Minimizing Negative Influences on Children Question: How can people living outside of Stelle minimize negative influences upon their children? Answer: One of the best ways to help our children is to review and overhaul our own attitudes and ways of expressing ourselves. Many things that we say and do out of habit are extremely negative but escape notice because they are acceptable in our culture. The child, however, misses none of our casual comments. All his experiences and everything he hears influence him as he forms his perceptions of what the world is like. Sick humor, which usually involves laughing at the misfortunes of others, is actually n perversion which is acceptable in our culture; so are most of our attitudes toward the killing that takes place in war and the casual way that we view the practice of one nation invading another with armies. Each of us influences the children with whom we come into contact whether they are our own sons and daughters, nieces and nephews, or the children of friends. Each of us is responsible for the effect we produce on the next generation, Psychologists have discovered that virtually all of a child’s attitudes and ways of perceiving and dealing with the world are set in a fixed pattern by the time he reaches the age of four. Therefore it behooves us to spend a good deal more time attending to and directing our young children’s development than has usually been considered necessary. For example, children should not be allowed to watch television indiscriminately. An adult should be present to select programs which are beneficial to the child; and even on a program which is essentially uplifting and positive, a negative subject may arise. An adult should always be on hand to explain the things which could otherwise prove shattering in a child’s narrow frame of reference. Of course, we cannot shelter our children from all the negative influences around him, but we can and must protect them from many of the perversions of our culture. (03-1971)
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