This post has been in draft form for about 3 weeks along with several others which were even older. I’ve deleted them as they were either so unfinished it was not worth continuing with them, so outdated they were irrelevant or I had rewritten them in some other form already. This one could very well still be something of a work in progress but having written it I am pressing publish anyway in the vague hope that there is something in here somewhere which was a point I had hoped to make when I started the post in the first place!
My Mum asked me once what I thought the secret of a happy marriage was. She doesn’t consider herself to have a happy marriage to my Dad (and I don’t think anyone, Dad included would argue with her there!). I said ‘tolerance’. Tolerance and acceptance. It’s about knowing the other person’s faults and foibles, accepting them as part of that person and loving them anyway. Clearly there needs to be way more about that person that you think is fantastic than you think is bloody annoying and aslong as the good outweighs the bad then you’re away. 🙂 My Mum’s complaints about my Dad are always about the things ‘she can’t make him do’ which would be the same complaints she would make about anyone she struggles with.
I have been documenting my recent journey with Scarlett and realised that what has changed has been my attitude towards her. I am not viewing her as a challenge to my parenting anymore, I am viewing her as having a rough time with lots of struggles to control her emotions and deal with things that life throws at her (such things as getting dressed, wearing shoes, being in a car seat) and viewing my role as supporting her through that, making her path that much easier, helping her deal with the things she cannot change and find ways to change the things she can. Tolerance of who Scarlett is, how she acts and her sometimes irrational to me but very real and serious to her feelings seems to be really helping.
This is actually quite a tough thing to pull off. For me it seems faintly ridiculous to accept that having to wear a coat is worthy of tears for Scarlett. I struggle to understand why Ady feels so gutted when Portsmouth lose a football game. I get really angry when Scarlett yet again doesn’t want to tidy up the toys that she has played with even when it was only half an hour ago that I said to her if she got the toys out then she would have to tidy them up before dinner and she cheerfully agreed. I am really frustrated that Ady takes forever to leave the house because he is going round checking doors are locked, the gas is off, the fire is definitely out and then goes back in again to switch the light on incase we get back after dark. And that he is forever losing his keys, his coat, his work diary. But that is who they are, what they do, how they feel.
There are not many things I actively want to ‘teach’ my children, but respect, tolerance and acceptance of the views and beliefs of others are on that limited list. It’s an interesting concept though tolerance, because it’s one thing to exercise tolerance of who someone is, the areas of themselves which they cannot change, but it can be quite another to have the same tolerance for their choices, their views and their lifestyles. I have been questioning how we exercise that when those views are very different or even in direct contrast to our own. Because actually if you believe something with passion and you really consider your views The Truth then actually by definition you think other views are wrong.
I have a friend who is deeply religious. They say they don’t judge me for not holding those same views and I’m sure they don’t actively judge me, but actually by believing that it is only from having God in your heart and praying to Him and living in the way He dictates that you will get into Heaven then they also believe that people like me, who might lead a good life and not harm others will still go to hell anyway. As will my unbaptised children. To not believe that, to have even a chink of doubt about it would be to question their own beliefs. And before anyone jumps on me for that, that is specifically what that friend said rather than my interpretation of everyone who holds a religious belief.
Similarly if we don’t believe in any spiritual higher being, if we think that all there is is us, here, now and when we’re dead that is the end of it, then surely we must by definition believe that the believers are deluded. That they are wasting their lives hoping and praying to something which is a creation of man’s own mind. That every move they make motivated by their belief is one they needn’t bother with, that the wars and deaths in the name of religion are wasted foolish ones, that acts of kindness or charity in the name of the church are actually only done so the giver feels good and those living off the church continue to do so.
And then what about abortion? Surely you either support the woman’s right to choose or you don’t? Surely you can’t choose whether it’s OK for someone to abort if the pregnancy was a result of rape or underage sex but not OK if the baby would have been born to affluent, married parents who simply decided the time was not right. If we agree that women have the right to choose then surely in doing so we waive any judgement over how she makes that decision and what her motivation is.
