The blog has been inactive for far too long. AP tests are over; pressure has subsided slightly, but not completely.
In health class, lately, we've been in the process of discussing "touchy topics," if you will. The last unit we covered was one on contraceptives. The one before was based on sexually transmitted diseases. All are things that people deal with on a daily basis, but that remain hush-hush, especially in a society like ours. While concluding class last week, we read a scenario, and based on the actions of each character, had to decide who behaved most honorably in the given situation. In this specific text, a young teenage girl was at risk of being pregnant. Her mother did not know of the situation, yet voiced that she would never want her daughter to do anything that would harm her lifestyle or cause her any trouble. Therefore, I ranked the mother as being the most honorable of all the characters. The majority of the class, however, chose the young girl, Lily, as being the most honorable because she took initiative and made an effort to understand what would happen with her body.
The majority argued that Lily's mother had been too stiff and too unreasonable. The key, however, is to remember that Lily's mother had not known of Lily's true situation. Lily had denied the rumor, and her mother believed her, making us see that there was some sort of trust between the two. How could the mother possibly be at fault? She was neither presented with the situation, nor the chance to tackle it.
Why is it that when we find ourselves in trouble, we blame our parents for their "lack of support," yet when everything is fine and dandy, we scold them for fulfilling their maternal/paternal duties. Isn't it the same with any sort of intervention: divine, political, etc..?
I just thought this would be an interesting topic to rekindle the blog with.
(Sam Maliha)
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Well, I'm a bit unsure what the situation is between Lily and her mother so I'm not going to comment on that. However, I don't think that we blame our parents when we find ourselves in trouble. I think that at this point in our lives we recognize that we are responsible for our own actions and the things that happen in our own lives. We recognize that our parents don't have anything to do with the situation.
Blaming it on politics or divine beings are a different matter though. When things go wrong and we don't want to blame ourselves, we end up pushing the blame on something that we can't control, such as politics and divine beings. It makes us feel that it truly isn't our fault and that it is something impossible to control.
I don't think that 'scolding' our parents for 'fulfilling their maternal/paternal duties' necessarily correlates with everything being 'fine and dandy'. Because our parents come from a completely different generation, there are some situations where we are going to have a completely different opinions than them. So of course we are not going to happy with some action that goes against what we have in mind. And of course this doesn't happen all the time. There are times when we actually do have the same idea in handling a certain situation. To say that we 'scold' them for fulfilling their 'duties' is stretching things a bit too far and making this a bit too extreme.
I'm only basing what I write on what I have observed. I don't think that we can deny that we've heard our peers say, "Ugh, my parents are so annoying!" or something along those lines.
Scold may have been too harsh a word, yet when we find ourselves self-sufficient and in no need of help, favors, money, etc.., we are quick to rid ourselves of parental intervention. "Leave me alone, it's my life!" Does this ring a bell?
I'm not saying that this is the case with me, or you, or our class, or anyone you might know. But it does happen; so I'm merely wondering why. Does it have anything to do with the environment, or is it inherent?
If, like you said, political and divine intervention are inevitable (both of which me cannot control to certain degrees), why do we blame our parents so often?
(Sam Maliha)
Indeed we are never satisfied with what we have. Some say that it is human nature, but I believe that each individual sets his/her own level of satisfaction. Unfortunately, some people are simply more captious than are others and tend to object to every little inconvenience and then blame things on others. Parents are one of the targets for such blame.
I agree with Sam that if we face a certain inconvenience, then we often blame our parents for their lack of support, but if we also criticize them for fulfilling their duties or being overly protective when we believe we are not in any sort of harm or issue. Mary stated that "to say that we 'scold' them for fulfilling their 'duties' is stretching things a bit too far." I beg to differ. We clearly DO scold our parents when we believe that they are being overprotective. In the scenario we read in health class about the teenager named Lily, Lily's mother asked if she was in a sexual relationship with her boyfriend, and she lied that she was not. Her mother said "good" and explained that she couldn't imagine what would happen if Lily became pregnant. The reaction from the majority of our health class upon reading this scenario was that Lily's mother was not at all helpful nor supportive of Lily and claimed that she had not behaved responsibly/honorably. This is an example of how too many of us would scold our parents for asking us questions about our "private" affairs and being "overprotective."
I, on the other hand, argued, as Sam did, that Lily's mother HAD behaved responsibly or honorably due to her concern for her daughter's best interest. Furthermore, I personally think that Lily's choice to lie to her mother was utterly irresponsible and dishonorable, no matter what situation she was going through.
(Janet Lee)
Well, I didn't quite understand the whole "Lily/mom" situation, but nevertheless, I agree that we have a tendency to blame our parents for situations of our own making.
Actually, we can broaden that. We have a tendency to blame others for our own failures, but take credit when success occurs. Part of that is due to our ego: a lot of times, we don't even consciously realize that we shift blame onto others. Because we consider ourselves to be right until proven wrong, it seems natural when something goes wrong that it was someone else's fault, not ours.
Of course, it goes both ways. There's a saying from JFK: "Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan." When things go well, we all try to take credit and picture ourselves as the star who brought forth this success. When things blow up..well, it's "his" fault.
Certainly this attitude is displayed by us to our parents. We like to take credit for our own accomplishments, but often forget that our parents are responsible for much of our success. But when we fail, we blame our parents for not raising us correctly.
Well, it's human nature.
-Eric W.
"...we are quick to rid ourselves of parental intervention. 'Leave me alone, it's my life!' Does this ring a bell?... Does it have anything to do with the environment, or is it inherent?" (Sam)
This is yet another question of nature vs. nurture, and one quite relevent to our lives as teenagers. I think many people are tempted to blame rebellion during the teenage years on the particular "season of life." While it may be true that the teenage years are a time of testing and growing independence, I would like to point out that rebellion is not special to the teenage years and can't be blamed on the teenage years. We are human, therefore people of all ages have the desire to be independent. It just so happens that teen rebellion is so apparent because it is the time of life when teens transition from dependence to relative independence. I do believe rebellion is not inherent. It is a choice. I know that this is much easier said than done when we feel that our rights are being "abused" by our parents, but ultimately our parents are authority figures, and we are responsible for the choices that we make to obey or disobey their rules, whether these rules are "just/fair" or not.
Emily T.
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