“I have the right to play!An angry response from a 7-year-old when his mother tells him to “put away his toys and get ready to go out.”
“I have a right to an education!“A badly behaved boy's sulky response to his teacher telling him to leave the classroom.”
Is our obsession with children's rights in our schools producing a generation prone to selfishness and rebellion? Are schools weakening their own authority with constant “rights” education?
First of all, who is behind the current children's rights campaign? After all, it's the United Nations and, specifically, its child-focused agency, UNICEF.
What are the children's rights they claim to be promoting? There are too many to list here. 54 to be exactThese embody lofty ideals and practical measures to promote the welfare of children (up to the age of 18): providing education and health care, prohibiting torture and unjust family separation, and Rights of adultsAt least within a human rights framework.
It's all pretty straightforward and completely irrelevant to the lives of almost every schoolchild in the UK. While serious violations of these rights in other countries can be challenged with reference to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, children's rights activists in the UK have limited options: they have to poke around to find where the existing system isn't working properly, or where the laws that are in place are technically broken.
Immorality
So what’s the problem? Surely this summary of sound principles for protecting and promoting the best interests of children sounds ideal? Surely it does. The problem is that this minimal framework: A complete ethical systemIt is the ultimate test of moral objectivity. The debate over rights has become a quasi-religion in many schools, with its scriptures adorning classroom walls and being read at assemblies. Songs about children's rightsThese rights allow us to live in happiness and harmony, and seemingly they are the only thing standing between our children and limitless fear.
But there is a big problem: the UNCRC is woefully inadequate as a moral code. We can never derive the most basic moral lessons from it. Don't steal. Don't lie. Help those in need.— there are no signs of these. The rights promulgated through UNICEF are fundamentally about what the state should do for you, not about what you should or shouldn't do to other people.
Now, if you are of New Left or progressive persuasion, then the devaluation of individual responsibility and its replacement with state provision will fit squarely with your political philosophy. Thus, children's rights act as a Trojan horse for perverse political influence, if not outright indoctrination.
The problem is compounded when activists interpret child rights clauses in ways that have nothing to do with the authors' intentions and only a tenuous relationship to the actual text. These activists are both inside and outside of UN bodies. Because UN bodies are controlled by “progressive” activists, “progressive” governments can claim to fully support any policy measure that breaks down the proper distinction between children and adults.
For example, article 28 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child states that “school discipline shall be administered in a manner consistent with the human dignity of the child.” Who would disagree? But what does that mean? averageWhat was that? means When was it introduced in 1989?
Let me tell you what that means in Scotland today. no Punishment in schools. The policy of pushing schools away from a system of punishment towards a “restorative” approach, where any disciplinary incident is dealt with in a short counselling session, is justified as the realisation of children's rights. This was clearly not the original intention of Article 28, but every opportunity presented by the imprecision of the text is happily exploited by campaigners who want to impose their philosophy.
Disclaimer
Moreover, children are given the strong impression that they have a “right” not to be punished, which compounds the error. The doctrine received in these schools creates chaos in the home when parents are properly disciplining their children.
Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child has similarly been taken out of its original context to justify an overly progressive approach to children.
Every child who is capable of forming his or her own opinions has the right to express those opinions freely in all matters affecting the child, and the child's opinions will be given appropriate weight in accordance with the child's age and maturity.
To provide background, the article continues:
In particular, the child shall be given the opportunity to express his or her views in any judicial or administrative proceeding affecting the child.
Again, the intent is clear: Children should have a say in important issues like custody proceedings. I support this.
Even UNICEF’s simplified version of this right, with rampant mission expansion, is gold-plated as follows:
All children have the right to express their opinions, feelings and wishes in all matters affecting them, and to have their opinions considered and taken seriously. This right applies at all times, for example in everyday family life.
By the time this trickles down to the school through progressive teachers, primary school children will have a right to have a say in the appointment of a new principal. The underlying assumption is that every aspect of school life will be democratized and that children will never just be told what to do. To cement this restriction on adult authority, children are taught that adults must listen to them at all times on any issue. The line between “listen” and “listen and do what I say” becomes downright blurry. The message children hear can be indistinguishable from the message, “No one has the right to tell you what to do.”
Emboldened children react with confusion when adults issue instructions instead of negotiations. If teachers are faced with rebellious behavior as a result of their disrespect for adult authority, they are at least rewarded. But when children carry their newfound rebelliousness into the home, it undermines the legitimate authority of their parents and disrupts family harmony.
Ungrateful
In both cases, misquoting the UNCRC harms children by preventing the development of structure and discipline essential to character development and stable adult-child relationships within and outside the family.Schools bemoan disobedience and declining standards of behavior while at the same time actively promoting rebellion and ad hoc advocacy through their children's rights programs.
In the world of children's rights, there is no room for gratitude. Must provide The service. School You have to be concerned. parents Must provideprotect, and nurture. Failure in these areas is condemned, but serving perfectly well is merely checking a box. Encouraging children to interact with the world primarily through demands erodes good character.
This is especially true in families, where warm feelings of gratitude should breed mutual cooperation, but children are led to believe that the state entrusts parents with responsibility for their children. Must They do their job because the UN tells them to. The hidden truth is that patent owners lavish love on nature out of their love for their children.
Likewise, gratitude to one's community is stifled. The mutual bonds of brotherhood that allow resources to be shared and provide for all in times of need are ignored, and a sense of entitlement trumps gratitude and ignores personal responsibility.
Seduction
These rights, ostensibly so fundamental to a child's existence, are accessed and monitored by the state. Thus, as the ultimate guardian, the state intrudes into the child's thoughts and even affections. The state exists to ensure that parents can perform their duties properly. Rights invariably lead children to seek agents of the state as guardians, advisors and advocates, alienating them from the people who love and care for them most: their parents. Children's rights empower experts and undermine parents.
If you see a UNICEF Rights Respecting Schools flag flying outside a school, there is a good chance that the headteacher is either following educational trends or has an eye for major opportunities, or both. In Scotland, the lack of opposition from within and outside the teaching profession is astonishing. Proposals that should repeatedly be questioned because they are controversial as the imposition of a progressive educational ideology are ignored as being entirely uncontroversial. If teaching is to be considered a profession, it must demonstrate a collective capacity for critical thinking. The unconditional pursuit of educational trends is a sign of charlatanism, not professionalism.
If you express doubts about the children's rights movement, you will be accused of wanting to torture children, send them to mines, and send them to war, when in reality you are simply perceiving the promotion of an extreme “progressive” view of childhood that weakens and alienates parents, erodes the authority of teachers, and above all, harms children by limiting their personal development and undermining the most important relationship in their early lives: the bond with their parents.