And education? Surely if one follows an autonomous route, if we eshew the very idea of a curriculum and wasting time on learning things which may never be needed in ‘real life’ then by definition we think the people who send their children to school, or who even follow some sort of structure whereby a child is being bribed to sit and work through workbooks or do some ‘work’ before they can play are stunting their children, taking away their autonomy, their right to spend their time on their passions.
And those who follow a curriculum, who send their children to school must think that the approach of parents who don’t follow any structure, who allow their children to develop passions and interests in their own time, who have children who cannot read far older than is the accepted norm, who don’t teach their children times tables are in some way neglecting them, are setting them up to fail, are giving them enough rope to hang themselves.
But we don’t do we? Or if we do we don’t say so. Or maybe we don’t even know we do. I, and most the parents I know practice religious and racial tolerance and teach our children to do the same, I support any parent who educates their child in any way no matter how different to how I am aiming to educate my own. I would not consider someone who used ‘the naughty step’ as a bad parent even though I know full well that such an approach would not suit either me or my children.
I think where we go wrong is in deciding that we found the one true path, that everyone needs to come round to our way of thinking. I cringe at listening to mothers who slate the choices of other mothers. The working mothers who love their careers and use full time childcare from the earliest opportunity to enable them to return to work and sneer at the mothers who choose to stay home with their children, downtrodden, disempowered, relying on someone else to be the breadwinner. Those same mothers who sneer back at the ‘career bitches’ while smugly knowing they are the one’s doing the real work, tending house, raising children. Surely we should be supporting each others’ rights to choose? Surely we should be celebrating the opportunity to do either or?
And us Home Educators? We should be celebrating the freedom that we (currently) have to choose which path to tread, standing shoulder to shoulder (once we’ve finished our normals round the kitchen table starting promptly at 9am or roused ourselves out of bed sometime around 11am, played on the xbox for an hour or so and finally gotten dressed in time for lunch) and not squabbling among ourselves.
Over the years, particularly since becoming a parent I have had many, many, many of my views and beliefs and ideas challenged and changed. Does that mean that they were not genuine in the first place? No, I don’t think so. I don’t even think it closes some of them off from me returning to them at some future time. I certainly don’t think supporting other people’s rights to different views dilutes my own, but I am very aware that despite outward tolerance I am still silently, privately judging others and their choices and I think we all do the same. I have undergone fairly spectacular U turns in various areas of my life and somehow I have managed to persuade those around me that I was right when I was doing things one way, but I am continuing to be right now even though I am doing them completely differently! So the tolerance I am hoping to pass onto my children is more of an openminded one, a questionning approach certainly, an acceptance that it is from those who have different views to our own from whom we can learn the most, that it is far more valuable to have our ideas challenged than agreed with. That it is in enjoying the differences between ourselves and others which provides the most richness can be gained from life and our relationships within it.
Wow! Lots to think about and I’ll probably make a complete hash of responding, but then I’ve not been mulling this for three weeks 🙂
I believe in God, and I believe in science, which sometimes leads to being stuck in the middle. I respect the intellectual ability of people like Richard Dawkins, but really object to his hatred of religious belief. He doesn’t see that his nice cut-and-dried biology rests of chemistry, which in turn rests on physics. When you get to things like relativity and quarks there’s so much in physics that you just have to take on faith, even though it seems absurd (time slowing down, lengths stretching, things moving from one point to another without going through any of the space in between etc.) – just because it seems the best explanation of life that you can come up with.
Science thinks it can answer everything. Why? What (other than science, which is cheating really?) says that it must? Given the purest core of science and reason (logic) has proved itself to be incapable of avoiding paradox, why should we assume that reason and rational thought is all there is to a complete answer?
Then there are the church-goers who think that you must believe X, Y and Z or you’re going to hell. But what about the thief on the cross next to Jesus – he hadn’t toed the party line, but still he got a personal welcome into heaven by the Son of God himself. Then there’s the paralysed man let down through the roof by his friends as the crowds around Jesus were too thick. Jesus sees _their_ faith (not the man’s) and makes the man well.
