Ep. 7 - Parents in America Need to Start Doing Some Actual Parenting
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Summary
A girl went to school without her underwear on, and it caused a national outrage. How did the school handle the situation? And what should we do about it? Is it the fault of the school or is it something else?
Transcript
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Welcome to the show, everybody. Thanks for watching. So let me just say to start with here
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that I am very sympathetic to parents because I am a parent. I've got three kids. I know how
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difficult it is to be a parent. Or I should say, we back up for a minute, because parents always
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like to say, well, being a parent is the hardest job in the world. I've said it myself. That's
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true with a qualifier. To raise a child to be a good person in this degenerate, disgusting culture,
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that is the hardest job in the world for sure. That is a 24-7, never sleep, round the clock,
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relentless, stressful, heartbreaking, strenuous job that just never ends. And every fiber of your
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being must be invested in it all the time, constantly, if you want to raise your kid to
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be a good person. So that's the hardest job in the world. But just to raise a kid in general,
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if by raising a kid, we mean, well, that you have them in your house and you feed them food and you
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put the TV on for them and you make sure they're wearing some kind of clothing and maybe you take
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them on a vacation every once in a while. If that's what we mean by raising a kid, well, then no,
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that's not the hardest job in the world. That in and of itself is not a difficult job at all,
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actually. Literally anyone can do it and anyone does do it. So that in and of itself is not hard.
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What is hard is raising your kid to be a good person. I fear that the problem is that many
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parents in this culture aren't so much worried about the moral formation of their kids. They're
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not worried about raising their kids to be good people. They're more worried about, well,
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they need to be a good student. They need to get good grades. We got to get them into a good
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college. We got to make sure they get a good career. There are parents who aren't worried
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about any of this stuff whatsoever, but there are plenty of parents who are worried about that.
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But in terms of the state of their child's soul, well, they don't concern themselves as much with
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that. And that is just bad parenting. It's not just bad parenting. That is awful parenting. That
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is non-parenting. That is, you may as well not even be parenting. You could just make a robot with
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a computer algorithm that could do that. The hard part is the moral formation. And I fear that a lot
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of us just don't worry about that. I bring that up just as a means of introduction to this topic,
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which I think is kind of an illustration of a larger problem. So every year, it seems like we
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get maybe, I don't know, 10 or 12 national dress code outrages. It's always the same thing.
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A teenager goes to school dressed inappropriately or hardly dressed at all. And the school is forced
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to reassert its dress code policies. And that, of course, that's a horrible, oppressive thing.
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And it persecutes the poor child. And she runs home to her mother and tells her mother. And the
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mother calls the school and alerts the media. And then the child, who, by the way, is so embarrassed
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by all this and humiliated, then goes on social media and tells everyone in the world, because
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that's what you do when you're embarrassed about something. You tell everybody. And then that's how
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it becomes a national outrage. This happens, like I said, probably 10 or 12 times a year.
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And it really ramps up when we get into the warmer weather. So we're starting to see now.
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And we got our first dose of this, this week, with a national dress code outrage. I think it's
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our first of the year. One of many, I'm sure, before the year is up. I'm not going to go into the
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specifics of this story. It doesn't really matter. I'm just using this as an intro, as a means into
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this larger conversation. I mean, in this case, it was the girl. She went to school without
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undergarments on. And that was a problem for the school, understandably. They handled the problem
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in kind of a clumsy, weird way. And so then the daughter went home and told the mom. And the mom
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and the daughter are now saying that she's persecuted and it's terrible and she's been sexualized and so
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on and so forth. Now, it is true that schools are very often clumsy, as I said, and awkward and
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weird in how they deal with this stuff. But I don't fault them for that. Because they shouldn't
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have to deal with it at all. And there really isn't any non-awkward way for an adult to tell
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another adult's kid that she's not wearing enough clothing. There is no way to do that,
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no way at all, that will not be embarrassing to everybody involved in the situation. There's
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just once you have, as an adult, as a parent, put another adult in the position where they have to
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have that conversation, you have put them in a lose-lose situation. There's nothing they can do.
