(This is an archived extract from the book Patterns of Power: Edition 2)
The only widely-accepted right to influence another person’s beliefs is that of parents,[1] to influence a child until the point that it is regarded as autonomous. A child’s moral values largely stem from its observation of what is said (and done) by members of the family, friends and teachers during its upbringing (4.2.1); it is also affected by characters in films and on television. But if a child asks questions as to why moral behaviour is necessary, it should be possible to provide an explanation – to provide both “the power to criticize, to reform and to explain itself” and “the appropriate intellectual confidence”, in Oakeshott’s words.[2] This right of parenthood is not uncontested though,[3] and there is also contention about the point at which the child’s right to decide must be respected; some cultures don’t recognise the child’s right at all.[4]
© PatternsofPower.org, 2014
[1] For example, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 26.3 states that “Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.”
[2] Michael Oakeshott’s explanation of the need to justify behaviour appeared in The Tower of Babel, from Rationalism in Politics and Other Essays, p. 70.
[3] Richard Dawkins argues that children should not be brought up in a religion, in The God Delusion, Chapter 9 (which is entitled Childhood, abuse and the escape from religion).
[4] In The Great Transformation (p. 153), Karen Armstrong describes an extreme example of a culture of filial piety in Chinese society in the 7th century BCE, where the son does not take over from the father until 3 years after the latter’s death.