I’m not disputing the passages in the Bible that say things that support “believe X, Y and Z or you’re going to hell”, but I think this isn’t the complete picture. Just as Jesus railed against the religious people of his day, who thought they were doing everything right (compared to all the riff-raff), I strongly suspect God still thinks that of many church-goers like me these days.
Sorry that this has turned into a mini creed! Yes, keep teaching your children tolerance and sorry for waffling (this is your blog, not mine!)
Comment by Bob — 20 November 2006 @ 8:34 pm
Good post (and good response!)
For me, tolerance is not so much about not judging (as you say, we all do it privately at least) but about understanding, compassion and respect. You should not have to compromise your own beliefs to do this. Being tolerant of Scarlet (or to take it to the other extreme, a mad-axe-murderer or rapist…) does not mean you can’t strive to make them see the error (or your perceived error) of their ways. It’s doing this with mutual respect that is hard. Is it our duty??? So we should also be thankful of people who take the time to do the same for us, even when we think we’re right and they are wrong.
Our own children/partners/parents… are the perfect example of the idea of ‘hate the sin, love the sinner’ (which we all are).
And now I’m waffling too.
Comment by Barbara — 20 November 2006 @ 10:51 pm
Interesting post. I have a best mate who is a Christian. We were friends at school and we had some pretty mega rows in those days! But we had a shared passion for the Mapp and Lucia novels of EF Benson (fairly unusual in teenage girls) and lots of other stuff in common. I found that I admired her deeply held convictions (at least she had some) and that we could get to the inevitable sad end to an argument and still be friends who respected each other.
She did tell me my sister was in hell, but then I countered with the traditional family trump that I wouldn’t want to be in heaven anyway ’cause all the fun people would be in hell… And, in the end, how could I really take offence if she consigned me and my loved ones to a imaginary place?
I try to get the kids to understand that people have beliefs that mean a lot to them, and we should respect that fact. We have beliefs that mean a lot to us and we should expect to have that respected. We can’t always respect other people’s actual beliefs – especially if they are that we are sick, or depraved, or possessed by demons – but we can respect the fact that those opinions matter to them. It’s a fine line sometimes but I think it is important.
Comment by Allie — 20 November 2006 @ 11:35 pm
Really interesting post and responses.
My own feeling is that I’ve given up trying to change anyone, having thought in my 20s that I could convert anyone to at least trying or wanting to be vegan, or at least vegetarian, among other things. Since hitting 40, I find I have a wider view and it’s much easier to appreciate individual people for what they are, to be interested in why they’re different and how they see things differently and sometimes to celebrate that or to share a joke about it as well as to thoroughly enjoy any similarities. I do find people as a mass quite alarming though as they seem to hold so many views in direct opposition to my own.
All I can do is do the things I believe in and be honest about what I believe while trying to accept what other people believe and not make them feel crap about it. I don’t always manage that, but it’s all about the trying.
Comment by Ali — 21 November 2006 @ 10:29 am
I think that’s a real shame, Ali. But I supose it depends on how strongly you feel that not to be vegan is ‘wrong’ or just ‘wrong for you and worth a try for others to be vegan’. Does that make sence? I’m not vegan, but I welcome to be challenged about it, maybe because deep down somewhere I do wonder whether I ought to be. Or at least vegetarian. Maybe it’s because no-one who feels passionately enough about it has actually sat me down and grilled me hard enough and I’ve never felt strongly enough about it either way to invest the time and energy in grilling myself. Is that because they are too polite, or because I’m not worth the effort, or because it’s really not such a big deal to them? Probably politeness/political correctness. But actually I would feel very valued if someone who thought I was doing something very wrong had the concern for me and the guts to want to explain their way of thinking. Offended is the last thing I’d be, even if I thought they were plain wrong, and even if I was, it would be misplaced.
