My son is 3 and he is so very aware of his world.I feel that my responses and moods in regard to the planet and our species and all that entails will color his world and sort of program his reality tunnel. More or less I ask how we go about making it fun,not so doom and gloom.How do I tell my son through action that his species is not all fucked up and that our cultural myths don’t have to keep chiming that crock of shit into our heads. Because really our children inherit all of this including the myths.
Not watching TV can help, but you can’t completely shield your child from this culture, much as we might want to. We just have to except that it’s out there. All we can do, really is to plant seeds in their minds that they aren’t crazy for thinking the world is alive. Kids already think the world is magical and alive, so you don’t really have to teach them that nonhumans have feelings too, just refrain from teaching them that they don’t. For example, say that you take your child to the playground and he pushes another kid. You’d make him apologize, right? And explain that it hurts when you push people. I do the same thing if my kid knocks over a flower or runs into a bush. I treat them the same way I would a human.
I like to tell my own myths and stories or find positive ones that are out there already. I make up stories about the trees that we see around us. If you check out the “Children’s Books For Rewilding” thread, you’ll find some great book recommendations. Also, go to the “Storied Landscape” series on anthropik.com. When my almost 5 year old tells me one of those myths of our culture, I will say “But what about…?” or I might simply laugh and tell her how silly that sounds (not in a mean way, but inviting her to share in the joke)
I totally agree with starfish, about personalizing flowers and plants, and telling stories that matter.
The more I learn about the successful “survivance” of tribal cultures, in the midst of civilization, the more I think that the basic human toolkit of confident disgust really works. In fact, I have a theory…
You have three kinds of people who need protection from the destructive influence of civilized culture.
- Adults immersed in civilization.
- Adults newly immersed in a culture dwelling beyond civilization.
- Children
For #1, these people need explanations and articulations to reveal the dark side of civilization. They need it brought to light, so they can make a conscious choice about it.
For #2 and #3, articulating things makes acculturation more difficult. We just need to act in disgust and revulsion towards things that do not affirm life. Body language, and simple statments, lead the way.
As, in “yuck! gross! weird!”. With that Mr. Yuk face.
Nobody needs to explain to a child who sees Mr. Yuk what will happen if they taste the contents of a bottle with his face on it.
We all know, at this point, that civilization had to work overtime to fool anybody that it made even the least bit of sense. In fact, civilization created a “yuck!” response for abandonment.
Tribal cultures, the world over, have used gossip, and social pressure (otherwise known as “guilt” and “shaming”) to keep their cultures intact and humming along.
Guilt and Shame impact us rewilders so powerfully, that we have to tread incredibly lightly in rewilding these concepts. They have caused enormous amounts of pain in myself, and my friends, and even now haunt me a little. Such power they have! In using them, we can easily regress into civilized modes of virtue and purity, exactly what we want to escape.
But, as a community, I think we’ve reached a point where we can begin to talk about them, and begin to consider what it means to feel “shame” that one has made a life-denying choice.
At this point, civilization has done so much damage to human and other people, that the burden lies with it to explain itself. I reject it utterly in every aspect as a gruesome joke, an anti-life and anti-human endeavor. I need no more explanation, no more books like “Culture of Make Believe”. A cruel and laughable enterprise, Civilization makes a mockery of those who engage in it, and deserves no more substantive rebuttal than Mr. Yuk:
In balance to that side, then you can celebrate the life-affirming side, like starfish proposes. Talking to plants and animals with your children, treasuring family connections and making them stronger, etc. etc. Everything that we already know to do.
I believe that we over-explain things to our children. Children look to our faces, our body language, the tone of our voice, for direction on what affirms life, and what doesn’t. If we act from a strong center with disgust or joy, we embody the world we want.
If our children grow up seeing us repeatedly choosing to “buy in” while we continually complain about being fucked over and trapped, if we exemplify powerlessness and resignation while we espouse our ideals, they will believe that our values and ideals are a bunch of pie in the sky hot air that could never happen.
So we need to do our best to opt out whenever the choice comes up. Choose another way. We can’t brainwash our children into adopting our ideals but we can raise them to know that there is more than one way. There is no need to feel trapped. Mainstream leads us to believe that our options are few so we may as well tow the line. Our children need to know about the other options.
In many ways I was fortunate to have grown up in a family that mainstream culture didn’t work so well for. They did what was expected of them and things didn’t work out very well. So I never really had the idea that it would work out for me. I opted out very early and went looking for another way. I raised my kids to know they always had choices and there were other options besides what mainstream had to offer. I think that is the best thing we can do for them.
Live the alternatives and it will be plainly obvious without a lot of harping and lecturing. If our kids watch us living as we believe each and every day from the time they can take it in, it will stick and it will be deep inside them. And it will be there for them when they need it no matter where they are.