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So the schools, as they're looking at this issue, they have two general avenues they can take. The
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first avenue is let's do nothing and just accept the fact that our hallways are going to resemble
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a downtown bar at 1am on a Saturday. We'll just accept that and whatever. Or we can try to impose
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some basic standard of decency and decorum and dignity in our school. I respect the schools that
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take the latter approach. I give them a lot of leeway, even when they do it awkwardly.
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Um, I can generally be pretty hard on the school system, I admit, but, but I acknowledge that they
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are in an unenviable situation in an almost impossible situation where they're constantly
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having to do things that parents won't do. And they're constantly having to have these conversations
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that parents won't have with their kids. Sometimes the, sometimes the schools go too
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far. They take too much liberty. And so for instance, they'll, you know, they, they want to
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talk to the kids about sex, like in kindergarten now, because they say, well, the parents aren't
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doing it. That's something that you got to leave to the parents. And if they don't do it, they don't
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do it. But that's not for the schools to do at all, except for teaching the kids, the basic
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biological scientific facts of sex, when it, when, when it's appropriate for their age group
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in science. But beyond that, to go anymore into sexual ethics or telling them when to have sex and,
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you know, just that's not for the schools to do. Um, especially government schools, but
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basic decency, basic modesty. Well, if they don't have a conversation about that with the kids
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and the parents don't have a conversation with that, about that, with the kids, then we're back
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to the schools looking like a red light district. And that's not really an acceptable outcome.
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So the schools have to do something. Now we were discussing this a couple of days ago in my, um,
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Facebook group, and I received quite a few messages from teachers who, uh, tell me that kids
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regularly come to school. These are their words, not mine dress like hookers and streetwalkers.
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And there's nothing they can do about it. And one thing that all these teachers echoed to me
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is that those of us who are not in school and those of us who don't have teenagers,
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um, we probably don't really understand how bad it is, how crazy it's gotten with the outfits and
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just the inappropriate, ridiculous, as they say, hookerish outfits that these kids are coming to
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school in. Now, maybe it's not like this in every school, but some of these stories that teachers
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told me, I mean, it's, I, you know, I, I graduated high school. Um, I don't know how old am I now?
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I graduated high school like 15 years ago, uh, around there, 15, 20 years ago, 25. I don't know.
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But for me, it wasn't so long ago that things should have changed that much, but, and it was
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pretty bad when I went to school, but it's apparently so much worse even now. But if the
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parents are alerted to the problem, and this is the case, you know, not just with dress code stuff,
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but just in general, if you listen to the teachers, this is what they say. You try to talk to a parent
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about a problem involving the kid and the parents will rush to their little darling's defense and
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become very indignant that anyone would dare give their poor child a lecture. How dare you?
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It's none of your business to which the school should reply. Well, when you send your kid
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into public half naked, it is our business. Now you've made it our business. I wish it wasn't,
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but now it is, that's your fault. Be a parent. Um, but of course the real source of their indignation
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is embarrassment. They are not embarrassed over the conduct of their child. Like they should be
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they're embarrassed and they feel personally chastised that a school employee had to mop up
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after their negligent parenting. They realize on some level that they're doing a terrible job
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parenting. Um, they're not really parenting at all. And so the schools had to do it for them
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and that makes them feel bad. And that's why, you know, the parents who not, like I said,
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not just with wardrobes, but when a kid is being disruptive, acting out,
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and, um, the schools have to talk to a parent about it. When the parent gets defensive and says,
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no way, how did that? My, my kid didn't do that. You, that's the teacher doesn't like him. It's all
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your fault. He's being persecuted. Not, not all parents respond that way. That's not how my parents
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responded when I went to school and I got in trouble. But, um, the parents who do respond that
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way, it's, they're not defending their kid. They're defending themselves. That's all they're doing.
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It's just selfishness. It's all about them. They're defending themselves and they're saying,
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how dare you? Because if it's true that my kid's doing that, then that means that maybe I'm doing
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something wrong at home and I can't face that fact. So no. Um, but this is what you get parents
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when you leave the parenting to the school system. It's embarrassing for you. And I, and I imagine it,
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come in and have a meeting with a teacher, talk to a teacher on the phone and hear all these things
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that your kid's doing wrong. Um, that's embarrassing. But if your kid, you know,
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if your kid gets a lectured by the assistant principal over her miniskirt or whatever,
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don't be indignant at the school. The assistant principal was just doing something that you
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refuse to do. It should have been you giving the lecture, but you didn't do it. So they had to do it.
