From:

http://familyintegrity.org.nz/

7 April 2008 – Family Integrity #365 — One family’s ordeal…

Dear Friends,

This is a terrible story.

The outrageous antics of the Police and the social welfare agents are bad enough. But they are not the only villains in this story.

Have a read:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=557440&in_page_id=1879
The parenting practices of this apparently very typical family are also to blame. The practices, I believe, are quite common and typical. But let’s look a wee bit closer.

The children attended school. Simply being separated for at least 6 hours a day, 5 days a week will soon make the children strangers to their parents. In addition, we all know that children pick up all kinds of lousy messages and attitudes at school. Many teachers convey the anti-parent message that your parents are not allowed to force you to do anything, to discipline you or correct you. This is totally subversive of parental authority. So the first question: why do parents allow their children to attend these institutions where they are subject to such subversive propaganda? Probably the simplest answer is that the parents send their children to school in good faith and have no idea whatsoever as to what is going on. The typical answer to, “What did you do and learn at school today, Johnny?” is “Nothing.” Application: get your children out of such institutions. Ideally teach them at home or find a private school you can thoroughly trust.

The children were allowed computers in their rooms as well as other games and entertainment technology. That means a fair bit of what they did was unsupervised. Children need guidance in these areas. If the computers were connected to Internet, this was indeed a very foolish thing to do, leaving the children to surf the Internet unsupervised. Application: never let children have unsupervised time on internet and never let them have their own computer or TV in their rooms. This is just the same as leaving stacks of pornography magazines, books and films in their rooms. How can one be surprised if they then come out with vile speech and disobedient and disrespectful attitudes?

The children were allowed to develop friendships, spend lots of time and even stay over night at the homes of people the parents did not approve of. Again, this is incredibly foolish. Why do parents do this? Again, they do so in good faith, do not want to appear snooty or arrogant, want to apprear friendly and non-discriminatory toward neighbours, for after all, they are neighbours. (Actually we’re not sure if they were neighbours or not.) But the strongest influence that caused the parents to have such a hands-off approach to the shepherding of their children was that such an approach is what society today demands. Application: tell society and its demands to jump in a lake: your children are your responsibility and you must raise them according to what you believe is right. If you do not approve of certain people, do not let your children associate with them. This is impossible if they attend school, of course, so again home education is nearly essential. We must say more: if you disapprove of this or that, you must be clear about this to your children and explain why. More than that, you must approve, and even demand, behaviour and standards that you want to see in your family. Schooling institutions no longer propagate the higher standards of our Traditional Western Christian Civilization, but today they socialise everyone to a politicised list of so-called commonly held set of values. That is the formal curriculum. The hidden curriculum (what goes on behind the bike sheds and at recess and behind teacher’s back) socialises all to the lowest common denominator…and this is getting lower all the time.

The children were allowed to get away with saying “F…off, you cow,” to their mother who would give a few warnings about such language. Such language should have been rooted out years ago. Again, it is nearly impossible to do this if the children are at school, but at the very least they could have learned to never use that language at home, but only at school, as I did as a kid. But to tolerate them saying such things to their own mother is unbelievable. But then, the father did say the same thing to a social worker. Sure he was under duress, but it was a terrible example. The application is: don’t use language or act in ways you don’t want to see replicated in your own children. They need to know exactly where the boundaries are and that you will be swift and sure about enforcing the boundaries. Swift and sure about enforcement. Here we are up against it as the re-write of Section 59 categorically forbids parents from correcting or disciplining their children. It would seem the law we have is designed to prevent parents from doing their duty toward their children and to give children license to be as disrespectful and disobedience as they like.

So, the police and social welfare agents in this story were abominable, but they were following the trends and policies of their superiors. This is bad, and NZer will be suffering such interventions more and more. But none of this would have happened if the parents had closer relations with their children, if the family had been operating as a unit instead of as a collection of individuals living, most of the time, under the same roof. The parents and children were clearly NOT on the same page. Application: train your chldren to recognise that the agents of the state are sadly no longer to be trusted, but that they will divide, conquer and destoy your family, your reputations, your future employment prospects and even your ability to travel. So children must stick close to parents and stick up for them and never, never divulge to others outside your four walls what goes on inside your four walls. Your family’s private family life is no business of anyone else. If authorities come around and start getting nosey, you must all be agreed that “Silence is golden.” Simply say nothing — NOTHING — to any of these agents.

As this story dramatically illustrates, the state agents (schooling institutions, police, social workers) used the tactics of divide and conquer plus their privileged position of using force, to damage this family. Don’t let it happen to you.

Regards,

Craig Smith
National Director
Family Integrity
PO Box 9064
Palmerston North
New Zealand
Ph: (06) 357-4399
Fax: (06) 357-4389
Family.Integrity@xtra.co.nz
http://www.FamilyIntegrity.org.nz