I’m not saying everybody needs to head off to the woods. Wherever you are, live the life you dream of the best you can. For me, if I am in the city, keeping my spiritual practice happening anchors me. If our kids see us giving thanks for our food, honoring the plants and animals, being grateful for the things we have, appreciating beauty whenever we experience it, treating those around us with respect and integrity, honoring our commitments to each other and them and generally not buying into the mainstream values, the contrast will be evident.
Willem said,
“I need no more explanation, no more books like “Culture of Make Believe”.”
I was actually going to bring that point up in the “Depression” discussion that is happening here. Understanding the lies and extent of the propaganda is good, but dwelling there will bring you down if you don’t move forward.
Live the alternatives and it will be plainly obvious without a lot of harping and lecturing.
I so agree with this. We have no better “argument” (as in a line of reasoning) than the actual, fully realized, full investment in living lives worth having. (Backed up by life-affirming stories and songs, and such fun stuff too, of course.)
When a child who experiences an adult living that way, and still chooses apparently life-denying things…I suspect they have gifts that we don’t yet understand, that need expression in those spheres, and nothing we could have “said” would change that anyway.
“When a child who experiences an adult living that way, and still chooses apparently life-denying things…I suspect they have gifts that we don’t yet understand, that need expression in those spheres, and nothing we could have “said” would change that anyway.”
You have really nailed it there.
I have seen many examples of this. Young people need to try a lot of different things. Especially our children who grow up outside the mainstream. It’s hard for them to believe that all those other people who have all that incredible stuff could be “wrong”. A lot of them need to go find out what the story is for themselves. What I have seen is that the foundation that they recieved in their younger years is what pulls them through and gives them what they need to not get swallowed up.
I have seen many examples of this. Young people need to try a lot of different things. Especially our children who grow up outside the mainstream. It's hard for them to believe that all those other people who have all that incredible stuff could be "wrong". A lot of them need to go find out what the story is for themselves.
Don’t the Amish have something of the sort in which, at a certain age, young adults go off into the outside world to live, and have to decide whether or not to come back?
uh huh…funny, eh? these things work!
Hmm, that reminds me of when I was about 5 or 6 and I was watching my dad and his friend Donny filet panfish. I said, “You’re hurting those fish,” and Donny replied, “Fish don’t really feel it because their brains are not as large as people’s.” Which I really didn’t get. And still don’t get.
I think that if you can quickly kill something before you cut it open to use it, you’d follow a more natural line of thinking (the one they try to stamp out of us as kids).
I don’t know about the whole just act with revulsion thing. I think that yes, it is important to move beyond the whole civilization is bad thing, and the multiple arguments why, but I think those still need to be talked about. I can’t even remember where it was now, of the exact woring, but somewhere I once read something like:
When our descendants are out gathering and hunting and someone comes to offer them civilization, they can’t just say no becuase their way is the way it has always been done, or gathering and hunting is just spiritualy right. Our ancestors have to be able to say: “We know that what you’re offering will dissconnect us from the land and each other and will bring us nothing but destruction” in very specific ways, otherwise our descendants will just get drawn in again.
I think that children, even as young as eight or ten can handle that, and need to be told that, or shown that.
My son is three almost four.He lives with me and his mother.He goes to his grandmas house often and he and I just visited Texas to see his other Grandparents.I don’t have a particular love for the civ,although I grew up in it and this is what I know.His mother listens to me rant on about all the doom and gloom,not so much any more,but she doesn’t seem to be as invested in changing our culture.His grandparents and extended family have no intention at all in changing.So he hangs out with grandma and gets a heavy dose of fucked up civ stuff at least once a week.I would rather not have him get super mixed messages and then stop listening to me because all the shiny blinky sweet civ garbage is more fun to him than sitting in the woods looking for animals.I also want him to value his family and know that they have their own opinions and they matter.
yeah. we seem to belong to a generation of split personalities - half in civ, half out.
we all carry around an inner child inside us, however hokey that sounds, i truly believe it, just like we carry around every age that we’ve ever lived. whether we have children or not, every adult faces the same issue: how to follow one’s passions (starting with the childlike ones, I believe), forgive and reinvest in family, renew our relationship with our land, all while at the same time dealing with a dying culture desperate to keep us sucking on its teat.
kind of a mess, but also kind of a crazy adventure…!
I really love the adventure.I love my inner child.I often forget to throw away the armor and live this all more litely. I hope my son does not grow up feeling the need to have a hard armor encasing his spirit for survival. I appreciate the responses i have read here.
hey Green,
What I found with my kids is that overtly trying to show them how fubar the mainstream is doesn’t work that well. The media makes mainstream look too good. I don’t think showing our kids the horror in an effort to counteract the propaganda is a very good strategy either. We end up with really depressed, frustrated resentful kids.