And to Allie, I suspect that your friend telling you that your sister was in hell was far harder for her to say than for you to hear, because as you say, what would it matter to you anyway if there’s no such place? I think the offence comes in when a non-Christian hears that from a Christian, they interpret it as the Christian thinks there is something inherantly bad about them, or that they are somehow better. Which is not nice to hear from a friend, however much you disbelieve the reasons. But actually that’s a misinterpretation becasue no-one deserves to be in heaven. It’s not about how good you are, because then no-one would ever get through those pearly gates.
Comment by Barbara — 21 November 2006 @ 5:44 pm
Maybe I just got realistic in my middle age Babs, it feels good to me to be finding the positive in people who are different to me, feels like growth in fact, and a widening of. Anyone with the intelligence to realize that animals suffer combined with the compassion to care about it doesn’t need me to (LOL) ‘grill’ them (with a nice slice of pineapple on top), they will come to that decision themselves. Nothing I can say will make any difference – if they were interested or cared, they would think about it themselves, surely.
If someone told me I was going to hell or someone I loved had died and gone to hell I think I would wonder why they would want to tell me that. Would they be trying to change my ‘evil’ ways or something? Not sure what their motivation would be.
Comment by Ali — 21 November 2006 @ 8:16 pm
Thanks for your comment Bob – feel free to creed as much as you like 😉 I love the idea of debating and discussing things, particularly religion and it is not often you meet someone who is prepared to do so in my experience.
Barbara I disagree I think, although it is possibly a double standard. I have no tolerance at all for rapists, paedophiles or any other belief or view which I personally find very depraved or basically sick. To me tolerance is about accepting someone has different ideas, respecting them and leaving them alone. If I start trying to show someone the ‘error of their ways’ then surely that is the point when my tolerance and acceptance has stopped?
I don’t think many people who eat animals, to use Ali’s example, are not aware that the animal has suffered, but we trade that off against the fact that we like the taste / think that is what humans were designed to eat / don’t care anyway. Similar goes for anything which we know there has been a compromise to bring us – for example I know that drinking too much wine is not a great thing to do to my body. for my purse or for my head the next morning, but I make a calculation that decides it is a sacrfice worth making – same as my eating animals.
I would be really pissed off if someone starting preaching to me / judging my decision to do so. I feel like this about most of the things I am very vocal about – Home Education, parenting, religion, abortion. I have my views, I am prepared to discuss them at length, take on board other people’s views and possibly, through debate have my mind opened to the possibility of other views but if someone was to ‘sit me down and show me the error of my ways’ I think I would be mighty offended. But then I guess all of my hard line views on anything or indeed any area where I would be inclined to meet someone strongly opposing or disagreeing with me are things I have thought through, have firm reasons for my views and would happily defend, eating meat included ;).
Comment by Nic — 21 November 2006 @ 8:51 pm
I agree, finding the positive in people is very important. It’s easiest to do with your friends, not so easy with the guy who’s just written off your new car and takes an exceptional person to find the good in someone who’s beaten up your child (for want of better examples).
Don’t put yourself down… I think you can make a difference. People can put their heads in the sand for all sorts of reasons (over all sorts of issues) and sometimes they need a good friend to be brutally honest with them. Not wanting to necessarily turn this into a vegetarian debate here (but please do grill me next time I see you, lol) but I do think about it every now and then, feel a few pangs of something (guilt?) and console myself with a million and one reasons why I eat meat and manage to justify it and shove it to the back of my mind again to worry about the next burning issue.
As for the someone telling you that you or a loved one was going/had gone to hell, I suspect the most likely reason would be that some religious/spiritual debate had come up and the non-Christian had asked the direct question, out of interest. In the course of debate, I have often been asked ‘so would you say I’m going to hell then?’. As you can imagine it’s an awkward question even if it has been asked out of pure curiosity and facination because of the misinterpretation the simple answer. I think it’s something that facinates non-Christians to think that their Christian friends might hold that view and why. I think it would far more likely come up in this sort of context than a Christian friend just coming out with it in anger or in an effort to ‘change’ you or simply becasue they felt a burning need to let you know. As you say, why would it change you if you don’t believe in such things anyway?
