Confession: At the ripe old age of 19, i stood up to my father and dared the patriarch to marry me off without my consent.
Over the years, yours truly has been guilty of multiple such "insults" to "elders". but ihm's blog, over a period of time, got me thinking.
Why do we ask our children to respect age for its own sake? other than staying alive, there is little a person has done to deserve respect because of sheer age.
When we stand up for a senior citizen, a lot of it is because they need the seat more - because of their age. But respect is not in the same category as helping someone because they are physically more in need of that seat.
And somewhere, i think, we need to teach our children the difference between "help" and "respect".
When we respect age, some assumptions are implicit:
a. The person has more experience than us and is therefore "wiser".
b. The person has , over the years, acquired qualities that deserve to be learnt. Therefore, we respect the person for having those qualities.
c. The person has, over the years, loved us, or taken care of us in a way that we should be grateful for them.
d. The person has, at some time, helped people who are important to us, and therefore, they deserve our gratitude.
Now, think hard. Look at all the random people around you. Take away the age factor. How many people would u respect if they were 10? or 12? Everything else being exactly the same, how much would u respect them?
Why is it important to stop respecting age?
Because, this respect severely hampers progress forward. "it has always been this way" is a lame defence that has been used by age ad infinitum to stop any new action. But the world is changing - not by the day, but by the minute. We have never had it change so much so fast. Patterns are being broken everyday and the only defence of these patterns is "it has always been this way."
Not all patterns merit to be changed or broken. My problem is with the universal "it has always been this way" defence.
This is really hard for one to say as they approach the age where ahem.. age starts to be respected for its own sake, but here it is :
I think we should teach old age to respect youth as much as teach the youth to respect old age. Children and grandparents are natural allies for one reason - they understand each other . They have a lot to learn from each other
What do u think?
Over the years, yours truly has been guilty of multiple such "insults" to "elders". but ihm's blog, over a period of time, got me thinking.
Why do we ask our children to respect age for its own sake? other than staying alive, there is little a person has done to deserve respect because of sheer age.
When we stand up for a senior citizen, a lot of it is because they need the seat more - because of their age. But respect is not in the same category as helping someone because they are physically more in need of that seat.
And somewhere, i think, we need to teach our children the difference between "help" and "respect".
When we respect age, some assumptions are implicit:
a. The person has more experience than us and is therefore "wiser".
b. The person has , over the years, acquired qualities that deserve to be learnt. Therefore, we respect the person for having those qualities.
c. The person has, over the years, loved us, or taken care of us in a way that we should be grateful for them.
d. The person has, at some time, helped people who are important to us, and therefore, they deserve our gratitude.
Now, think hard. Look at all the random people around you. Take away the age factor. How many people would u respect if they were 10? or 12? Everything else being exactly the same, how much would u respect them?
Why is it important to stop respecting age?
Because, this respect severely hampers progress forward. "it has always been this way" is a lame defence that has been used by age ad infinitum to stop any new action. But the world is changing - not by the day, but by the minute. We have never had it change so much so fast. Patterns are being broken everyday and the only defence of these patterns is "it has always been this way."
Not all patterns merit to be changed or broken. My problem is with the universal "it has always been this way" defence.
This is really hard for one to say as they approach the age where ahem.. age starts to be respected for its own sake, but here it is :
I think we should teach old age to respect youth as much as teach the youth to respect old age. Children and grandparents are natural allies for one reason - they understand each other . They have a lot to learn from each other
What do u think?
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