The New Dare to Discipline

by James Dobson

  CONCLUSION

  In the first chapters of this book I discussed the importance of the child’s respect for his parents. His attitude toward their leadership is critical to his acceptance of their values and philosophy, including their concept of premarital sexual behavior. Likewise, the most fundamental element in teaching morality can be achieved through a healthy parent-child relationship during the early years. The obvious hope is that the adolescent will respect and appreciate his parents enough to believe what they say and accept what they recommend.

  Unfortunately, however, this loyalty to parents is often an insufficient source of motivation. It is my firm conviction that children should also be taught ultimate loyalty to God. We should make it clear that the merciful God of love whom we serve is also a God of justice. If we choose to defy His moral laws we will suffer certain consequences. God’s spiritual imperatives are as inflexible as His physical laws. Those who defy those physical laws will not long survive. Likewise, the willful violation of God’s commandments is equally disastrous, for “the wages of sin is death.” An adolescent who understands this truth is more likely to live a moral life in the midst of an immoral society.

  One further comment may be relevant. Many years ago on my daughter’s tenth birthday, Shirley and I gave her a small, gold key. It was attached to a chain worn around her neck, and represented the key to her heart. Through the years, she has kept her vow to give that key to one man only—the one who will share her love through the remainder of her life. You might consider a similar gift for your daughter, or a special ring for your son. These go with them when you’re not there and provide a tangible reminder of the lasting, precious gift of sexual fulfillment that God intends for His children. (They can also be ordered from Focus on the Family.)

  QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

  Q Your comments about sexually transmitted disease are very unsettling to me. I have three teenagers and am afraid they don’t understand how diseases are transmitted and what they can do to the body. That is a very scary subject.

  A Like you, I wonder what it will take to awaken our young people. I interviewed Dr. C. Everett Koop while he was Surgeon General of the United States in the mid-eighties. He said then, “The AIDS epidemic will soon change the behavior of everyone. When infected young people begin dying around us, others will be afraid to even kiss anyone.”

  That has not occurred as of this writing, even though young people are indeed dying as Dr. Koop predicted. The following article, written by reporter Kim Painter, appeared in USA Today, April 13, 1992:

  AIDS Surging among Teens

  AIDS cases among teens and young adults grew 77 percent in the past two years.

  And the 9,000 cases among 13- to 24-year-olds form just the tip of an iceberg: Thousands more are likely HIV-infected; millions more are at risk, says a report by a House committee on children and families.

  The report says federal prevention efforts have been inadequate. It cites evidence that teens are risking infection through sex and drug abuse:

  68 percent of girls, 86 percent of boys have sex before age 20; fewer than half report condom use.

  3 million teens get a sexually transmitted disease yearly.

  Nearly 3 percent of high school seniors have used steroids; 1.3 percent, heroin. Shared needles can spread HIV.41

  So why have teenagers not become “afraid to even kiss anyone,” as Dr. Koop predicted? Because the natural fear of the deadly HIV has been pacified by the safe-sex nonsense. We have seemingly come up with a way to have our cake and eat it, too. It’ll be the first time.

  Thank goodness for a few physicians who are sounding the alarm and trying to get the uncensored facts to our kids. They don’t get much press, but someday they will be vindicated. One of the most vocal of these concerned doctors is my good friend, Dr. Joe McIlhaney, an obstetrician-gynecologist in private practice in Austin, Texas. His book, Sexuality and Sexually Transmitted Diseases, should be read by every parent and every teenager. A frequent “Focus on the Family” broadcast guest, he talked about the fallacy of “safe sex” on a recent program:

  “What you hear mostly from the press is what science is going to do for people who have a sexually transmitted disease (STD), how science is going to come up with a vaccine or treatment for AIDS, how antibiotics will kill gonorrhea and chlamydia. What is not discussed is how these STDs leave women’s pelvic structures scarred for life, and they end up infertile or having to do expensive procedures to get pregnant later on.

  “I could name patient after patient in the twenty-two years I’ve been in practice where I’ve had to perform a hysterectomy before a woman had the children she wanted because of Pelvic Inflammatory Disease, which is caused by chlamydia and gonorrhea,” he continued.

  “The public announcements about `safe sex’ infuriate me, because what they’re saying is that you can safely have sex outside of marriage if you use condoms, and you don’t have to worry about getting an STD. The message is a lie. The failure rate of condoms is extremely high, and that’s why married people don’t use them.”

  He went on to say, “I see the victims of these failures in my office every day. These include victims of chlamydia, probably the most prevalent STD, and of human papilloma virus (HPV), which can cause a lasting irritation of the female organs, as well as cancer of the vulva, vagina and cervix. It is one of the most difficult diseases to treat, and kills more than 4800 women a year. I also see victims of herpes, which some studies indicate is present in up to 30-40 percent of single, sexually active people, as well as victims of syphilis, which is at a forty-year high.”