Comment by Barbara — 21 November 2006 @ 8:56 pm
comments crossed then I suspect. I agree Babs it is something that probably only comes up in conversations such as these, and again only when pushed as a point by a non believer, and again something that I certainly do find fascinating about my religious friends.
I certainly didn’t mean for this to turn into a religious debate so I hope that noone participating is feeling attacked or lacking in tolerance from the rest of us 😉 but it is interesting.
Actually some of this post came from a conversation I’d had with Julie (SIL) about a book she is reading written by a religious woman about parenting with lots of references to religion throughout. I think rather than try and recount that in comments I’ll do a blog post about it and we can discuss it there (we being anyone who is interested in the issues it throws up rather than anyone feeling they need to defend ‘their corner’.)
Comment by Nic — 21 November 2006 @ 9:04 pm
And to Nic 😉
I guess I used the extreme example to imply more of a spectrum than plain black and white. And the idea with Scarlet being that tolerance is not mutually exclusive to helping her modify her behaviour.
I guess abortion is a good example because feelings on that are so varied.
But surely it’s through debate and discussion that people’s views are changed (my own included). It’s not about ‘sitting someone down…’ That just sounds so patronising! Although I think I would be amused rather than offended if someone tried to do that to me.
Everyone will have some views stronger than others. For me I think anyone would be hard pressed to change my mind on abortion, but vegitarianism I’m more on the fence. But both I would debate and listen to and respect others’ views. Maybe its precicesly because of my strong line on abortion, I had to learn at a very young age about acceptance and tolorance! Doesn’t mean that I have to condone or agree with it. I think I would even have to listen to the rapist or peadophile too, before I judged them.
Comment by Barbara — 21 November 2006 @ 9:23 pm
and crossed again 😉
got distracted half way through…
look forward to your post.
and where did the mathsy one go that you promised us?
Comment by Barbara — 21 November 2006 @ 9:25 pm
Babs – the ‘being sat down’ thing came from you: ‘no-one who feels passionately enough about it has actually sat me down and grilled me hard enough’. And LOL at you telling me not to put myself down – in my terms I haven’t, I’m much happier with my wider view and ability to accept and enjoy people, but I don’t seem able to convince you of that (not a good omen for any attempt I might make to convert you to being a vegan!). Over the years I have heard all the arguments in favour of eating meat and the only one I have respect for, because it is honest and there is no argument against it, is ‘I like eating meat and I don’t quite care enough about animals to stop’. And that’s entirely the same as my own ‘I am a (TM Nic Goddard) ‘crap vegan’ because I don’t quite care enough about calves to stop having the odd bit of their milk in my tea and occasional chocolate.’ We all have lines we draw, we move them now and then, but I think when people need someone to be brutally honest with them, they usually at least ask a few exploratory questions. So if someone asks me about being vegan/vegetarian, then of course I’m happy to talk about it. It would be dishonest and patronising not to.
I’ve completely lost the thread of my argument now so I’ll stop again! LOL
Comment by Ali — 21 November 2006 @ 9:40 pm
giggle… so it did 😀 I guess I was coming from the point of having asked those inviting, exploratory questions, no-one’s ever taken the bait. Or at least they’ve been too PC about it to sound particularly passionate about it, where I probably wanted to be held to question and made to answer for my actions. I’ve stopped bothering. That’s bad on me. Maybe we should have met 20 years ago 😉
And yeah, Ok, I admit it (sheepishly), I was being a bit toungue-in-cheek with the ‘don’t put yourself down’. I knew you weren’t intending to. Pleased to make you laugh though. 😛
Maybe I’m just not easily enough offended. There’s a lady at an he group I used to go to who was very anti-vaccinations. Whenever the subject came up she got quite evangelical about it. I really admired and respected her for that (even though I didn’t agree with her) and welcomed the chance to be challenged in my views. But I think most pro-vaccination people just felt got at, judged and ‘preached to’ in the way Nic mentioned. I admired her guts.
