HURTING OR HELPING

George McGurn

March 29, 2000

Last year Gina and I went on a trip to South Carolina with my son, Ross, his wife, Kristin, and their two boys. Matt is now four years old. And Danny is now two years old. The boys were very impressed by their first ride in a jet plane. And every once in a while the boys and I sit on their couch and pretend we are going on another plane ride.

Last week we took off for some air travel from the couch and Mat spotted another airplane and said that we were going to shoot it down. That touched off a very touchy issue for me. I am very sensitive about issues of violence. And the boys know it. I asked the boys how the people inside the plane would feel about us if we began shooting at them. They both said that the people would be mad at us. I asked the boys if those people we shot at would be our friends. Matt said that they would probably be our enemies.

This led to a discussion about how we would feel if we were in the plane and people began shooting at us. We also talked about whether we wanted more enemies or more friends. And we talked about how to make enemies by hurting people. And how to make friends by helping people.

Then Matt got sick of talking and spotted another plane and the plane was in trouble. And we had to help the people in the plane. Danny is two years old. So he didn't have much to say about our new mission. But he understood that now we were not going to shoot. He knew that we were going to try to help. For some reason Danny thought that the plane needed gasoline. So he decided he could help by being their gas man. When Danny goes into his pretend mode he has a silly way of hunching his shoulders and moving around with a very stiff walk. So he began hunching back and forth to the pretend planes. And he was so busy pretending to pump fuel into the gas tank. And he was into helping those people.

Danny was doing a great job as the gas man filling the tanks of the damaged planes. Then Matt began to pull the people out of the planes with his hands and carefully put them on a pillow on our couch. Matt told the rescued people that they could stay in their new home forever and forever. And he wanted them to be our friends. It was amazing how much Matt's tone had changed. Matt had become the sensitive, caring helper. And Danny went right along with him.

Well, I remember that Gina was ready to go home. But the boys were really into this new game. And we went on and on and on with spotting new airplanes and filling the tanks with gas and then rescuing the people. The boys loved it. And after a while we had filled our couch with rescued people who became our friends.

It's really scary to think how quickly adults can influence the value system of children. Matt and Danny shifted completely around from hurting to helping with just a very brief discussion about the issue.

The boys already knew my feelings about hurting people. They know I don't like guns and knives. And I don't like hitting, or pushing or kicking or insulting. And if we are watching a video Matt will tell me that I won't like this part because there is some punching. Matt usually tries to justify the punching by saying that those guys who get punched are "bad" guys.

Some people feel that it's OK for kids to have toy guns or knives because they are only playing. When I see kids with toy guns or knives I think that they are practicing. And it scares me.

When my boys were young the neighborhood kids used to have games involving guns or knives. Gina and I wouldn't allow our kids to buy toy guns or knives. But our boys wanted to be part of the neighborhood group so they would make primitive guns or knives out of wood. I didn't like it. I went along with it. But we had a family rule that any "trouble toys" could not come into the house. These trouble toys had to stay in the garage.

When I was working in the schools, one of our second grade teachers was concerned about encouraging more respect among his students. He asked me to help him develop a "Bill of Rights" for his classroom. We came up with a pretty general guideline. I call it the Four Respects.

BILL OF RIGHTS FOR YOUR FAMIILY

1. Respect for everybody's body. Don't hit it. Don't push it. Don't kick it. Don't bite it.

2. Respect for everybody's property. Ask before you borrow it. If you break it, repair it or replace it.

3. Respect for everybody's ideas. You don't have to agree or accept the ideas.

4. Respect for everybody's feelings. You don't have to feel the same way.

5. You have the right to disagree within this family. BUT disagree with no insulting, no threatening, no attacking and no hurting.

I have been using the Four Respects for a long time. And families who utilize the Four Respects seem to be able to cut down on much of the hurtful behavior within the family.