So what does seem to work is being a living example of another way. Even if we don’t really have it together to be hunter/gatherers but it’s obvious we are doing our best to live an alternative, our kids can admire that and see that not everyone totally buys into the system. Include them in your own experimenting and learning as much as you possibly can.
They may be embarassed by their wierd parents when they are adolescents, and they might go for the glitter of mainstream, but they will always know there’s options that the mainstream doesn’t talk about. They may come back to it when they are in their thirties after the shine of civilization wears off.
The details of exactly what you do aren’t nearly as important as setting an example of integrity.
I say all this from experience with my own three kids who are adults now.
Your kids raise you as much as you raise them. Being a parent is one of the greatest gifts. Like they say though, kids don’t come with an owners manual. We just do the best we can with what we have to work with.
Thank you for the responses Hey Victor.Although I don’t personally know you,It helps to hear these things from a person who has been there before.I try to lead by example with everyone.I get down a little sometimes when it seems everyone around me just don’t see it.Ill keep living my own vision,as I know in my heart that is the way to have an effect on my sons world view.What was it like for you when your kids grew up a bit and started to rebel?
what an awesome gift to your son. I need to remember that too. maybe flexible armor, eh? 
heyvictor, I love the stories of your family’s life too. Keep 'em coming!
green, I witness my son’s incremental domestication with alarm too. shiny blinky, sweet civ garbage, I hear that. machines that chew and scar and mutilate and pave over earth, such compelling monsters live on our streets in their civilized disguise of benign yellow ordinariness.
but it helps me to remember to think of rewilding as a direction we go in, and also as a set of relationships, always changing, growing. if another voice keeps whispering to him as he grows up, he can eventually decide for himself which set of stories nourishes him and which don’t.
[quote=“Willem, post:3, topic:872”]I totally agree with starfish, about personalizing flowers and plants, and telling stories that matter. . .
In balance to that side, then you can celebrate the life-affirming side, like starfish proposes. Talking to plants and animals with your children, treasuring family connections and making them stronger, etc. etc. Everything that we already know to do.
I believe that we over-explain things to our children. Children look to our faces, our body language, the tone of our voice, for direction on what affirms life, and what doesn’t. If we act from a strong center with disgust or joy, we embody the world we want.[/quote]
yeah.
yarrow dreamer, “it helps me to remember to think of rewilding as a direction we go in,”
Right on!
Green,
It was very hard when our son was in his rebellion years. He started rejecting our values in his early teens. He got really into the hardcore gangster thing. He went very far from what we are about. He got into alcohol and drugs in a big way but the most worrysome thing for us was violence.
He had a bunch of assault charges and was coming home with bloody knuckles, broken hands, black eyes, stitches in his head. Then he pretty much quit coming home when he was 17. He never got past 10th grade.
At 25 he started a big turn around. Quitting drugs and alcohol. He started doing volunteer work with teens and opening up to a spiritual part of himself. He’s now 30 and is a kind, generous and gentle person.
We had to learn about unconditional love. We had to learn how to let someone we love dearly, walk their own path and come to terms with the fact that he might not make it to the other side of it alive.
He had some things to work out in this life that I don’t fully understand. We all have our own things to work out. I’m glad he had the courage to do what he had to do.
He recognizes that what we gave him as a foundation and our unconditional love is what enabled him to make the turn around and find home again. He’s told us that many times.
heyvictor-
holy crap. that would have tested me to the core. what an awesome story. i hope i can do that when my time comes! in truth, i think any sane teenager would react that way when faced with the conflicting messages of the seductiveness of civilization, and the realness of a truly loving family.
It’s not like we always knew how to handle it. We spent years thinking that somehow we had really fucked up as parents. We were totally thrown off our center by that situation and didn’t know what to do. We were just doing the only thing we were able to do. We prayed for him, we took the situation to the ceremonies and asked for help, we talked to elders.
The hard thing for me, was to figure out how to let go of my attachment to his process without writing him off. This is the difficult part of unconditional love. It’s hard for me to put into words.
We have all our judgements that we are raised with and things that we accept and reject, admire and respect. He forced us to really get clear about that stuff and our judgements of people, and our attachments to how other people percieve us. Holy man, it was like being ripped apart and put back together again.
i guess i’m not only glad that your son had the courage to do what he needed to do, but also that his parents had the courage to do what they needed to to support him, as you say, that’s no easy thing.
i have to echo Willem, i can only hope i do as well if/when that challenge is presented to me.