A Better Generation

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Statistics climbing

Did you notice there was a new poll? It went up along side some of the romantic nonsense this week which coincided with Hallmark Day. Before I get any guff, I left the Other spot open for all of those whose answer was not in the top ten. Want to see what you want to teach children?

The last poll had a big winner. The question was What is the most important value to teach children? Many thanks to those of you who answered All of the above in the Other category, but your votes did not count unless you added another value to the list.

The choices were:

  • Kindness/Compassion
  • Responsibility
  • Respect
  • Honesty
  • Tolerance

Who are you?

The poll group included the M3 Readers and a cross section from across the globe. Ages ranged from 20-72. The state of children included childless, stepchildren, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Last Place

ThreeGarnering 3% of the vote, Belief/Religion/Faith. Some of these answers were added to All of the above, while others were not. These voters saw the exercise of religion and faith in a higher power as the most important value to teach children to function in society.

It is a tie.

Tolerance and an add on both grabbed up 7% of the votes each. The addition to the list was Critical Thinking/Problem Solving/Common Sense. All voters who added these tags to this list added them with All of the above. We will reserve the debate of common sense being able to be taught for another day, but voters believed these to be values which could be taught to children.

Tolerance was not chosen in the poll until after the post Talk Tuesday, whose topic was tolerance and respect. Getting to the roots and dispelling the myths of both tolerance and respect changed the minds of some voters.

10 percentHonesty

One in ten people voting on the poll (10%) chose honesty as the most important value to teach children. We have discussed the many shades of honesty on M3, some to the point of debate. Some of the participants stated the adage: The truth will set you free.

Responsibility

Twice as many people who thought honesty was the most important thought responsibility was the number one value to teach children. Of the 20%, some would explain their stance by including honesty by employing the theory taking responsibility necessitates taking ownership of actions honestly.

Respect

23% of the survey pool ranked respect at the top of the list. The reasons given were similar to responsibility and honesty. Respect also included both tolerance and kindness. The prevailing theory was:

To respect someone, you have to tell them the truth. To respect yourself, you have to take responsibility for yourself and the things you do. If you respect someone, you really have to be tolerant of the things they do that make you crazy. You can’t be respectful if you are not nice to people. You have to care about them enough to not do stuff [sic] to hurt them.”

More than one participant used portions of the theory, but the quote above was only offered by one person who encompassed all aspects of the theory.

Kindness/Compassion

Overwhelmingly, more people thought it was important to teach kindness and/or compassion to children than any other value. One in three voters (33%) chose these from the list. As with other values, survey takers gave reasons why compassion covered more than one issue with the following statements:

  • When you are kind, you respect other people.
  • You have to be kind to have tolerance for anything.
  • Compassionate people take responsibility for people who can’t take responsibility for themselves.

One problem arose with the mixing of values. Those who chose kindness did not think always telling the truth was compassionate. They instead subscribed to the theory it was better to lie than to tell someone a truth which would they believed may hurt feelings.

It is all in the fine print.

That’s a wrap.

Some of your reasons for your choice may not be represented here. Feel free to give me your reasons for your choice or the reason which would convince you to change your vote. If you did not vote, sound off!

For the M3 Readers who are new to polls, please read the disclosure in The Office as to the use of the results. If you are not sure what the question means, feel free to email Red@mommasmoneymatters.com for clarification.

Take a moment to reply to the new poll. I am not going to apologize for limiting the choices, and please do not put All of the Above in the Other box because your answer will be discarded. Think about your answers because your top five first attractors are the ones I seek, not the ones which you would come to find attractive later. Do not miss Stuart’s interview!

© Red Dwyer 2012
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9 Comments

  1. Interesting piece Red! 🙂

    Because I live in a poor area with families whose discipline in the home is a joke, we see lots of child crime from vandalism to (about fifteen years ago) a rape case involving a six year old girl who was left in the care of some of our trouble teens while the mother went to work.

    When I first moved in gangs of up to 30 teenagers ran riot and the tenants were afraid to open their doors or walk the streets after dark.

    Year by year the problems declined and these days I see little trouble in comparison, but that’s because the teenagers have found a new place to hang out and we are not as troubled by them here.

    Horrible thing to say, but if the parents actually gave a damn about their kids and brought them up properly we’d see less of this…

    Thanks for the visit and comment! 🙂

    My Olanzapine also makes me put on weight, so the statins will probably make it harder to slim down and stay slim, but I have a good diet and now I know what not to eat as well as what I CAN eat I hope to get the cholesterol levels down the diet way as well as lose weight! 🙂

    Love and hugs!

    Prenin.

    Reply
    • You are correct about parents not doing their jobs. It makes the spiral of society all that much more dismal.
      {HUGZ}
      Red.

      Reply
  2. Hi Red! 🙂

    Just caught your second comment! 🙂

    Yep: As long as more and more people fall for the bait the more they’ll try! 🙂

    Love and Hugs!

    Reply
  3. Well, your poll made me think because none of them really were what first attracted me to my wife. But, that’s ok. I did the best I could. Some of them certainly had a part in it.

    Reply
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