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It would have been better coming from you, but you didn't do it. So they did. That's your fault.
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Be indignant at yourself. Be embarrassed about yourself. Be angry at yourself.
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If you're not going to do your job, then the school system is going to pinch hit.
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And the school system has to do a lot of pinch hitting because there are a lot of parents who
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just aren't doing their job. And I think the school system oftentimes does a bad job of
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pinch hitting, but it's an indictment on America's parents that they even have to step up to the
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plate at all because they shouldn't have to. Here is a, here's an idea.
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Maybe we should instill in our children a sense of dignity and self-respect.
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Maybe we should teach them modesty and we should teach them to be humble. We should teach them to
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dress with class and with maturity. Maybe we should teach them to stop seeking attention. Maybe we should
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teach them to respect authority. Teach them to be adults in a civilized society. The whole, this is
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the whole point of parenting. If you're not going to see to your child's moral formation, then what
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are you doing? What, what exactly are you doing? I often hear parents say, well, I mean, uh, I don't
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want to force my child to be a certain way. I don't want to force him to fit into a box. I want him to
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find himself. He doesn't know how to find himself. He doesn't know where to look. He's confused. He's a
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kid. He doesn't know who he is. He's a, he's a, he's a child. He doesn't know anything. He knows
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nothing about, about anything. That's your job to tell him, to show him, to guide him.
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Don't say, oh, he's got to find himself. He's got to figure out his identity. He's got to express
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himself. He doesn't know any, he's confused. Don't you see that? He's bewildered. He's got,
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he doesn't know which way is up because you never told him. That's your job. So yes, you should be,
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you should be getting your child to conform with, with, uh, with, he should be conforming with basic
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standards of etiquette and decency and courtesy. He should be conforming with some kind of moral
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structure. He should be conforming with the rules of the family. He should be conforming
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with the rules in the school. He should be conforming under the authority of those who are
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above him. He should be conforming with the idea that he should respect his elders. Yes, he should
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be conforming to all of those things. Those are boxes that he should be fitting in and you should
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be putting him in those boxes. That's your job. Again, if you're not going to do that as a parent,
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then, and I say this with all due respect, but as a parent, you're basically useless. You're not
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doing anything that there are specific things that society needs parents to do. And in this case,
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if you're one of those, you're not doing any of those things. So what, what's the point? What are you
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doing? You may as well just ship them to a boarding school or something at that point, because you're not
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the, the whole, the whole parenting deal you've just checked out on.
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He's going to find himself. I mean, people say this now about their, uh, you know, people say
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this now about like their four-year-olds. Oh, he's got to find himself. He's got to,
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got to figure out his own identity. He's four, you nutcase. What are you doing? He's four years old.
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Got to find himself. Can't find any, can't even tie his shoes. Doesn't know anything. Yeah. You got
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to tell him he's a boy. This is what boys do. This is how boys act. Again, that's your job. You're a
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parent. Um, all right. Got a little worked up there. I, I just, it really, this is the thing.
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This is the thing above maybe anything else in this society that, uh, irritates me the most.
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These parents who just categorically refuse to do their job, refuse to do it.
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One other point, um, one other point I want to make. Okay. And I know this is a thing that gets
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me into trouble, but, um, when we're talking, you know, just going back specifically to the dress code
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issue. One of the things that you hear sometimes is that one of the reasons why we should have dress
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codes and why we should teach our daughters to respect the dress codes is that it can be very
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distracting for boys in the school. If the girls are coming in dressed, like they're going to the
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beach. Right. Um, and we, when someone makes that argument, we tend to write that off and say,
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that's a, that's a silly, sexist, patriarchal argument. It's not my problem. What your boy
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does. It's not my, if your boy can't control himself, it's not my problem. It's not my daughter's
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problem. He's got to deal with it. That's a terrible attitude. And it's a terrible attitude
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to instill in your daughter is a terrible, obnoxious, selfish, ugly attitude. Um, it is not sexist
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to point out that your daughter's skimpy outfits really are extremely distracting to the boys in
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her school. They are, if you've never been a teenage boy and you've never been the parent
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of a teenage boy, then you really do not understand the overwhelming power that a boy's hormones
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have over him at a certain age. And I know that girls have hormones too, and they've got their own
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issues with that. Not downplaying that at all, but those are different issues and it's not the same.
