All credit to those parents who front up daily to deal with the challenges of raising a family in this disruptive era. May they continue to be encouraged in their efforts, to find direction and satisfaction in how their children mature.
That many fail is not surprising. During 2017-2018, 159,000 (28.7 per 1,000) Australian children received child protection services and/or were in out-of-home care. (https://www.aihw.gov.au) For many, neglect, abuse and abandonment will have distorted their psychological and/or physical growth that will be hard for them to overcome.
History has form
Throughout history, due to the distortion of power between adult and child, children have been misused and weaponized, deprived of normalcy. Child soldiers kidnapped from families in Liberia were forced to fight a mindless war. Girl students in Nigeria were kidnapped from school and deprived of education to become breeders for Boko Haram. Rules of engagement in the Middle East mean little to adversaries who use women and children as shields for military action. Rapidly industrializing Britain used child workers in their factories until concern was raised that the supply of able bodied adults would be insufficient to meet future needs. Though the UN outlaws child labour, children are still exploited in developing countries. From kindergarten onwards, the PLA brainwashes children with a hatred of Jews and promotes the honour of killing them, distorting any hope of peace and progress for their people. In China, Mao Se Tung weaponized children against their parents and other adults, resulting in the death and re-education of tens of millions. Globally, the deplorable sexual exploitation of children is commoditized by deep web commercial activities.
The Family Court
Smug as we may feel in Australia about how well we’ve done as a developed nation, the tide seems to be turning as families fragment. Take, for instance, the Family Court, which is supposed to hold the interests of children paramount. All too often children are weaponized by parents trading blows to assert power. Shared parenting often means the conflict continues in undisguised hostility till the children become adults. On unproven allegations of domestic violence, the Family Court is known to deprive the alleged offending parent of access to children, while payment for child support remains compulsory. Legal endorsement by the Family Court for weaponisation of children for financial gain is not uncommon. How else could a psychologically abusive father claim inability to pay netball fees, while buying himself a Maserati?
All strength to Senator Pauline Hanson for pressuring for an enquiry into the processes and outcomes of Family Court operations! Let’s hope that people come forward with their stories, so that the costly, complex processes are addressed to become more simple and the outcomes fairer, more truly in the interests of children.
Grandparents
One of the areas of concern that Senator Hanson intends pursuing is the loss of access to grandchildren that grandparents experience as a result of a divorce. Understanding where you come from is in the interests of children. For the grandparents it is important to their sense of family and continuity that affirms the worth of their lives. Deprivation of access to grandchildren – the weaponisation of children against elders – is not restricted to those divorcing; it is common enough practice amongst those grown busy and successful on the back of elders’ investment in their lives. While abandoning elders may suit parents’ present interests, little do they realise that in time, they may find themselves in a similar position. Tolerance and respect would be preferable: affection may be a step too far.
Education
It is a while since I’ve been to school or even university, so my idea of education may be somewhat outdated. Education, I believe, should support the parents’ efforts in bringing the child to productive adulthood by inculcating literacy, numeracy, fact seeking skills and a life-long love of learning.
Whereas that is the case in many instances, educational edicts embedding political and social issues into every element of learning has diluted both the quality of education and the outcomes. Literacy and numeracy standards have stalled or are falling and capability to seek out facts has been subsumed by indulgence in conspicuous compassion and privilege pain.
- Climate catastrophe strikes by children globally and extinction rebellion activists exemplify just how feelings trump facts and how far children have been weaponized by educators and global elites. Follow the money. Elites stand to profit from renewable investments and educators gain power by weaponising children – other people’s children – even if those children are short on literacy and lack facts. Berating the government and responsible adults takes on shades of Mao’s Red Guard. Next may come public humiliation and a spell on the re-education farm for the olds!
- Gender fluidity: Publicly funded Safe Schoolsprogram, supposedly to deter bullying, ends up being a weapon for promotion of gender fluidity, sex change and LGBTQI+. Normalcy for the 1% is pitched as normal for the 99%, creating confusion amongst those trying to find their way into productive adulthood. Again, other people’s children are weaponized by recruitment to the cause. Respected professionals can be sacked for daring to question the intent.
- Colonialism portrayed as damaging to aboriginal culture and lands fosters guilt for actions by people long gone against those long dead. No amount of apologies, recompense or care can erase the guilt now used by educators to weaponise children in the cause.
Facts, context and forgiveness
Every one of these social issues drives a nail into the heart of western civilization, in order to destroy it in the best socialist/Marxist tradition, with children weaponized to expedite. Whether the family (children against parents), environment (against parents and government), gender (against biology and religion), or colonialism (whites against blacks), the focus is on division and virtue signaling rather than coherence of people of the nation and celebration of (imperfect) achievements in progress.
Children are being weaponized to believe virtue signaling on any or all of the issues has higher moral value than any other morality recognized under western traditions. Issues presented lack truth (facts) and context, so the virtue and compassion they are being called to are deeply flawed, and, according to my Maturity Model, unsustainable, with high social and economic costs.
Of course western civilization is not perfect: its value has been in open, honest debate to determine issues or take an alternative path, rather than unquestioning authoritarian, dictatorial bullying now used with hatred and condemnation by drivers of the current social issues.
Absent from the repertoire of hatred and condemnation of the dictatorial virtue signalers is the power of redemption and forgiveness, a central element of the Judeo-Christian traditions from which western civilization emerged. Douglas Murray, in his book The Strange Death of Europe, talks about “the tyranny of guilt” foisted on “denialists” of any of the new religious cults. If offered no other options than slavish adherence to the latest belief in the end of the world, the end of family, of culture, if you no longer know whether you are male or female, no wonder children suffer anxiety, depression and distress.
Weaponising children is just another form of child abuse that has abuse of others as collateral damage.