Thursday 12 November 2009

Brainwashing.

We got into the car and headed off down the drive, as classic fm kicked in on the radio (maybe classic fm glides in, rather than kicks...). "I don't want that song on", says Joshua. Ok, so he hasn't developed my taste in music, but I was surprised by his answer to my next question. "What do you want on sweetheart?", I asked. "The Hallelujah one", he replied. I honestly don't know which precise song he was referring to, but I was impressed that he knew the word (though pronunciation was a little questionable) and pleased that he enjoyed the genre of Christian music enough to put in a request. So we whacked on the CD of Soul Survivor songs (which tend to kick, rather than glide) and he was satisfied.

And it all got me thinking. When people talk about children being 'brainwashed', what exactly do they mean? Because it occurs to me that what they mean is likely to be something along the lines of, "I can't believe you'd stoop so long as to indoctrinate your child into something that I don't believe in". Maybe that's unfair, but it seems to me that that is at the heart of the 'brainwashing' accusation. The fact is, why would I not teach my child what I believe and know to be true? Surely it would demonstrate a lack of certainty if I did anything else. If you remember the classic film 'Short Circuit', you'll remember the robot thing (number 5, or 'Johnny Five', as he was later known) buzzing around saying, 'need input, need input'. And surely kids are a bit like that (further comparisons between kids and Johnny Five could be drawn, but perhaps that's for another blog, or for the comments section below!). They need input. And as a parent, I want to make sure that I'm fulfilling my responsibility of being a key provider of such input. I don't want him growing up citing everything and everyone else as the major influences on his life, because that's not their role - it's mine. And as a Christian parent, it's also my responsibility to provide the majority (at least for the first decade or two!) of his Christian teaching. So I'll stick with it :)

Anyway, that's enough of a ramble for me. I'm being beckoned by a book and a cup of tea.

And to those of you who care about such things, apologies for the very haphazard mishmash of tenses in the first paragraph.

1 comment:

  1. yes - has made me think a bit more about the definition of brainwashing, which reveals what people think about the nature of Christianity.

    Brainwashing implies enforcing people to believe something that isn't true and/or isn't good for them. I guess brainwashing also implies forcing something as compulsory that should be optional.

    I guess that means that people view Christianity as brainwashing because a) they view Christianity as something that is untrue/harmful and shouldn't be forced, like telling children to be racist or (more commonly) b) as something optional, like playing an instrument that one shouldn't get too serious about or treat as a non-negotiable.

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