions should the mother divide her time between the upbringing of children and her own work/profession? This question is artificial, for in the early years, the first three-four years at least, priority must be given to the children without any qualifications. The wise state recognizes this, creating every condition for the mother, because it is in these first years that the human being is formed, and therefore the future of the state is determined, and ultimately the future of mankind.
Here is a more difficult question: what if the mother herself is an extraordinary person – a creative person: actress, writer, artist, even a scientist? Which has priority then: the child or the creative work? Judging from many interviews and biographies, the majority of people are inclined in favor of choosing the profession and leaving the children to the care of nannies and other such substitutes. The children get tended to in parallel with the mother’s career, or they are moved to the background. Such an approach signifies elementary egoism that is evidence of the woman’s insufficient development.
I want to stress once again that everything the child sees and hears is absorbed by him as life code. His speech type, habits, rudiments of thinking – all this constitutes a “mirror.” The closest, most trusting relations are developed in the child’s first years – precisely with those who surround it. There are many known cases of children raised by animals; these children bark, oink, bite; they survived based on laws of nature. In order to cultivate a child, personal impact is required. The “career mother” will always remained just a good friend to her child, rather than the absolute truth.
I know one exception, however: the “crystal” actress Elena Solovey, who used to be very well-known in the Soviet Union and who currently resides in the USA. To the detriment of her fame and her stardom, she chose unequivocally the side of her children. To her it was not even an issue – it was her meaning. Her female essence is the ideal of the female nature. Here is an excerpt from her talk with a female correspondent[5]:
— But you were a star. Your career was on an upswing...
— I was just an actress whose life worked out fortunately. However, the profession can never be the most important thing in life. Life is what’s most important. Otherwise, what’s the use of children, of family?!
In actual fact, a major personality never faces such a dilemma. A personality is different from an ordinary man in that she finds the time to accomplish everything. This, however, pertains to the type of the ideal woman.
[1] Some of these may appear strange. For example, in Oxford (The United Kingdom) I read a rule saying that “in the interest of safety, children under 14 are not allowed to ride the bus unaccompanied by adults.” Myself and all coevals of mine, we rode in all kinds of public transportation “unaccompanied by adults” from about the age of six (that, though, was in the provincial city of Astrakhan in the era of socialism), and from the age of 14 I traveled by myself in trains and airplanes; therefore this rule appeared incongruous to me.
[2] I recall an episode in this connection: in the National Gallery in London, a guide was speaking of the beauty of Van Gogh’s paintings to children aged 6-7. He when asked them if they liked the painting. The children were hesitant, one of them nodded, but one gave a precise reply: “No”. – “Why?” – “Because it’s not pretty.”
[3] Diogenes Laertius.
[4] With this connection it is unclear why Western and Russian democrats, seemingly all of them religious, keep attacking Stalin whose policies conformed exactly to the Bible’s commandments.
[5] Moskovsky komsomolets, 5 March 2005.
On Love, Family, and the State
(Philosophical-sociological Essay)