Is It Really Our Responsibility?

No parents can fail to have been shaken by the news this week of the two children who violently and sexually abused two younger children because, in their words, “there were nowt else to do.”

While we are all rightly appalled and shocked (I hope this sort of thing continues to shock me on the rare occasions when it happens), the story seems to have turned inevitably to the parents of the attackers, who only now are being brought to account for their total lack of control of their children.

As a parent, and admittedly often a bad one(!), my eyebrows were raised as I watched this tale unfold, and like all of us I will be thinking of my own children and how much or how little I set them guidelines and firm boundaries.

None of us wakes up one morning and says “Hey, I am going to try to be a rubbish parent.” Fact is, though, we all make mistakes at times. What scares me is whether initially these two children must have had the same chance as everyone else – the playing field was not level, surely.

So many lives are now ruined, perhaps almost beyond repair. Is it the fault of the children or is it the fault of the parents? Where does the blame lie?

Normally I am not interested in blame – I find it a negative, unhelpful and destructive force. We only have to look at our current system of parliamentary democracy;the party of government only changes when enough blame is heaped on the currentone – how pathetic!

But personal accountability for our own actions is important  - I just don’t know how much I am ready to accept the blame for the mistakes my children make, when I see mistakes as part of life’s learning journey? Yet maybe I should.

Don’t get me wrong – these two boys are evil, and should be punished, but their behaviourwas learnt. From where? The parents? Or was it the absence of any parenting that allowed them to take drugs, watch violent and pornographic films, and reject all reason, respect and authority?

Let me confess something. I was a pretty unimpressive young guy (ok not even that pretty), and both my parents recently apologised to me for doing such a bad job of parenting me. But that doesn’t stop me from taking responsibility for my own actions.

So ironically, maybe they didn’t do that bad a job after all.  And maybe that’s the answer. We can only do the best job we can manage at the time.

After that, history, and how our children turn out, will be our judge.