  Rather than expecting science to solve our problems, Dr. McIlhaney said a better solution involves a return to spiritual and moral guidelines that have been with us for thousands of years:

  Dr. McIlhaney concluded, “The people who made my automobile know how it works best and what I need to do to avoid car problems. They tell me that in my Ford manual. Likewise, God knows how we work best, and gave us an ‘owner’s manual’ for the human race: the Bible. In it, He tells us not to have sex until we are married; not to have sex with anybody other than the one man/one woman to whom we are married; and to stay married the rest of our lives. That’s the one and only prescription for safe sex.”42

  Q Should a child be allowed to “decide for himself” on matters related to God? Aren’t we forcing our religion down children’s throats when we tell them what to believe?

  A Let me answer with an illustration from nature. A little gosling (baby goose) has a peculiar characteristic that is relevant at this point. Shortly after it hatches from its shell it becomes attached, or “imprinted,” to the first thing seen moving nearby. From that time forward, the gosling follows that particular object when it moves in the vicinity. Ordinarily, it becomes imprinted to the mother goose which hatched the new generation.

  If she is removed, however, the gosling settles for any mobile substitute, whether alive or not. In fact, a gosling becomes imprinted most easily to a blue football bladder, dragged by on a string. A week later, the baby falls in line behind the bladder as it scoots by.

  Time is the critical factor in this process. The gosling is vulnerable to imprinting for only a few seconds after hatching from the shell. If that opportunity is lost, it cannot be regained. In other words, there is a critical, brief period in the gosling’s life when this instinctual learning is possible.

  There is also a critical period when certain kinds of instruction are easier in the life of children. Although humans have no instincts (only drives, reflexes, urges, etc.), there is a brief period during childhood when youngsters are vulnerable to religious training. Their concepts of right and wrong are formulated during this time, and their view of God begins to solidify.

  As in the case of the gosling, the opportunity of that period must be seized when it is available. Leaders of the Catholic Church have been widely quoted as saying, “Give us the child until he is seven years old and we’ll have him for life.” They
are usually correct, because permanent attitudes can be instilled during these seven vulnerable years.

  Unfortunately, however, the opposite is also true. The absence or misapplication of instruction through that prime-time period may place a severe limitation on the depth of a child’s later devotion to God. When parents withhold indoctrination from their small children, allowing them to “decide for themselves,” the adults are almost guaranteeing that their youngsters will “decide” in the negative. If parents want their children to have a meaningful faith, they must give up any misguided attempts at objectivity. Children listen closely to discover just how much their parents believe what they preach. Any indecision or ethical confusion from the parent is likely to be magnified in the child.

  After the middle adolescent age, (ending at about fifteen years), children resent being told exactly what to believe. They don’t want religion “forced down their throats,” and should be given more autonomy in what they believe. If the early exposure has been properly conducted, children will have an inner mainstay to steady them. Their early indoctrination, then, is the key to the spiritual attitudes they carry into adulthood.

  Q My young daughter recently told me that she is two months pregnant. What should be my attitude to her now?

  A You cannot reverse the circumstances by being harsh or unloving at this point. Your daughter needs more understanding now than ever before, and you should give it to her if possible. Help her grope through this difficulty and avoid “I told you so” comments. Many important decisions will face her in the next few months and she will need cool, rational parents to assist in determining the best path to take. Remember, lasting love and affection often develop between people who have survived a crisis together.

  Q When do children begin to develop a sexual nature? Does this occur suddenly during puberty?

  A No, it occurs long before puberty. Perhaps the most important understanding suggested by Freud was his observation that children are not asexual. He stated that sexual gratification begins in the cradle and is first associated with feeding. Behavior during childhood is influenced considerably by sexual curiosity and interest, although the happy hormones do not take full charge until early adolescence. Thus, it is not uncommon for a four-year-old to be interested in nudity and the sexual apparatus of boys versus girls.

  This is an important time in the forming of sexual attitudes. Parents should be careful not to express shock and extreme disapproval of this kind of curiosity. It is believed that many sexual problems begin as a result of inappropriate training during early childhood.

  Q Most colleges and universities permit men and women to live in coeducational dormitories, often rooming side by side. Others allow unrestricted visiting hours by members of the opposite sex. Do you think this promotes more healthy attitudes toward sex?

  A It certainly promotes more sex, and some people think that’s healthy. The advocates of cohabitation try to tell us that young men and women can live together without doing what comes naturally. That is nonsense. The sex drive is one of the strongest forces in human nature, and Joe College is notoriously weak in suppressing it. I would prefer that supporters of coeducational dormitories admit that morality is not very important to them. If abstinence is something we value, then we should at least give it a wobbly-legged chance to survive. The sharing of collegiate bedrooms (and bathrooms!) hardly takes us in that direction.

  Q You have said on several occasions that a society can be no more stable than the strengths of its individual family units. More specifically, you said sexual behavior is directly linked to survival of nations. Explain how.