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And the, the fixation on the opposite sex on sex in general, this is something that is so much more
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pronounced for boys than it is for girls. That's just a biological reality. There are exceptions,
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but they are just that exception for the most part is so much more powerful and pronounced than boys.
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And they can't control that. They can't, you know, we can try to teach them to control their actions,
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but they can't control the fixation. They can't control what their mind is doing inside their
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head. Um, it's not an exaggeration to say that it is very nearly impossible, very nearly impossible
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for a, for a pubescent boy to focus on his work while his girl classmates are coming to school,
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barely clothed. It's, it's, you are asking him to do something that is practically impossible
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for him to do. It would require just, I'll tell you this, let me put it this way.
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It would require more self-discipline and, um, maturity and moral courage than you probably
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have right now as an adult. So you're asking him to exhibit a kind of control over his mind and his
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faculties that you yourself do not exhibit. Um, so this is just a fact of biology.
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Maybe you as a parent should teach your daughter
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that her attempts to get attention are harmful, not only to herself, but also to her male classmates
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who have almost no choice, but to give her the attention she's demanding. It's, it's like a
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biological imperative that they're going to give that attention. And so she shouldn't be out there
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seeking it. It's selfish. I mean, it is obviously selfish in more ways than one.
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Just, just a man. I want you really, I mean, I don't think we empathize enough with boys in this
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culture. Imagine what this culture is like for boys. And like I said, I remember how it was for
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me when I was a kid, not all that long ago, and it was very difficult, but it's even it's, it's,
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it's gotta be 10 times worse even now than it was for me. Um, you're a boy in 2018, there's porn
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everywhere. There's sex all over the TV, there's sex all over the computer. Uh, and then he goes to
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school and the girls are dressed like they're going to the club and he just can't escape everywhere.
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Now he's got his hormones raging. He's going through puberty. He's I, and everywhere he
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turns, he can't turn anywhere where it's not there. I mean, it's, it's, it's, do you have
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any idea how difficult we've made it for a boy to be virtuous and chaste, let, let alone productive
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in this society? And so the, the, the response of a lot of parents of girls is, ah, that's their
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problem, whatever. I mean, how disgusting of an attitude is that? Why don't you have
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a little bit of, I mean, look, just stop thinking about yourself for a second. And just, just
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for a moment, if you can, and try to empathize with these boys, they didn't choose to be this
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way. This, and they didn't choose to live in this culture either. That is constantly preying
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upon their weakest impulses at a point in their life when they have not developed the maturity
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and the discipline to, um, to overcome those impulses. As I said, as, you know, as adults,
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we don't, we're not prepubescent boys anymore. So we don't have the same impulses. We don't
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deal with the same, um, struggles that they do internally. But what I'm saying is the amount
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of self-discipline that we are requiring boys to have in, in this culture, it is a greater
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self-discipline than even most adults exhibit. Um, and that's not fair. You know, it's just
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not fair. So I don't know. I mean, that's not the only reason why we should have the dress
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coats, but that is a reason. I don't think it's an irrelevant reason. I think it's something
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that we should all be concerned about. And maybe, I mean, we focus so much on the plight
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of girls in society and what they go through and the societal expectations and everything.
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And that's great to focus on that because that's an important issue. I have a daughter
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as well. Um, so I'm worried about that, but we just neglect altogether. We just, we just
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scoff what boys go through. We just scoff at it. We don't care. We're like, just let them
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deal with it. It's their problem. Like I said, it's just, it's a disgusting attitude. It really
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is. Uh, but that's maybe a topic for another day. I mean, I will talk about more about that
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some other time. Um, but we'll leave it there for now. So thanks for watching everybody and