I think re the vegie argument, mine is that if I delved too deep, I’d have to go ‘all the way’ and be vegan (those poor calves…). Which just sounds like a scary amount of effort and learning and then i’d be worrying about doing more damage to my children due to ignorance of the whole subject, and I just can’t fit worrying about something else into my life at the moment. Back in sand goes head whilst reaching for soothing cup of milky tea.
Comment by Barbara — 21 November 2006 @ 10:12 pm
Exactly, and having spent time in my 20s earnestly arguing the case, I’ve learned that pretty much everyone who eats meat, especially if past their 20s and having had time to have thought about it, comes into that category of not really caring about it enough to change their lifestyle, so not much point me grilling them, they’ve already considered all the arguments and, for them, it’s not enough.
That’s why Home Ed is such an interesting area because you still come across people who really didn’t know it existed, had never thought of it, so it makes for a much more interesting and open-ended debate. The equivalent in the vegan debate would be meeting someone who knew nothing about modern farming or about nutrition, maybe?
Comment by Ali — 21 November 2006 @ 10:31 pm
So is this very enjoyable debate coming down to a kind of ‘takes all sorts’ consensus?
Comment by Ali — 21 November 2006 @ 10:34 pm
Ali, you are undoubtedly the most confident crap vegan I’ve ever met 😆 Ali is actually a perfect example of my post title – our friendship is very ‘against all odds’ in terms of pretty much all lifestyle choices we come from totally different angles and had we met 10 years ago I suspect we could well have been sworn enemies. As it is we actually share probably as many views as we disagree on, we bonded over our differences and delight in the pisstaking opportunities that our opposing views offer.
The same is true of my friendship with Barbara and it is friendships such as these which have given me clearer perspectives on what I think and offered the chance to discuss things – whilst exercising tolerance for people I care about’s views and beliefs.
Oh and Babs – it’s in draft 😆
Comment by Nic — 21 November 2006 @ 10:38 pm
Oh no Ali, let’s not conclude something as PC as that 😆
Comment by Nic — 21 November 2006 @ 10:41 pm
I don’t think you can avoid it – some PC stuff is just good sense – but we could go for settling it with a three-way virtual arm-wrestle with Babs, if she’s up for it.
Comment by Ali — 21 November 2006 @ 10:56 pm
In mud.
Comment by Ali — 21 November 2006 @ 11:00 pm
I think Ali’s point about people not changing to vegetarianism after their 20s is important. The trouble is that most people have done most of their thinking out their positions on things by their early 20s (many late night conversations at college / down the pub etc.). Then – and I think this is the important bit – they start to define themselves by their positions on things. So they say “I’m a vegan” or “I’m a Catholic” or “I’m a Tory” (picking at random). To get people to change e.g. from omnivore (carnivore, Nic? 🙂 ) to herbivore isn’t just changing their opinion on something from X to Y; it’s changing _them_ from _being_ an X to being a Y.
A related, slightly off-topic, example. If you don’t exercise or you eat too much, it’s easy to see yourself as someone who eats that much or exercises that little. To lose weight, you have to see yourself as a different kind of person (one who exercises and eats more healthily), which is scary and hard work. Until you make that mental leap all your good intentions fight against your deeper identity and usually lose.
Errr… bringing it back on topic, that’s why it’s so tricky debating this kind of thing and persuading them to change. Unlike e.g. using Typhoo rather than Tetley, these opinions form part of the person and so questioning them can be taken as questioning the person’s identity and even worth.
Comment by Bob — 22 November 2006 @ 10:10 am
I’m trying to respond to the mud-wrestling comment and can’t without it sounding smutty, so I shan’t. Oh poo – I have!
Comment by Bob — 22 November 2006 @ 10:13 am
Excellent point Bob about that change from it being an opinion to an identity, I think that does happen.
And no worries about the smut – my ‘In mud.’ comment did invite it really – was a typical tactic I use all the time to come out of serious debate mode into having a larrrrrrf.
Comment by Ali — 22 November 2006 @ 11:01 am
Yep excellent point Bob, I agree.
I was going to suggest either lard or holy water 😆
Comment by Nic — 22 November 2006 @ 5:49 pm