  A book could be written on that topic, but let me give you a short answer to it. This linkage you referred to was first illuminated by J. D. Unwin, a British social anthropologist who spent seven years studying the births and deaths of eighty civilizations. He reported from his exhaustive research that every known culture in the world’s history has followed the same sexual pattern: during its early days of existence, premarital and extramarital sexual relationships were strictly prohibited. Great creative energy was associated with this inhibition of sexual expression, causing the culture to prosper. Much later in the life of the society, its people began to rebel against the strict prohibitions, demanding the freedom to release their internal passions. As the mores weakened, the social energy abated, eventually resulting in the decay or destruction of the civilization.

  Dr. Unwin stated that the energy which holds a society together is sexual in nature. When a man is devoted to one woman and one family, he is motivated to build, save, protect, plan, and prosper on their behalf. However, when his sexual interests are dispersed and generalized, his effort is invested in the gratification of sensual desires. Dr. Unwin concluded: “Any human society is free either to display great energy, or to enjoy sexual freedom; the evidence is that they cannot do both for more than one generation.”

  It is my belief that the weakening of America’s financial position in the world and the difficulties its families and children are experiencing can be traced to our departure from traditional values and Biblical concepts of morality.

  Q Do you think religion should be taught in public schools?

  A Not as a particular doctrine or dogma. The right of parents to select their child’s religious orientation must be protected and no teacher or administrator should be allowed to contradict what the child has been taught at home. On the other hand, the vast majority of Americans do profess a belief in God. I would like to see this unnamed God acknowledged in the classroom. The Supreme Court decision banning nonspecific school prayer (or even silent prayer) is an extreme measure, and I regret it. The tiny minority of children from atheistic homes could easily be protected by the school during prayerful moments.

  Q You spoke of kindness to animals. That reminds me to ask you about my seven-year-old son who is cruel to animals. We’ve caught him doing some pretty awful things to neighborhood dogs and cats. Of course, we punished him, but I wonder if there is anything to be more concerned about here?

  A I would consider cruelty to animals as a serious symptom to be evaluated by a professional. Children who do such things are not typically just going through a phase. It should be seen as a warning sign of a possible psychological problem that could be rather persistent. It also appears to be associated with sexual abuse in childhood. I don’t want to alarm you or over-state the case, but adults committed to a life of violent crime were often cruel to animals in their childhood. This fact was verified in a recent study by the American Humane Association. 43,44 I suggest that you take your son to a psych ologist or other behavioral specialist who can evaluate his mental health. And by all means, do not tolerate unkindness to animals.

  Q Is AIDS God’s plague sent to punish homosexuals, lesbians and other promiscuous people?

  A I would think not, because little babies and others who bear no responsibility are suffering. But consider this: If I choose to leap off a ten-story building, I will die when my body hits the ground below. It’s inevitable. But gravity was not designed by God to punish my folly. He established physical laws that can be violated only at great peril. So it is with his moral laws. They are as real and predictable as the principles that govern the physical universe. Thus, we knew (and He certainly knew) with the onset of the sexual revolution back in 1968 that this day of disease and promiscuity would come. It is here, and what we do with our situation will determine how much we and our children will suffer in the future.

  By the way, did you know that God created the moral basis for the universe before he made the heavens and the earth? His concept of right and wrong were not afterthoughts that came along with the Ten Commandments. No, it was an expression of God’s divine nature and was in force before “the beginning.”

  That’s what we read in Proverbs 8:22-36, referring to the universal moral law in first person:

  The Lord brought me forth as the first of his works, before his deeds of old; I was appointed from eternity, f
rom the beginning, before the world began. When there were no oceans, I was given birth, when there were no springs abounding with water; before the mountains were settled in place, before the hills, I was given birth, before he made the earth or its fields or any of the dust of the world. I was there when he set the heavens in place, when he marked out the horizon on the face of the deep, when he established the clouds above and fixed securely the fountains of the deep, when he gave the sea its boundary so the waters would not overstep his command, and when he marked out the foundations of the earth. Then I was the craftsman at his side. I was filled with delight day after day, rejoicing always in his presence, rejoicing in his whole world and delighting in mankind. Now then, my sons, listen to me; blessed are those who keep my ways. Listen to my instruction and be wise; do not ignore it. Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway. For whoever finds me finds life and receives favor from the Lord. But whoever fails to find me harms himself; all who hate me love death (NIV).

  These last two verses say it all. If we conform our behavior to God’s ancient moral prescription, we are entitled to the sweet benefits of life, itself. But if we defy its clear imperatives, then death is the inevitable consequence. AIDS is only one avenue by which sickness and death befall those who play Russian roulette with God’s moral law.

  ELEVEN

  A Moment

  for Mom

  As the previous chapters have indicated, the responsibilities of effective parenthood are staggeringly heavy at times. Children place great demands on their guardians, as a colleague of mine discovered one morning when he told his three-year-old daughter good-bye.

  “I have to go to work, now,” he said.

  “That’s all right, Daddy, I’ll forgive you,” she tearfully replied. She was willing to overlook his insult just once, but she didn’t want him to let it happen again. As this little girl demonstrated, children are terribly dependent on their parents and the task of meeting their needs is a full-time job.